Microphone screens for voice-over recording?

Factual Questions
1

I’ve watched a lot of ‘making of’ sections for animated films, and enjoy the voice-over recording sections the most. I’ve often noticed that the microphone has a perforated circular disc or a screen a few inches in front of it. What is the purpose of this? Sound filter? Spit guard? To keep the voice actor from flailing into it? The actor is usually a foot or more from the microphone, with a music stand (for the script) between him/her and the microphone, so shouldn’t that keep enough distance? If it’s a filter, what does it filter out, and wouldn’t it affect the performer’s voice and tone? Or is it to affect voice and tone?

So what’s the deal with the screen?

2

Sometimes called a windscreen, it keeps spit, and breath from being picked up by the mic.

3

I’ve also heard it referred to as a pop filter designed to eliminate the puff of air sound usually caused by saying (or singing) the letter ‘p’.

4

The trick at home is to place the mike at the side of your mouth, not in front of it. That avoids puffs from P, B, etc from hitting the mike directly.

5

In addition to the windscreen (or the foam cover; I’ve never seen a mike with both), there is also software that will edit out (or reduce, since you want your talent to make the occasional breathing sound) those pops.

Robin

6

In addition to cutting down on breath pops, the screens protect the microphone from being blown on. Often, the studios will use what’s called a ribbon mic. Ribbons traditionally have excellent sound quality, but they are very expensive, (in the $500-1500 range) very fragile and very intolerant of being blown on. The fastest way to make a sound engineer cringe is to walk up to any mic and do the “pfff, pfff! testing! pfff, pfff” bit as this will destroy a ribbon.

7

Stretched panty hose is a cheap but effective alternative to spending $$$ on a state-of-the-art pop filter.

8

One of the advantages of ‘popper stoppers’ is that they work without changing the responsiveness of the microphone. The foam type of windscreens may change the frequency response of the microphone. Foam windscreens are ideal for outdoor recording or ‘breezy’ indoor locations. For controlled indoor recording, like in a recording studio, the popper stopper is adequate to stop most 'acoustic wind’ (produced by talent) while retaining the pick up characteristics of the microphone.

9

Thank you folks. Much appreciate the info.
(Gotta admit, of all the names, I like ‘popper stopper’ the best.)