How to Set Shotgun Microphone Levels

"Now I'm going to set the levels on my Shotgun Mic or my Cardioid Mic. And, remember, if you're using a Condenser Mic, like this, that requires Phantom Power, go back and watch how to turn that on. It's just right up in front of your XLR jacks on your XH A1. I've got everything hooked up and now I'm going to power everything on. Power on my Mic and power on my camera. I've got my trusty over-the-ear headphones to set my levels. So, here we are and right now, you can see, we don't have any levels and that's because our little audio over here is set all the way down. But, of course, we want to make sure it's set to M for manual audio levels. Now I'll just kind of start turning it up, turning it up, and we start to get some levels. The thing is, I'm talking behind this microphone so it sounds really bad. Just snapping in front of it, you see it's a little bit louder out here. Definitely, when you're setting the levels with your Shotgun, make sure that you're in front of the microphone, talking. You can't really hear this, but I sound really far back over here and really present in front of the microphone. So, you definitely want to have your talent, or whoever, sitting there, and talking when you're setting these levels. If you're in a more ambient situation, you maybe try to go find the loudest thing you're going to hear. If you're in a ballroom with speakers in one corner, maybe go over to the speakers and see how loud it is over there and set levels like that. But, just a general setting level tips, try not to set them too high because then if everything is too loud you're going to start peaking. But, try not to set too low, try to get right there in the middle. And, remember you can adjust later, but just be wary of that. That's about setting the levels on your Shotgun or Cardioid Mic that you connected to your XH A1."