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I've got a canon powershot. It has an inbuilt mic. I usually take interview-type videos, mostly indoors. The audio quality is poor as far as the purpose is concerned. I use pitvi as my editing software.
The question I have is...how easy is it going to be to record audio from another device and merge that with the video using pitvi?
I also would want to know about audio recording devices which support a lapel or a collar microphone.
I don't know Pitivi but in general it's not hard to do what you need, just sometimes a little time consuming. Use a digital audio recorder that can record 48K at 16 bits at a solid fixed rate.
In this case since you already have sync audio from the camera, you can use it as a reference track to find and check sync with the separate track. It helps to use a clapper at the beginning and end of each scene, but since you have both tracks you might not need a visual clap, just a recognizable audio clap. If possible announce the scene and take so that it's audible on both.
If the sep sound drifts out of sync you can use those start and end claps to find the exact frame duration and adjust the rate of the sep sound to match. If Pitivi does this, great, but you can also use a free tool like Audacity.
You can do it with any decent video editor (I use openshot -http://www.openshot.org/)
The process is as Jim Mack says. You clap your hands 3 times in front of the camera and then you combine the video track and external sound usings these claps.
Regarding audio, your best and cheapest solution is the Zoom H1 (recorder) and the Audio Technica 3350 (lapel microphone)
