Microphone: DJI MIC WIRELESS DUAL MICROPHONE, BUY ONE HERE:
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Camera: SONY ZV-1
Second Camera: DJI ACTION 2 CAMERA
Three months ago, I bought the DJI MIC wireless dual microphone system - with my own money - to help me with my vlogging. I have not looked back - this is for me, the best microphone for my YouTube channel, and I use them all the time with my Sony ZV1 camera. But it's really pricey, so 3 months on, I review my DJI Mic to show you how they sound and share some of the features, pros and cons with these microphones. I also run a test with both mics at the same time in mono and stereo mode with friend, camera expert and YouTuber Gordon Laing from cameralabs as we walk around sunny Brighton Beach.
Is this the best microphone for video? DJI MIC 3 MONTHS ON
TRANSCRIPT: (CLICK PLAY ON THE VIDEO ABOVE)
THIS IS THE TRANSCRIPT - CLICK PLAY ON THE VIDEO ABOVE!
But something else happened three months ago. I got this, and this has absolutely transformed how I do vlogging and how I vlog.
It's the DJI microphone, the DJI mic. And I thought, if you are looking into buying a DJI mic or just interested in upping your audio game here on YouTube, I thought I'd come out and plug it into my Sony zv1 camera and show you how it sounds, how it looks, what it's like to use.
I'm in absolutely the noisiest place I can be, which is Under the Pier with the seagulls and the non-stop waves, which are going to sound great in the edit. And I've actually got a second camera going. You probably see it bolted to me here. This is the DJI action 2, so you can see what I'm filming. And I'm wearing a lanyard. I'm wearing it like a magnetic lanyard so you can actually see the camera while I'm talking about the camera and the microphone plugged into the camera.
Let me take the camera off, and I'll show you that to connect the DJI mic to the zv-1. I'm actually not using the cable that came with the mic. I'm using a Rode curly cable because I like the look of it. It looks like a little hair band for my camera, but I just found this a lot more fun and flexible than the very dull black cable that came with the DJI mic.
Everything else is pretty much as it comes out of the box, except for the logo.
It looks a bit scratched and dented. It’s not. I just coloured it in with a Sharpie pen, as you can probably tell. I'm going to do lots of talking, which I don't feel comfortable with, but I'm doing it so that you can get as much of a sense of the sound quality and how this microphone sounds.
So, this is quite a huge jump for me, though, because I think it's something like $320, and in the UK, it's about £290. This is an insane amount of money for me to spend on anything. I'd feel uncomfortable spending that on a camera, let alone a microphone.
I have a second channel. It's called the Dad delivers Vlog, and I do lots of vlogging. I also randomly stand on ladders, but I do some DIY and Home Improvement on there, and I go traveling with my kids and film those and share those as Vlogs. And getting a wireless microphone for those has absolutely transformed my vlogging. Being able to lose the cable between the microphone and the camera just makes it so much easier to shoot stuff.
Let's start with this. It's the transmitter. This is one of the two microphones that comes in the box. There is a little fluffy windshield to stop the wind noise. I'm not sure how effective that is. You'll be able to tell me in the comments what you think, whether it sounds windy or not.
I've chosen the worst, most difficult location I could to test it out for you. You can't see it because the wind... windshield covers it, but there's a little socket here so you can plug another microphone in. And the unit itself, it's got a USB-C port. Sorry, I'm trying to point the microphone and the camera to me, so I might go off-mic a little. But you can see there's a power button and a USB-C port. That's for charging, and also because it's a recorder, this actually records my voice onto this device, this little transmitter, as well as transmitting it to the receiver.
On the other side, there is a link button for pairing it with the receiver, and a record button here. Again, that windshield is covering it up, but there's a little red light. So, I'll show you some other footage. You can see there's a red light that comes on when you are recording on board. I can also see on the receiver there's a red light that tells me if it's recording on board. And if that accidentally gets turned off, if I accidentally hit the record button here, I can see that on the receiver, and I can remotely make this start recording again from the receiver, which is kind of cool.
There's a clip, a little gripper clip that can attach to your clothing.
I'm not so sure about that because I think it sort of points it in an unhelpful direction.
So, I keep looking behind me to see if there are any seagulls photobombing me. And there's also a magnet. This magnet... I can't do it one-handed, but you can, like I have done with the camera, you can put the magnet on the other side of your clothing, and it holds in place through the clothing.
Should I do it? I'll try and do it one-handed. It's really... these bits are really fiddly and really easy to lose, though. So, that magnet is holding the microphone pretty... a bit low down, so that's holding it in place, and hopefully you can still hear me.
I can see on the little audio screen the levels going up and down, so you should be able to see me, hear me. This is so difficult.
Let's clip it back onto here.
This next bit is going to be difficult to show. I'll have to do it on this camera. But the receiver clips onto the top of the camera with the hot shoe mount. And this is probably one of the downsides of the DJI mic. This clip feels really fragile and really quite plastic. I know that I'm gonna snap this. Future me will not be happy about that.
Before I show you the receiver, let me pull the cable out, and you can compare how it sounds with the DJI mic. And this is how it sounds with no microphone plugged in. So, this is the on-board microphone. I haven't got the fluffy windshield on it.
I probably should, but I can't with the receiver up there on the cold shoe mount.
But this is how the camera, the Sony ZV-1, would sound with no microphone plugged in. And this is how it sounds with the microphone plugged back in, so you can see the difference, hopefully. Rather, hear the difference. I don't know why I'm confusing those two.
