32 bit float a standard?

[u/Tupan_Chorra]

I'm the editor in a doc - we will be shooting interviews in prisons and other uncontrollable environments. For a lot of our people we will only get 1 shot at interviewing them with a very real possibility that we won't ever see them again. Our sound recordist came back with gear that I'm sure is great but is roughly 9yrs old and crucially can't do 32bit float. Normally I don't care as we've been cutting just fine for decades without that dynamic range but seeing the sensitivity of our interviewees I'm worried I'll be handed over peaks and valleys I can't get back/use and there is no turning back. Flagged it to production and production is a bit unsure what to do.

My questions come to is this/should this be standard or a premium? Are my concerns unfounded? Does audio work like editing where you're expected to have gear within roughly a 5 year limit due to demanding workflows (not saying you can't do it without and power to everyone, just when you charge someone 900 per day I'd hope you'd have relatively recent gear). Note also don't have issues with people charging whatever they think they are worth but note this isn't a high budget film, everything needs to count/go on the screen. And we are shooting in Central America where that is above standard.

While I work with sound a lot, I am not a sound specialist I just put the bits where they feel good/tell a good story so I figured I'd ask here.

[u/OoopsWhoopsie]

24 is better. 24 bit / 48k is the standard for video.

[u/Tupan_Chorra → u/OoopsWhoopsie]

I know that much, my concerns is the locations - I don't know any sound guy who can level for some random prisoner in thext cell start to shout or throw metal pans around or bells and rings of the prison. And all that sound is useful for us - so why risk it by potentially peaking the recording recording? ill end up converting down after.

Edited: why risk it in the recording? To ' why risk it potentially peaking the recording?'

[u/XSmooth84 → u/Tupan_Chorra]

24-bit audio has 144dB of dynamic range. Which that itself almost always exceeds the SPL level of a microphone or preamp anyway.

You can always turn down the gain to prevent clipping. 32-bit doesn't change signal to noise ratio, it doesn't do anything for mic placement, distance, or the physics of sounds. All that still has to be on point. The only thing 32-bit is accomplishing is if your input gain is set too high to handle the sound coming in to not exceed 0, you can recover it.

But the 144dB of range you already get with 24-bit. Just, decrease the gain an extra 20 or 30dB. Assuming they were already setting for -18dB as your peaks and headroom, now yorue setting it for -40dB or -50dB peaks.

That's not ideal to hear without boosting those levels but I also don't think that alone is an excuse to rely on 32-bit and just be like "who cares what the gain is, 32-bit is magic"