Field report—Tivoli Bays wetlands, take II
A couple of days ago I went back to the Tivoli Bays wetlands to try and capture the night ambience there after my first attempt didn’t go as planned. I took the same compact drop rig (Sony M10, MicBooster Clippys with wind protection) and set up a stereo array, securing one microphone to either side of a thick walkway post.
Picking up the kit the next morning, I was relieved to find that the M10 was still recording (going on 12 hours on two AAs!), but I noticed that the left channel was showing a much lower signal level than the right on the meters. On reviewing the audio I saw that the left microphone slowly faded out to a next-to-zero level about 5 hours in to the recording, and then came back in very slowly. This happened several times over the following hours. I’m not sure whether to attribute this to a faulty microphone capsule or the humidity of the environment, but I’m leaning towards the latter as there is no static or crackling type sounds, and after a couple of days in storage with a desiccant packet the microphone seems to be working properly again. That said, I would hesitate to use this pair of Clippys in a one-off recording opportunity.
This left me with about 5 hours of good audio to listen through. The Clippy + M10 combo worked well, though will require a significant bass roll-off as there is a lot of low end rumble. I’m not sure what caused this, maybe vibration transferring through the post the mics were mounted to, or if it’s just to do with the frequency response of the capsules. I’d prefer it if no post-processing were necessary but it’s an easy fix and the resulting audio is pleasing to my ears with a nice stereo image.
There are some interesting parts in the recording, with frogs barking intermittently to the left and right of the microphones and at different distances away. What I think might be a large bird shakes out its wings, and there are different splashes and water sounds, some from fish breaking the surface of the stream and others from birds or animals moving through the shallows. The insect chorus is ever-present. Sadly there is still a lot of noise pollution from cars and a near-by train line, even in the early hours of the morning. If I’m lucky I’ll get a few clean minutes of wildlife, but I think the outcome is positive regardless—I’ve learned more about my equipment, captured some sounds I wasn’t expecting to hear and generated some ideas for future drop rigs.
Report notes
- Date:
- 2024-08-15
- Time:
- 20:30-07:30
- Location:
- Tivoli Bays wetlands, Tivoli, NY
- Recorder/settings:
- Sony PCM-M10, gain 4.5, limiter on
- Sample rate/bit depth:
- 96/24
- Microphones:
- MicBooster Clippys (stereo pair), tree ears setup
- Comments:
- Left channel microphone faded in and out at random starting about 5 hours into the recording—possibly due to moisture. Recorder was still running on two AAs when I picked it up after ~12 hours. A lot of noise pollution at this location, even in the early hours of the morning. Captured some interesting frog vocalisations and nice stereo train-bys.