RODE smartLav

The RØDE smartLav microphone is a mic that you can use for many situations. It plugs in and records to your iPhone, iPod or iPad. You can use the RØDE Rec HD software or use your own recording software. In this demonstration Chip Dizard uses the smartLav outdoors with the included foam windscreen. You'll also hear the built-in mics of this popular DSLR camera - the Canon 7D. The difference is quite telling. Now remember, you can be hundreds or even thousands of feet away from the camera, and still be picking up great audio - unlike a wireless lavalier costing hundreds more! To sync, you may be able to use your editing software's tools to line up the audio with the video or use a third party app such as Plural Eyes.

We've seen high level productions where audio was ruined due to unforseen circumstances. Would it be worth the $60 to always have "dual system sound"? Based on pre-orders alone, we know the RODE smartLav is going to be a hit. Special thanks to Chip for taking the time to share his findings.

Visit Chip online at chipdizard.com The RODE smartLav is available here at DVeStore.com for $60! Download the RODE REC App:

Broadcast Camera Tutorial Video

We produced this quick tutorial on the Panasonic HPX500 as we felt that a few folks would benefit from seeing the major differences between it and consumer cameras. We hope that you enjoy it. - Guy Cochran

Transcript:

The camera that we're going to take a look at today is called the Panasonic HPX500, and maybe you have had the opportunity to use Prosumer cameras like a Canon GL2, or an XH A1, or an HVX200, or something along those lines, and now you have a really important project and you want to get up to speed on how to use one of these full size cameras because you want to rent one, or you have a friend that has one. I just wanted to get you up to speed really quick on some of the key differences. This camera has a different battery than you may have traditionally been used to, so this is an Anton/Bauer gold mount battery, and you can see that it's a pretty hefty battery as opposed to some of the batteries that you may have seen in the past. This one's kind of cool. It has a little readout, and it just goes on like that.

The next thing that you're going to notice that's different on these cameras is the tripod plate. The tripod plate is just beefy, and that's what it looks like. The bottom of the camera looks like that, so you're going to want to line up that little V right there with that little V right there, and you drop it right in there and push it forward and it'll lock in there. Make sure it's really locked. You're also going to want to be aware that there's a slide on these more expensive tripods that allow you to find out where the center of gravity is of the camera, and I don't have time to go into detail about that right now. I just want to really get you up and going. Generally, it's going to be here unless you have something like a matte box on the front, and then you're going to be playing with this until you get the camera to where it's not wanting to dip down like this one is right now. It's a little bit front heavy, so I'm going to go ahead and scoot it back a notch. It should just stay wherever I point it. So, good to go there.

Most all these cameras have the power on in the same spot. I'm shooting this by myself, so you're going to have to forgive me if I'm out of focus here on some of this, but you're going to notice that the power on is -- let me zoom out a little bit -- power on's right here. Go ahead and flip it on. You're going to notice that the LCD will light up. First thing that you're going to want to check is what you have your ND at. If you're shooting outdoors, you're probably going to want this at one, two, three or four and these, just like the other cameras, neutral density, you can see what it does to this hand here, two, three and four. See our little readout here. The first thing you're going to want to do is get into the ballpark range, so if we open this all the way up, because we're shooting indoors, most likely you're going to be a one, depending on how much light you have on your subject. I'm at ND1 for this shot. Right now our iris, which is a little bit different than what you may be used to on a Consumer camera, so on your Consumer camera you may have had a dial that did this. This is a full on lens like you would find on a typical 35mm camera. You're letting in maximum light at one point A. At 16, you're letting in very little light. Let's see what that looks like on the LCD. I'm shooting this with myself, so I'm trying to do everything at once. Here's F16 and here's all the way open. I like to generally shoot open to get that showered up the field look, so I'm going to actually go all the way to ND3, which I can get away with because we've got a lot of light on our subject here and let me actually focus a little bit more. There we go.