So, the receiver itself doesn't record, it just receives the wireless feed from the two microphones.
The DJI mic comes with lots of attachments, what, three attachments? So, you can either plug it in using the cable, a 3.5mm jack, or there is a USB-C clip-on, so you can actually plug it into your smartphone or even directly into your computer. I can put this into my MacBook. It also comes with a lightning connection. I don't use those, I don't have an iPhone, but if you wanted to plug it into an iPhone or an Apple device, DJI has got us covered.
These connections are... they're so easy to fall out, they just fly off. I don't know if I need to plug them in a bit more just to get a bit of wear and tear in so that they glide in a bit more smoothly, but these bits are so easy to lose.
There's a touch screen on the receiver, and on the touch screen, you can change all of the settings. You can press the power button to lock the screen. The screen warns you... if you're not plugged in, so if you pull the plug out by accident, it does put on this error message, which is really reassuring.
It comes with an amazing case that just presents the microphones. It's a real joy to open this thing up, and as soon as you pull the microphone and the receiver out of the box, it just works and it starts recording. That has been absolutely gorgeous, to just flip open the box and just pull the things out, and they're good to go.
The case itself is a recharger, so as soon as I put the microphone and the receiver back into the case, it starts automatically recharging them, ready for the next use.
I like the clear display. It's so easy for me to see. Even now, I can just look up and know that the audio levels are good. And this screen, the touch screen, is a little bit fiddly, and I think I have to use it more to get used to it, but you can get to all the features really easily with even someone as hand-fisted as I can get around these menus.
I love that - it's such an obscure thing, - but I love the record control. I love that if I've forgotten to set the microphone to record, I can see instantly if it's recording or not, and I can start it recording again if I've forgotten.
It was one of the reasons why I didn't want a wireless microphone. I don't know whether you can hear me now, and I don't know if the wireless connection is actually working or if there's interference. And that is probably what stopped me from having a wireless mic for so many years, apart from, you know, the £290 price tag as well. And knowing that this microphone is actually recording here into here is absolutely golden.
To transfer the files, this would be a pro as well. It's so easy. You just plug in a USB-C cable, plug it into a computer, and this microphone right here appears as a little hard drive. And it's really easy to just copy over the WAV files that it records and just transfer them over to my computer, ready for editing.
And the way I've got it set up at the moment, you can set it up two ways.
The first way is to set it up mono, so that both of our microphones are mixed, so you can hear both of us.
So if we talk over each other, um, Neil,
[TALKING OVER EACH OTHER: the thing about you at University, that's where I originally met Neil, and I actually used to have a lot of respect...]
Why! You're not talking over me!
But the um, the other downside of mixing, apart from it being much easier to edit because it just all goes into the camera and you can use it, oh, look, there's a train! There's the train that tried to run us over...
Um, but the other downside with it is that you have two microphones, each with background noise, so it kind of doubles all the noise in the background.
What I can do is flip it in the receiver so that it sounds like this!
Now, we should sound... I apologise if you've got earphones on, this is going to sound appalling because I'm in your left ear
and I'm in your right ear, or the other one depending on whether you've got it switched.
But the beauty of this is, is that if I talk over Neil and I do, the thing is,
[TALKING OVER EACH OTHER: is that when Neil comes down to Brighton...]
So I can now mix out Gordon, and you can only hear me, you can hear him in the background.
And now, hopefully, you can't hear Gordon. I can keep talking, and I can fade him out in the edit, even though he's talking over me, the cheeky blighter.
But this isn't CameraLabs!
It's a typical drama student, not like me, I did a proper degree.
Let's move to the cons, the downsides with the DJI mic.
These are the things, they're really petty, but they are the things that have been annoying me for three months.
So, the first one on the list is... This sounds so petty, but this lovely case, you can't store the cable or the mini deadcat windshields in the box. So, you've got to carry the box around and put it in another bag, which they provide. And it's nice to have a bag of bits, but it would be really good if all of this was just in one case.
It does have really small parts, and they are quite plasticky as well. Already, I've put things on the wrong way and almost snapped them off.
It looks like they're easy to snap, and it's definitely easy for these little parts to fly off.
And it's been the same with this camera here when I'm trying to get bits, like this magnet here. If you lose one of these bits, it's really difficult. You have to order them through DJI support. They've been really friendly and really helpful, but you can't just buy them off a website easily. And if you lose them, your microphone is pretty much useless.
The battery life has been amazing. If you're used to the battery life of a phone or a camera, you know, with this setup, I'm used to having to charge every hour or so. These microphones, I've worn them all day, recording all day and transmitting all day, and the batteries have just lasted. It's also really easy to top them up. Just pop them in the case and give them a little boost. Or if you needed to, I could, I think, plug in a battery pack straight to the USB-C port there and give them a little boost. I think I'm going to have to charge up my camera to do a range test.
The thing with a range test is - which is to see how far away from the camera you can walk and still be heard by the transmitter, is that I've never, ever seen anyone do that on a vlog. Have you seen anyone piece-to-camera 60 metres away?
Um, someone might want to do it once, but for it to be a thing that needs a test, I'm not so sure.
So, this is how the DJI mic sounds. Is this something that you might want to get? Why not leave me a comment down below? It'd be great to hear any questions or your thoughts on how you think this sounds.
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