When it comes to using your iPhone as a mobile video rig, you’ll find a variety of products from stabilizers to lenses to external lighting. Few solutions, however, put a strong emphasis on audio. Microphone manufacturer Shure hopes to change the status quo with its new MV88+ Video Kit, a collection of accessories designed to help you create professional videos with great sounding audio.
As someone keen on recording voiceovers and podcasts from an iPad, I needed a Lightning-enabled microphone that could handle such a task. While it’s true that Apple’s Lightning to USB 3 Camera Adapter allows iOS to interface with a variety of microphones that it wasn’t able to before, I like the idea of keeping my setup as minimal and as dongle-free as possible.
Enter the Shure MV5 Digital Condenser Microphone. This is a MFi-certified Lightning-enabled microphone that works with the iPad or iPhone using a single microUSB to Lightning cable. By switching out the Lightning cable for a traditional USB cable, you can use the same microphone with your Mac or PC.
This microphone is a digital condenser that can be powered via Lightning or USB. It doesn’t require any special adapters or power supplies to work, just plug it in, launch an app, and start recording.