Because we've got a lot of light on our subject and this camera's really sensitive with its two-third inch chips. I'm going to push in, and to focus on this camera, it's a little bit different. You do not have any focus like you would typically see on a Consumer camera. You would have auto focus. This camera has distance markings. You're going to notice that here we're at two feet, two and a half, three, four and a half, six, all the way up to infinity, or 50 feet and then that little symbol's for infinity. You are manually focusing these cameras, and you can see what happens here. If we find our talent, there's 50 and we're just trying to get in. Pushing in all the way is my solution to getting great focus, so I'm zooming in all the way, and we have one more thing to help us on this camera, in particular. It's called focus assist. I'm going to press that button. You'll notice that we get a little histogram in the corner here, and this will help us when we get right into focus. It's starting to let us know by giving us a lot thicker histogram. There you go. I like to also check the eyes for focus and then go ahead and zoom out and frame up your shot. The way that I'm zooming on this camera is different, also. You have something here underneath. It's kind of hard to see. Let me see if I can get you into the light here, maybe, right there. There's a little servo or manual button. So, if we flip this switch, we're now on servo which is probably more like what you're used to. Servo is here. Typical of most cameras, you can zoom in, zoom out, and you can actually see the gears spinning there.

Another thing that's worth noting right there is that little iris control for auto iris. So you can set the iris to auto, and it will do its job there. So you'll notice if we go ahead and zoom back into our LCD, focus there. So let's go ahead and zoom in. You'll notice as we start to move around the frame that we get different exposures, 2.8, 2.8, 2.0, all the way open which brings us to our next test here. We want to take a look at how we can adjust the white balance. On this camera there are a couple settings for white balance. I'll actually pull the camera off for a second, and you can see white balance, and you can see that there is a preset which you can set to indoor or outdoor. And then you can also special set your own for A and B. So, we'll set A real quick. You might have had a white balance that was off, and if your white balance is off, you're not going to have very good skin tones. Let me just mess up the white balance intentionally, really quick. Here goes a bad white balance. Here's what our bad white balance might look like. If we go back to our subject here, you can see that her skin tones don't look correct, so what we're going to do is we're going to zoom in until the white fills up the frame. She's nice enough to hold this white piece of paper for us, and we're going to use this little button up front. Here's what you got to push, this little switch. You're going to slide it up, and that will give you your white balance. Let's again fill up the frame, let's flip that little switch up, so we're doing A, and now we're at 5.2. That's 5.2K, and if we go up, her flesh tones should look good. It looks great.

Another thing to look at is the recording format on this camera. We're right now recording in 1080i. You want to get used to how the menus work on this camera. The menu is this button down here. It's kind of hard to see on the bottom, right down here. If we press the menu, you can jump in, and there's certain things that you want to know about. You want to know what format you're recording in. Most people are going to be recording in 60i. If you're shooting a film, you might want to be in 24p. I like the 30p look. You don't have to be concerned with shutter, if you don't want to because in this camera, there's a little thing here that looks like a cockpit war fighter, or something. This is going to launch your missiles. Anyways, you can just turn the shutter off and what it will do is it'll just give you, depending on what you're shooting at, say for instance, if you're shooting at 60i, you're going to get 1/60 of a second. If you're shooting at 24p, you might be getting 1/48 of a second, or you will be getting those settings if you turn it off. You can adjust the shutter for different effects, if you'd like.

Last step to take a look at is gain, before we move on to audio. Gain is something that you want to be aware of. I have it all the way at low because we're lighting up the scene. Remember, gain's going to add grain, but in a low light situation, like maybe, down here on the floor, see if we can get a shot here of the floor. Let's turn ND off. See the floor down there. Man, this camera is great in low light. We don't even have to add gain here. Wow. Anyways, here's what would happen if we added a 60 DB a gain, 12 DB a gain. You can just see that the scene gets really bright. That's the gain. Gain adds grain and adds artificial brightness. Let's jump back down to ND3, and let's take a look at one more thing and that's the audio. You'll notice that you can add a shotgun mic to the front of the camera, right here on the front. You have two XLRs on the front, which are down here. That's camera input one. You would lead your mic in, and then you would be able to adjust the levels right back here on the top. If your mic takes phantom power, you are going to want to jump into the audio setup, and you're going to want to go down to the microphone power, And you're going to want to turn that from off to on so that you're getting microphone power. You also can control audio tracks three and four underneath here. There's three and four, and one and two are here. That wraps it up. Thanks for watching, guys.

Experiences with the Blackmagic ATEM 1 M/E

by Jesse Pepin

The world of production video switchers is rapidly changing.

