Video Review: Paladou (Affordable!) Lav Mic for Smartphones, Tablets and More!
/Video Produced by Young Jeohn
Paladou's affordable lav mic costs around US$20 and works for almost anything - smartphones, tablets, DSLR, and more.
You get a lot for your money too (relatively speaking) including:
Lavalier mic with 3.5mm plug (59" - almost 5 ft)
Extention cable (79" - that's 6 ft 7 in)
Adapter (4 pole --> 3 pole)
Wind screen x 2
Carry case
Instruction manual
The instruction manual is no joke; in fact it offers a lot a great advice to help you get the best audio possible. It tells you about Open Camera, one of the best apps for video recording with access to the mic input (whereas the video app that came with your phone might not even allow it.) Editing programs like Audacity. Things that only knowledgeable people could tell you - and that alone would be worth the price.
It's a well-built mic with the lav head made of metal. The long cable of 59" allows you to freely move around if you're shooting at arms length, but you have the 79" extension cable too if you're shooting at a distance with a selfie stick or a tripod. The lav head is comparable to the size of a nickel (in height), and adding the windscreen will make it bigger (and I advise you keep the windscreen on at all times).
The tip is a 3.5mm TRRS 4-pole plug (it has 4 sections if you look closely). This is a standard connection for most smartphones and tablets - which should be familiar if you use any kind of headset with a mic for phone calls. For everything else (like a dslr, Zoom audio recorder, voice recorder and so forth) you'd use the included adapter to convert the tip to a TRS 3-pole plug. If you don't hear any audio being recorded, using this adapter will likely fix the problem.
As for how it affects the sound quality, that's what the video is for! We test the mic in evolving levels of noise:
Level 1 - A quiet room
Level 2 - NY Penn station (A busy rail hub, lots of people)
Level 3 - A construction site (cranes, machines and trucks)
Level 4 - Party event (amplified music, singing/dancing)
More info: https://paladou.net
(Test unit provided by Paladou for this review)
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