DIY knitted deadcat microphone windscreen


Here's a do-it-yourself project Jeanette came up with that we haven't seen anyone else do on the internet.
Wind noise is the bane of outdoor audio recording, because even with those foam microphone covers, pesky little vortices of wind will slam into the microphone element, creating a noise that's hard to remove in post production. What you need are soft little tendrils to break up the air movements.

Hence the invention of the fuzzy (or "dead cat") windscreen. Unfortunately they often cost more than $25 if you buy them as accessories. Some people make them out of scraps of fake fur, but the fake fur often has a heavy backing that can interfere with the audio.

A cheap and effective solution is to knit a custom sock for the microphone from novelty yarn. At a craft store for less than $5, we found Lion Brand Fun Fur, sometimes known as eyelash yarn, in the "Silver Fox" color. Here it is on Amazon. 

Now here's Jeanette with the details for a nice looking windscreen that is custom fit for a Zoom H1 digital audio recorder (she's going to make one for my lav mike next):

I decided to knit the windscreen in-the-round on 5 needles, like a sock. I needed a slightly heavier plain yarn for the edge of the cuff, so I started with a bit of Red Heart "Sport" acrylic yarn that I had in my stash. With the black acrylic yarn, I cast on 16 stitches, onto 4 size 5 US double-pointed needles. I did 4 rounds of Knit2-Purl2 ribbing. Then I switched to the furry yarn, and stockinette stitch (all knit) and to size 8 US double-pointed needles. At 3", I combined the 16 stitches onto 2 of the needles, then did a 3-needle bind-off. Took about an hour at most. 
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