I remember 10 years ago being in college and taking some intro to video production courses. I'd taken 4 years of it in high school, so there wasn't much new ground to cover in this course. The board, however, covered a space of about 3' by 4' on a huge desk. It was purely Standard Definition, and didn't have any audio capabilities. The audio tech would mix separately on the sound board, engineer would run the video board, and the director would call the action. Even 3 years ago, to get a video mixer under $5,000, you used to have to go with standard def, BNC inputs, have room for XLR audio inputs, and a large amount of space dedicated to mixing. Those days are over.

In our studios here, I've had the chance to run what I consider to be the future of video mixing: a 2U rackmount unit call the Blackmagic Design ATEM 1 M/E. There are a few different and yet similar models, including the Television Studio and the 2M/E. What I'm talking about will apply to them all.

So, why is this so revolutionary?

First, while you have the option to run this with a physical board available by Blackmagic, the software it runs is pretty amazing. Just connect the ATEM anywhere in your network via ethernet, and you can fully run it from a desktop or laptop computer. (You can also plug directly into the computer from the ATEM if you prefer) Once installed and launched, the included software depicts a standard video mixing board, complete with transitions, a take bar (T-bar), buttons for video sources, etc. It even includes a downstream chroma-key tab (which worked very well with our Reflecmedia set up), and with the latest upgrade, Blackmagic has even added audio controls. The ATEM can now take encoded audio over SDI or HDMI from your source! It also has included step-by-step instructions to help you through each step of setting it up on your network, eliminating the guess work or virtually any need for support during this phase.

Second, I said above "SDI or HDMI": This thing is fully HD capable. Note: this is a double-edged sword, as the requirements for the ATEM demand all sources be the same type: all 1080i, all 720p, etc. If you have 3 of one and add one of a different type, it simply won't show up. This is good for signal continuity, but I believe needs to be addressed as soon as you pick one up, so there's no confusion during original set up. As long as all your cameras or sources (including computer inputs) can run the same, you're all set. At the price point, (about $2,300 as of this writing), having the ability to mix fully in HD is pretty amazing on it's own merit.

Third, in testing cameras exporting from component out (R,G,B) through an SDI converter, into the ATEM and then out through SDI to a 17" HD monitor, there wasn't even a hint of lag. The transitions were smooth, the signals from the cameras lined up perfectly, even when pointing at the same subject and switching between them, there was no noticeable latency between either source. This was huge for me, as it answered some potential questions regarding audio syncing with an external source, and so on.

Another point I'd like to raise is the media samples functionality. There are boards out there where you can load a certain amount of media, or attach a computer to run graphics, and this is pretty standard. Where the Blackmagic simplifies this is it's ability to quickly load media directly off the computer that is running it. Think of that: in the same system you could have Photoshop running in the background, quickly load up a title that's running in the lower third of the video you're switching for. You could change the name on the computer, and export directly from Photoshop to the ATEM (through an included plug-in) and have that media ready to go in seconds! It makes for an extremely fast and simplified workflow.

Also, the Blackmagic software suite for the ATEM 1M/E comes with UltraScope at no additional charge. UltraScope is a broadcast quality monitoring program that allows you to monitor waveform, histogram, vectorscope, RGB parade and more - all on your desktop PC or laptop. This can be running on the same machine as the switcher, so your engineer can truly be monitoring all the different aspects of the production. Not enough? The software includes a capture program that, computer allowing, allows you to capture the entire production you're currently mixing in uncompressed or compressed file formats all over a USB 3.0 cable.

So, what are the downsides?

I can't say there's a 100% downside at all, but there are some things I'll mention based on my experience:

First, there are plenty of us out there who are really attached to having a physical switcher to use. Nothing replaces having the transition bar in front of you, the lights on in front of you, and physically manipulating all that for a great mix. Blackmagic does indeed carry one that works for the ATEM family, but it's pretty spendy. The program that runs it works well, and can almost duplicate that effect of a physical mixer if you have a touch-screen computer like mine, but in the end some people just want a physical switcher, so I'm acknowledging that.

Second, it's rack-mounted. If the rest of your set-up is mostly desktop, this kinda leaves you at having to buy a small rack to mount the ATEM, or just leave it sitting on your desk. Because of the heat the unit can generate, I recommend against the latter option. So this could be a positive boon for people who already use racks and have a 1U-4U space open (depending on which ATEM you select), but can add a bit of clutter if not.

