Why You Should Get A Blue Microphones Ice HD Microphone
Blue Microphones Snowball iCE USB Cardioid Microphone with Adjustable Mic Stand
The Blue Microphones Ice HD microphone was one of the things Santa dropped down my chimney this Christmas. It’s pretty fabulous I have to say so I thought I’d do a little review of it for you. If you do, or are planning to do podcasts, webinars, screen share videos or video conferencing of any kind it’s definitely something you should consider getting.
Generally speaking the built in microphones that come with your computer, laptop or mobile device are not much more than adequate. Improving the quality of audio of videos or any content that has audio is one of the best things you can do. The Blue Microphones Ice HD microphone makes that very simple to do and at a price that won’t break the bank.
Put simply the Blue Microphones Ice HD microphone brings you the sound quality of a high-end audio mic but in a computer or mobile friendly, plug n play format. It also looks extremely cool (although since it probably won’t be in shot most of the time that’s just icing on the cake) – Just look at it – it’s gorgeous!
Blue Microphones Ice HD Microphone – Convenient and So Cool
This mic and the others in the Blue Microphones range simply plugs right into a USB port on your Mac or PC. You’ll need an adaptor to use it with a phone or tablet but these are pretty cheap. I’ve just ordered a camera connection kit for my ipad to do the job and it cost around £5.
So far I’ve only used my new Blue Microphones Ice HD mic for recording vocals on various programmes and I’ve been very impressed. It can also be used for recording instruments – I’ll be experimenting with guitar recording this week. It’s really just a high quality microphone designed for use with computers so you treat it like any other mic. The big advantage is that you don’t need any other processing hardware to use it. It works straight out of the box.
In the box you get: The Blue Microphones Ice HD microphone itself, a USB cable and a really nice little adjustable desktop tripod stand. The included manual covers setting it up for Macs, PC’s, tablets and mobiles. I tried mine with Screenflow, Imovies and Garage band and my Imac recognised it right away. In most cases you would simply need to select the Blue Mic as your input source from a drop down menu. Simples!
Like all mics you need to decide what your’ going to use it for. The Blue Microphones Ice HD microphone is the basic model in the Blue Mics range. It has one microphone pattern – this basically just refers to the area the mic will “hear” and how sensitive it is.
The Blue Microphones Ice HD Microphone In Use
The Ice is ideal for vocals or single instrument recording and behaves a lot like the legendary Shure SM58 – the decades long mic of choice for vocalists. More expensive models come with 3 patterns you can select from. These are geared towards recording several sound sources – a band, drumkit or maybe a panel of speakers for example.
Personally in those situations I’d be setting up several traditional mics with an outboard mixer and preamp but it might be worth experimenting with. A 3 pattern Blue Microphone would still set you back less than a single SM58 after all.
Recording quality audio with conventional mics is obviously the other option but the Blue Microphones Ice HD microphone and it’s sister mics is far more convenient. You don’t need to import the audio from a camera or other recording device for a start. That means you don’t need to spend time editing and matching up the audio.
If you just want to sound better in live situations – Skype conversations, Hangouts and webinars the Blue Microphones Ice HD microphone is an ideal choice too. You’ll sound better and it won’t pick up background and computer drive noise like an inbuilt mic does. Just get one!
Blue Microphones Snowball iCE USB Cardioid Microphone with Adjustable Mic Stand
By Dave Menzies