6 min read
Short film audio checklist: what to pack and test before day one
The only thing worse than bad sound is discovering it was preventable. Print this checklist before your shoot.
Short films are shot in a hurry, usually with borrowed gear and no time to reshoot. A simple checklist prevents the preventable mistakes that kill first projects: dead batteries, clipped audio, missing sync, and files that turn out to be the wrong format. Print it or save it on your phone.
Gear bag
- Recorder set to 48 kHz, 24 bit WAV.
- Shotgun mic, boom pole and shock mount.
- At least one lavalier with cable and windscreen.
- Headphones you trust, closed-back for set use.
- Wind protection: foam and furry dead cat.
- Slate or clapperboard, even a hand clap works.
- Spare batteries, cables, memory cards and a card reader.
Before every take
- Check that the red record light is on and the counter is moving.
- Confirm headphone audio is clean and the level is healthy.
- Slap the slate and call the scene and take clearly.
- Listen for air conditioning, fridges, traffic and fans.
- Make sure the boom is out of frame and the lav is hidden.
After the shoot
- Copy the card to two separate drives immediately.
- Verify the copy by opening a few files.
- Inspect one file per recorder for sample rate, bit depth and timecode.
- Split poly WAVs into named mono stems before importing into the NLE.
- Keep the original masters untouched as the archive.
Files you should bring back from every day
Camera files with scratch audio, external recorder masters, room tone for each location, and wild tracks for any specific sound you noticed. Missing room tone is the classic mistake that makes every edit sound hollow.
What to test the night before
Record a one minute clip with every mic and every cable, then listen back. Set a file naming convention. Charge every battery. Format cards in the recorder. Write a small sheet with project frame rate and sample rate. This ten minute routine catches most day-one failures.