Third, the split display. Unless you have an extremely large monitor for your live view split, the source screens will appear pretty tiny. I'm running this on a 27" Samsung LCD monitor, and the 8-way split is about 3" by 2.5" each, with a larger preview and program display above the 8 sources. It's good if you trust your camera guys, but for critical focus monitoring you'd want broken out displays to really view those other sources.

So, what's it all mean?

For the money, you're not going to find a more versatile and compact solution to your live HD video mixing needs, bar none. It can run on Windows or Mac, and really doesn't use up much as far as system resources go. Blackmagic makes it extremely easy to just get the rack mount unit and get started, and then allow you the ability to add-on the physical mixer and other components later. There's no lag when switching, and the results I've gotten have been amazing. I definitely recommend looking at this before making any decisions for a video mixer, especially if your needs will include HD now or in the future.

Review of the Livestream Broadcaster with Nikon D800

by Jesse Pepin

After using the Teradek Bond with an AF-100 and streaming a 2 hour live

event, I decided to go ahead and test the new Livestream Broadcaster.

This is not a comparison test, but just me testing another solution at a drastically different price point.

One of the great things about working at DVeStore is that I'm afforded opportunities to try out hot new gear, often times right as it's released. I had the chance to test out the Livestream Broadcaster for streaming video, and wanted to share some thoughts with everyone:

First, the item itself. I was impressed with everything that came in the box. The instructions are extremely short and concise, yet easy to follow. 3 simple steps and you're ready to go (once you've set up your Livestream account, the unit gives you a code for 3 free months as a producer). Included were 3 AA batteries, a mini HDMI - HDMI cable, an ethernet cable, and the power supply with multiple adapters.The design of the unit is impressive: a rugged-feeling box roughly half the size and width of a VHS tape. The battery cover is held on by magnets, so you won't even need a screwdriver to change batteries.It also comes with it's own hot/cold shoe mount, which screws into a 1/4-20 thread hold in the bottom. (Note: there were no updates required once connected, either. This literally meant that it was ready-to-go right out of the box!)

My one criticism? When the AC adapter is plugged in, it makes it difficult to plug a 4G USB stick modem into the USB port, but this is fixable using a small USB extender cable.

Opperation of the Broadcaster is very simple: there are only two buttons. The LCD screen provides easy-to-understand instructions, and makes full-use of both buttons (one acts as a directional stick you can move up, down, left or right). I simply turned it on, connected to the internet, then punched in the code it gave me to my Livestream account, and it was synced and ready to go!

 

Test 1:

For the initial test, I attached the Broadcaster to the hotshoe of the Nikon D800 DSLR camera. The next step was plugging in a Verizon 4G USB stick modem, and the connection process to the internet took about a minute. After adjusting the setting to HD (2.3 Mbps), I then simply pressed "Go Live" on the Broadcaster, and my stream began! It asks if you'd like to notify your followers when going live, which is good to do. The Livestream service is similar to Twitter, in that you can have people "follow" your account, receiving these notifications whenever you're ready to stream content.

 After walking around the office a bit, I tested the quality by focusing on hair strands in relatively low-light, and the picture that was streamed was nothing short of stunning. This is true HD quality video! The Nikon with 35-70mm 2.8 lens certainly makes for a gorgeous picture, and allowed me to use the LCD viewfinder as a monitor even while feeding HDMI out to the Broadcaster! This was a big concern for us, as needing a monitor while filming would certainly add weight to any DSLR rig, but with the Nikon it wasn't necessary. (Note that on the Canon 5D Mark II, the screen goes black when an external HDMI source is connected, there are also screen overlays that are embedded in the HDMI stream)

We were able to view the stream through two computers, an iPhone and an iPad, and the picture was simply incredible. Everything went amazingly well during the first test. We weren't able to detect much, if any, pixelation during quick movements or pans, the audio ran consistently, and critical focus carried extreme detail. Sounds great, right? Well, because this environment is optimally set up for such things, I figured it would be prudent to test in less-than-favorable conditions.

Test 2:

My friend Aaron agreed to do a demonstration at his house of how to properly disassemble and clean an AR-15 assault rifle in low-light (his garage), and with unknown service for the 4G Verizon USB stick modem. I set up the D800 on a Manfrotto tripod with the Livestream Broadcaster attached and no external microphone. We all know DSLRs aren't known for the audio, but I wanted to see what it would actually do. I had no on-camera lighting, no studio lighting, just flourescent lighting provided by the garage's overheads. I must once again praise the D800: it's abilities in low light were incredible. I was a fan of the Canon 5D Mark II for years, and Nikon may be winning me over. But back to the broadcaster.

