You'll never dehumidify the four inches in front of a singer's mouth, unless you kill the singer. All the dehumidification in the world won't stop a person's breath from condensing on a cold object directly in front of it when they exhale... (which is probably why it's been a "test of life" for hundreds of years...)
Try it. Set your dehumidifier to stun for as long as you want beforehand, and then breathe on a beerglass straight from the freezer. People are some large percentage of water, and while a lot goes down the toilet, a lot comes also out the mouth too.
You can warm the capsule to prevent condenstion, you can dehumidify to help speed evaporation (moisture will re-evaporate significantly quicker if the surrounding air is not moisture-laden) -you can do both. Dehumidification is not without its benefits, but it's really helping to clear the problem quicker, it doesn't eliminate the problem.
Warming the capsule can be done by warming the mic. I've done this with velcro-attached heater pads before now... You can make your own, or buy the type that they use in Canadian winters to prevent condensation from forming on amateur astronomers' telescope lenses.
Gabriel asked me in a PM what the best type of pop-filter is. -I thought that my reply wold benefit others, so maybe I should reprint my answer here:
[
what's the best sounding pop filter?]
Make your own and see. It depends what you're blocking. Buy several sets of women's stockings, in several different mesh sizes. Buy a few cheap wooden (or plastic) embroidery hoops and mount them on.
(an embroidery hoop, in case it's an odd thing to translate... It's available in several sizes, and the craft & art stores round here carry them in several sizes, for $2-to-$4. Cheap! -Then screw them to a clip or bracket that can be mounted on a mic stand in front of the mic as needed.
Rather than asking "what's the best", try to think "what should I try" instead. That way you KNOW why you prefer something, and are not beholden to other people's abilities and opinions... You don't know me or how much I know, what kind of recordings I make, or how much of a fool I can be. You don't know my preferences and blind spots. You don't know if I'm easily led or reluctant to change... -But if yoou try a few things out, you can discover things for yourself, and KNOW what the difference is!
DO TRY THIS ALSO: Try not going "right up against" the filter. Hold the nylon filter between your lips and your hand. Blow on your hand. You'll notice that as you move the filter towards your hand, it becomes less effective and you feel more "wind". Notice also that as the filtyer gets closer to your lips, it also gets less effective. -Some space before the screen helps the airflow become more 'radial' and less 'laminar', some distance from the capsule (or your hand) gives time for the turbulent disruption (initiated by the screen) to help the airflow fight itself and dissipate the energy.
I usually make a 2-layer filter for singers who try to sing with the screen tight against their lips. Use an air-gap between the two layers, and you'll regain the 'distance' benefit without them having to move their concentration away from their performance.
Pop and blast filters are the simplest things in the world to test. You can test eh effectiveness by flowing through it onto your flat outstretched fingers. You can HEAR how it sounds. -That and a few dollars of commonly-available DIY materiels, and you can make great pop-shields. If you have a steadman or similar metal shield, go and LISTEN to it acoustically as you blow through it. Then go and dig out some recordings that you did with it. -Do you hear it now? -If so, do you think you'll
ever use it again??? -I know I never will.
Keith
Keith
