Digital Home Thoughts: Surround Sound on a Camcorder? ECM-HQP1 Microphone Reviewed

In Use
In use, the microphone does a reasonable job, but not a brilliant one. Part of the problem is its placement. Located on top of the camcorder, there is a good chance that you are going to effectively block the rear left and/or right microphone with your head or body as you film. That said, since rear sounds are there for ambience rather than being directly noticeable, this isn't too big a problem in practice.

It is also possible to rotate the microphone. This is useful if you're videoing a scene where the audio isn't aligned with the direction of the camcorder.

One drawback to the approach that Sony has taken to capture the audio is that it doesn't work with the new generation of HDV camcorders. These only record a single stereo stream and so, although the microphone fits the accessory socket, it cannot be used for surround recording, only for what Sony call "Expanded Stereo". In that role, it probably does a better job than the built-in microphone, but you are losing some of the functionality.

Conclusions
I suspect this product has a very short lifespan. It is going to appeal to a very limited number of customers (particularly since you've either got to have a VAIO or a lot of additional software and a good understanding of audio) and it won't provide the same functionality on the HDV camcorders.

It is a shame, really. It is a great bit of lateral thinking on Sony's part to deliver this capability with existing technology. They should have done more to make the functionality accessible to those people without a VAIO. It would have been interesting to see if they could have done anything with the HDV specification to get the four channels they required.

Philip Colmer is an I.T. Manager for a global electronic publishing company. In his spare time, he enjoys researching his family history, developing his videography skills and going shopping with his wife.