Using the same settings, I pushed out the live stream at HD quality, and immediately received reports from viewers that the stream wouldn't load on anything; computers, iPads, anything. I tested this myself on my iPhone and a laptop, and nothing happened. After resetting the Broadcaster, I downgraded the quality to Large (about 700kbps) and was instantly flooded with reports that the stream was working. I believe this was due to location, as cell providers' coverage areas definitely vary from place to place. Regardless, the rest of the video was able to be streamed with success, and still looked very sharp.

Additional thoughts:

When using the Broadcaster, make sure the LCD screen is facing you, the operator. You can monitor from there your signal quality, battery life and any other things that could happen. Unfortunately this is the only way to tell if something comes up during the shoot, and with only one USB port you're relying heavily on that one 4G USB stick modem, so make sure you've got options (Verizon, AT&T, Sprint) and check the coverage in the area of your shoot before going live.

Battery life of the 3 AAs the unit can use seems to be pretty limited. I would recommend using the AC adapter whenever possible, which means you'd want a 6" or so USB extension cable for your 4g data card. You can also decide to use the Broadcaster's onboard wireless to connect via Wifi, or use the ethernet port for best results. Note that we also are able confirm that Sanyo's Pedal Juice portable lithium ion works well as a great long life battery. The DC connector fits perfect.

Conclusion:

This is a fantastic solution for anyone looking to do streaming video, from consumer cameras to DSLRs to ENG, this will handle your workload. At $495 (as of this writing), there's a ton of value in the box. (The 3 month free Livestream Producer account alone is worth $150!) For such a lightweight design, it has the feel of a quality product, and has produced good results so far. It's weight, roughly a pound, doesn't add too much to the total weight of your rig either, so you shouldn't expect to become fatigued much quicker than usual if shooting hand-held. I plan to continue testing it over the next month or so, comparing it's uses, pros and cons to the Teradek Bond and any other streaming solutions.

Bottom Line: If you need one camera able to do live streaming or have a low-budget for a web series or video podcast, this is a FANTASTIC buy, well worth the money.

 jesse@dvestore.com

Blackmagic Cinema Camera and the DVChallenge

DVeStore has been a proud sponsor of DVinfo.net for many years now. Their semi-regular contest, known as "The DV Challenge", is a great opportunity for film makers of all walks to show their stuff, and we're proud to support this as well.

 

This year, however, we've upped the stakes.

 

For The DV Challenge #22, for this year (2012), we've gone absolutely crazy, and are giving away as a prize: a Blackmagic Design Cinema Camera! That's right, as of this posting, the Cinema Camera hasn't even hit store shelves yet, but we're donating one to the winner of The DV Challenge! This is just our way of giving back, and promoting film making for everyone from students and amateurs to professionals with some spare time.

 

So do you think you've got what it takes? Well then you're going to have to enter! Just click the banner below to go to the sign-up and rules forum for The DV Challenge from DVinfo.net!

 

RODE Podcaster Review by Glen Moyer of www.aero-news.net

 The Ideal "Road" Mic                                                                                                              

 a review by Glen Moyer

 Host: Aero-News Briefings @ www.aero-news.net

 

As a journalist and hot air balloon pilot I travel the country a great deal in the peak flying season, May to November, going from one event or festival to another. It's not unusual for me to spend upwards of 60-80 days/nights a year in hotels. As the host of a 5-day a week podcast on www.aero-news.net that presents some unique challenges.

 

Like most podcasters I work from a home studio where I have the advantage of space and control of the acoustics. I can think of few places on earth less acoustically suitable for podcasting than a hotel room. My home studio includes a Behringer XENYX1002FX 4-channel mixer and a MXL V63M large diaphragm condenser microphone. My challenge though was to find a suitable microphone to maintain sound quality while working on the road. Said mic also needed to be compact - easy to pack into a weekend bag, and durable - being set up and torn down night after night in a new location. For my money, the Rode Podcaster has proven to be the ideal "road" mic.

 

First, it's a USB mic, it plugs directly into my laptop. This eliminates the need to carry either a mixer or my MAudio audio interface. It also features a built-in 3.5mm stereo headphone output with volume control so I can monitor exactly what's being recorded without going through my computer sound card or recording software.

