Sound to light via a microphone.

[StuT]

I have a LED bar system that has a line in to be able to use an audio source to trigger the lights to the beat of the music. When plugged in via the line in all works fine.

I want to be able to use a mic to trigger this located in the room with the music. I have bought some mic kits to test. I have used a phantom power supply to make the mic compatible with the line in.

When the mic is up against the speaker all is fine but when I move the mic away from the speaker it cannot detect the bass of the beats to send to the controller. Do I need a special type of mic for this ? Some lighting fixtures have mics on board to trigger sound to light which look identical to the type I have bought.

Any advice is welcomed. 

[Hilary Watts]

You will need to amplify the mic signal to line level in order to in order to use the line input since the output of the mic on its own will be too low.  It's not clear from your post if the mic kit includes an amplifier but if not then that's the likely problem

[StuT]

10 minutes ago, Hilary Watts said:

You will need to amplify the mic signal to line level in order to in order to use the line input since the output of the mic on its own will be too low.  It's not clear from your post if the mic kit includes an amplifier but if not then that's the likely problem

sorry - yes I'm using a phantom power supply that boosts the signal on the mic to a line in level.

With out that it doesn't work at all.

[p.k.roberts]

I think you might have misunderstood Hilary's reply; you may need phantom power of some kind and something to boost the signal level from your microphone. Can you tell us what microphone and 'phantom power box' you are using?

 

[StuT]

this is the phantom power supply

Amazon link

This is one of the mics I have used

https://www.dv247.com/en_GB/GBP/Fame-Audio-CCM101-Clamp-Condenser-Microphone/art-REC0013950-000

 

from what I under stand this is all I need to boost it for the line in unless I need something else in line too ?

 

Edited November 11, 2021 by Bryson
Link compacting

[Jivemaster]

I'd expect to feed a s2L unit with line level that's about 0.5volts, maybe it will take more -read the manual- a microphone will usually give about 0.5mV that's a thousandth of what you need. Try putting the mic into a mic channel on a mixer and sending that to the S2L unit. Only the manual will tell you exactly what the S2L unit likes, SOME used to work off speaker signal. 

[Dave m]

all a phantom power unit does is provide a voltage to power a microphone.

I wouldn't be surprised if your mic has a battery in it.

What you need is a booster that will bump the microphone up to line level.

I'd send the phantom power back and buy a cheap mixer like a behringer. Ideally one that has phantom (though not sure you need it) and outputs either on Jack /XLR according to whatever the sound to light  needs (just for fewer leads)

That way you'll have a bit of kit with a secondary use.

Edited November 11, 2021 by Dave m

[sunray]

4 hours ago, Dave m said:

all a phantom power unit does is provide a voltage to power a microphone.

I wouldn't be surprised if your mic has a battery in it.

What you need is a booster that will bump the microphone up to line level.

I'd send the phantom power back and buy a cheap mixer like a behringer. Ideally one that has phantom (though not sure you need it) and outputs either on Jack /XLR according to whatever the sound to light  needs (just for fewer leads)

That way you'll have a bit of kit with a secondary use.

Something like this:

Ebay Link 1

Or if you want to keep it compact, something like this:
 

Ebay Link 2

 

Sorry about the long links.

Edited November 11, 2021 by Bryson
Link compacting

[p.k.roberts]

I'd pick yourself up an inexpensive dynamic mic and one of these;

https://cpc.farnell.com/pulse/mpre/microphone-pre-amplifier/dp/DP32529?st=microphone preamplifier

[sleah]

Equally the condenser they've bought will work with the CPC pre-amp. I'm thinking he bought it as it is lightweight and can be clipped to 'something' 🙂

[p.k.roberts]

That's what I was going to suggest - but the CPC pre-amp only kicks out 36V phantom, so will probably work, but might be a bit borderline ....

[Jivemaster]

A mic that needs phantom may or may not have an internal battery position, this can be several voltages from a single silver or lithium cell right up to 48v. 

No simple microphone will give enough signal to drive a S2L controller, simply a cheap mic fed into a mixer channel should give you what you want, I'd use a cheap dynamic mic simply for lack of the fuss that a phantom supply causes. (You are not going to use the audio as audio anywhere so quality is less important).  

[StuT]

interesting stuff.

I've learnt some new stuff here. I will go away and test with this new information. Thanks everyone