The Big Microphone Overview - Which Mic To Choose?

On this video photographer, Curtis Judd takes an interesting look at some of the microphones that he has been using over the years (and there are quite a few of them) and gives us his recommendations for different price ranges and different uses.

We have been following some of Judd’s reviews here on LensVid (see link below) and he has been testing quite a few different microphones over the past several years and has a wide perspective on how they compare.

He divided this video into several sections looking at different types of microphones and he gave his personal recommendation for each type (in many cases he gave more than one option – usually one high end and one which is more budget-oriented or at least less expensive).

On camera style Shotgun Microphone

RODE VideoMic Pro – around $230 (we can also suggest the Shure VP83 LensHopper which cost a little bit less bit should be at least as good).

Pro Shotgun Microphone

RODE NTG4+ Shotgun Microphone – around $380.
RODE NTG2 – around $270.

Indoor dialogue mic

Audio-Technica AT4053B – around $600.
Rode NT5 – around $220.

Lavalier for recording to phone

RODE smartLav+ – around $80.
Aputure A.lav – around $35.

Lavalier for recording to camera or audio recorder

Sanken COS-11D – around – $380 (we can add the Sennheiser MKE 2-EW which is one of the mic options for the Sennheiser AVX system – see our review with the basic mic and Judd review of the more advanced MKE-2 mic which we are also using these days).
JK MicJ 044 – around $25.

Voice-over microphone

ElectroVoice RE20 Dynamic – around $400.
Shure SM58 Dynamic – around $100.
Audio Technica AT2005 – around $55 (has XLR and USB options).

You can check out more of Judd’s videos which focus mostly on audio and video here on LensVid and finally if you are into sound recording for video productions check out this link which covers both equipment and techniques here on LensVid.

Iddo Genuth

Iddo Genuth is the founder and chief editor of LensVid.com. He has been a technology reporter working for international publications since the late 1990's and covering photography since 2009. Iddo is also a co-founder of a production company specializing in commercial food and product visual content.