 

Second, it's durable, heck even robust! Its body is cast metal, not plastic, so I don't have to treat it with kid gloves. It's single cable and a convenient mic stand mount all come in the one box - toss that in the suitcase (along with a small desktop mic stand) and you're ready to roll. A shock mount is available but I find it cumbersome on the road.

 

The audio quality of the Podcaster is surprisingly natural, warm and pleasant, but not "tinny". What an audio engineer friend of mine calls "presence." Still it has adequate bass response and with its proximity effect, moving a bit closer to the mic will increase bass response - a nice feature if, like me, you don't have the perfect announcer's voice. Careful though, it's easy to work too close to the mic and get distortion. It's a fine line. You also speak directly into the end of the Podcaster so finding it's "sweet spot" is simple enough. This feature is also helpful in diminishing ambient noise - like the cooling fans in your laptop or the TV in the room next door! (My XML picks up so much ambient noise that I find I have to use Noise Reduction as a step in my final mix down - I don't do that with the Podcaster)

 

Software issues - be forewarned about this. I work on a Mac platform so PC users will have to check this for yourself. The instructions with the Podcaster say set up is as easy as selecting it in your laptop's sound preferences. Indeed once connected my MacBook identified and accepted the Rode Podcaster immediately. BUT when I went to record in Audacity (my preferred podcasting software) it unknowingly defaulted to the Mac's onboard mic resulting in very hollow, "bottom of the rain barrel" sound. Not knowing what was happening I was more than disappointed and I was flummoxed - could not find a solution to the problem. I even experimented with Garage Band and had identical results.

 

I'll admit much of this was because of my ignorance of the specifics of the software. Besides setting the Podcaster up as your preferred audio source in the Mac's preferences, you also must do this within the software itself! Once I discovered this, problem solved!

 

Overall the RODE Podcaster scores very high with me. It has all the qualities I wanted in a 'road' mic - compact size, ease of operation, rugged construction and quality sound reproduction. Take one on your next road trip, you'll be pleasantly surprised!

Take a listen to the Aero-news Podcast

Chromatte Explained

Eric from Virtualsetworks created a great video explaining the tech behind Chromatte, and how using this technology for green screen work can help your productions!

Diva Ring Light reviewed on DSLR and Video Gear Reviews from the Battlefield


Blackmagic HyperDeck

The night before NAB trade show floor opened in April of 2011, a few of us were invited to take a look at the new products. It was here that I first held the Blackmagic HyperDeck Shuttle. When I asked the price, Kristian Lam from Blackmagic said, "About $350". I was just shocked.

Over the years, I have fielded tons of questions from customers asking for a portable HD recorder. Back in the day our only affordable options were $12k Sony XDCAM decks, so $350 is just an astonishing price. Even when AJA came out with the Ki Pro at $3995 we thought that was a deal. Many clients bought 4 units to ISO record 4 cameras in Pro Res at live events.

Intitially the downside was that both the portable HyperDeck Shuttle and Studio rackmount units were to record uncompressed files only. This amounted to huge files and would not work for our live event clients recording full day events. Now with the latest software release we are able to record QuickTime MOV files running at 220mb per second using the Avid DNxHD format.

Here is the window which appears when you launch the HyperDeck Utilty:

One of the most requested features was to Start / Stop record once running timecode is detected - this is a huge must for shooters in the field that have SDI cameras. Now with one button you can record to your camera's internal storage, plus have the HyperDeck Shuttle recording in high quality DNxHD format. I prefer to have a small monitor such as the Marshall 5" HDMI tethered to the HyperDeck shuttle so I can see that a signal is indeed flowing. This gives great confidence to be able to double check and ensure that you are getting a feed. For users without a monitor the front LED "Video" light will be enabled when a proper video signal is present.

With Quicktime being such a universal and prevalent file type, we're confident that the files generated by the HyperDeck Studio and HyperDeck Shuttle 2 will work with almost any NLE on the market.

Want to test how the files work with your NLE? We uploaded a sample .mov file for you to try (right click to Download file as) here. In our testing with Final Cut Pro 7 - the files playback smoothly and show up as expected with the compressor properly showing DNxHD. Are you using Premiere, Avid, Vegas, Edius or FCP X? Let us know below if the file works with your NLE.

RODE VideoMic HD