Can the D3300 record 5.x sound to video?

I have a Nikon D3300.


It has a microphone jack built in.


If I bought a surround sound microphone, would the D3300 record all channels correctly, or would it be stereo only?

First of all, I know NOTHING about this, but you got me curious. I thought these audio systems were mixed from many channels on a movie set and then encoded into a regular L-R system where they then could be later decoded if the user had the correct equipment. If not, it would just play back as stereo.

Apparently someone makes microphone that does this:

https://www.amazon.com/Cascade-Audio-VIV100-Surround-Microphone/dp/B0013TD8BA

It encodes and outputs to a standard stereo mini-plug. No idea if it is any good.

King Mustard said:

I have a Nikon D3300.


It has a microphone jack built in.


If I bought a surround sound microphone, would the D3300 record all channels correctly, or would it be stereo only?

Click to expand...

Stereo.

Specifications, page 348 D3300 Reference Manual:

Audio recording device - Built-in monaural or external stereo microphone.

If you want anything else, you need external recording equipment.

There are 5.1 microphones for camera mounting that do all the mixing and encoding within the device itself, and then feed that signal to the camera via its stereo input jack.

I do not think that camera has provision for recording digital sound directly. There is a provision for two analog channels only and the A-D for sound is done by the camera electronics. To record more than two channels of sound the camera will need input for digital sound, which is simply not there.

What is done in such cases is to record 6/7/8 channel sound (as the requirement may be) on a separate device, and then synchronise the audio and video in post processing software.

What you get with external boxes that input 6 channels and output an analog stereo signal is matrix 5.1 and not discrete 5.1.

aroy is correct. Honestly, if you want professional level audio on a DSLR, external equipment is needed....

Sounds like I've been out of the sound recording loop for way too long. Didn't even know they made a surround sound mic now days.