Musings on mic cases…

I appreciate it’s a little thing, but good mic cases for use in the field are not as easy to buy as you might think. Obviously, the needs of different recordists vary: if you are a classical music recordist travelling to a concert hall or church with a mass of mics and other more bulky equipment, then, perhaps, a large Peli case might be the answer. A similar solution might also suit the smaller mic collection of a sound mixer on set, where a sound cart means that equipment is bulky anyway. But for most of my use, and I suspect that of many others, I need mic cases that take up very little space in whatever I am carrying, yet keep the mics safe and easily accessible, be this for music recording on location or field recording for ambiences or sound effects. This short blog post is for those in the same boat, especially those who have yet to find a solution that works for them: others, I am sure, will have come up with better solutions than mine, or at least ones more suited to their needs.

First off, needless to say, are the cases that come with mics from the manufacturers. These vary hugely, although few are cases you would want in the field. The Schoeps ‘Desert Island Stereo Set’ is a welcome exception, with a diminutive stereo pair of mics and mic clips (perhaps of less use) in a dinky little Peli case, and is in sharp contrast to their usual wooden cases that are not so practical or space efficient in the field. My Rycote mics have compact cases, but are for individual mics or pairs, and the bulk soon adds up when taking several into the field. Their rather nice finish also doesn’t seem quite right and robust for the field. As for my Sennheiser MKH 8000 series mics, well they come in the same massive plastic cases as the older and larger MKH mics, so again are ones to leave at home.

My first foray into mic cases for the field was the Rycote mic storage case, which looked the part: a fabric-covered tough plastic cylinder containing three plastic tubes for the individual mics. It could have been good if only the three individual plastic tubes were a comfortable fit (they were far too tight, though, puzzling, not everyone found this to be so!), and again was bulky: not bag friendly enough for me. I never really used the outer case, but have used the individual plastic tubes for some years, and I know others like similar tubes (they can be bought much more cheaply outside the audio world). As the number of mics grew, however, I found a bunch of tubes knocking around the bottom of my bag less than ideal. That said, I do find them of use for shotgun mics, which are, of course, hard to combine with other shorter mics in a single case. What I wanted was a protective case that could hold a bunch of these shorter SDC mics together, and whilst looking into what others have found (including cigar travel cases!) I had the idea (doubtless not original) of using semi-rigid cases for 2.5″ external hard drives. They come with a bit of variance in size between makes and are well-suited to a bunch of smaller SDCs. The only problem was keeping the mics separate, so they didn’t bump into each other, and for that I used lens cloths, tucking up the mics for bed before zipping up the cases. The lens cloth business is not the hassle it sounds, but it does mean that when opening the case you can’t instantly see which mic is which.

So after a couple of years of this, and with some of my mics not neatly fitting into such cases or not doing so efficiently, I began to wonder if there could be a better solution. I had another good look at the smaller Peli cases, thinking about 3d-printing a tray to fit, but for my SDC mics, the model sizes just didn’t seem spot on. And that is when I stumbled across rigid cases for 3.5″ hard drives, which, being a little larger than their 2.5″ cousins, seemed the perfect size for my use. Now these vary hugely and many don’t look suited for repeated opening and closing (I guess they are for storing internal HDDs in an office or store environment?), I found some (an obscure brand!) that are more robust: really tough plastic cases, a reasonable hinge and locking clip, good seals and shock resistance (dense EVA foam), yet overall size not too large: at 172mm x 125mm x 43mm, they still slip easily into my smallest field-recording bag. With a bit of a search and you will find the same or perhaps a better model. And with a 3d-printed tray (yes, more fun with the new 3d printer!), the mics sit neatly and securely (with the perfect amount of pressure from the lid’s lining in the dense EVA foam) and I can see all the mics at a glance – like a box of chocolates. So that’s my current solution for SDC mics today and easily the best I have found. I have no doubt it will change in the future as my mic collection changes or, perhaps, when I struggle to find similar replacement cases in the future, but the basic premise will remain. As I said, only a little thing, but perhaps my musings will help someone!