How to Use Lav Mic for TV News Report

Video Transcript

"BILL ALBIN: Hello, I'm Bill Albin. And on behalf of Expert Village, I'm going to teach you what you need to know to be a local news reporter. In this clip, we're going to talk about microphones, particularly, the lavalier microphone. It--there are three basic types of microphones that reporters use. There's the lavalier. There is the handheld, and there's the shotgun mic. In this case, we're talking about a lavalier, which is basically just a clip-on microphone. It's very small. It's not going to take up much space, and it's easy to hide, or not hide, but it keeps it out of the way. In some cases, you don't want a bulky handheld microphone in the shot, or it might look sloppy in some cases. Or it might be inconvenient in some cases, especially if you have someone sitting at a desk or a conference table and you still want good audio, but there's really no good place to hold a microphone to them. So what you're going to do is you grab your lavalier, hook it on your lapel, hide the cord, because you don't want the cord sticking out and looking silly. So you would hide that underneath your jacket. If they're not wearing a jacket, you would run it up under their shirt and hook it on their collar. Close the jacket. And now, you have a microphone that will clearly and easily pick up all the information that I'm talking about without looking obtrusive or in the way."