Which should I buy?

[otobot9]

Hey guys I have had my eye on a couple of things lately but I cannot afford all of them at once as I am currently not getting a lot of hours at work. Anyways I was wondering which of these three different "options" I should get first, second, and third as I get the money for them.

Option 1 - ath-m50 with coiled cable ($100 on Massdrop) + A Monitoring cable so that I can use these or any headphones with my camera $50) http://goo.gl/RvuPNP

 

Option 2 - A new 50mm lens ($50) http://goo.gl/U8hBrN

 

Option 3 - An external audio recorder like the zoom h1 or something around that price point

 

My current gear - Canon Rebel t2i/550D with kit lens, Audio-Technica atr6550 mic, Sony MDR-7506 headphones, recording audio in-camera currently.

 

Also I guess if you found a new mic for around $100-$150 bucks that could be an option 4. Thanks.

[otobot9]

What do you mainly do with your camera?

I think that everybody should have a 50mm prime. But if better audio would be more beneficial to you, then spring for that.

Will be doing mainly short films and small projects.

[otobot9]

Do you feel like you would benefit from having better sound gear or better optics? Would having a 50mm prime be useful to your films? Do you mainly shoot indoors or out?

I think I will just go with the lens ha ha. Thanks anyways.

[alrobles]

I was using the M50s for a while with my camera and it got to be kinda bothersome with such a long cable (I had it twist-tied to a shorter length) Eventually I got the M50x instead. A little bit more but gives more flexibility.  The M50 coiled would probably be a good middle ground. Sill has a somewhat long cable though.

 

The lens honestly may not do much for you in video.  I shoot mostly with my 24-105mm because of the range it gives me. I can be shooting at the tele end of it and quickly go wide as well.  With the 50mm as I'm sure you are aware you are stuck there so it will have only specific uses for it.  I've only used my 50 a handful of times. Also keep in mind that on your camera it will be more like a 80mm lens so you will need to keep your distance from you subjects sometimes. 

 

The zoom h1 has pretty good audio recording.  I bought it once to try out and was impressed with the audio but not the build quality.  It picks up any noise from handling the recorder so its really only good if it going to be stationary the whole time.  If you mount it to your camera it will still pick up the noise from you handling the camera, stabilizer, etc.  Many of these noise issues can be fixed in post by dropping the under 100Hz frequencies in the audio. Also I wouldn't hook it up directly into the camera either. The gain on canon cameras are terrible so you will get very noisy audio.  When it comes to audio equipment for DSLR video don't go cheap. You get what you pay for. I've had to return several items cuz they just didn't cut it.  Save up instead to get something better that will do what you want the first time.  With the H1 you will want to record audio directly to it but be prepared for potentially a lot of post work.