@SharonC ive been. watching alot of Davids videos lately especially the sampling ones.  A couple years ago when i started experimenting with recording violin...id already been doinv stuff with guitar for another guitar learning type forum...i. bought a presonus BUNDLE from sweetwater and a shure sm57 mic. 

that worked great for guitar.  as david said i found out when i started with violin it added to the already shrill sound the strings espcially beginner playing can cause. BUT it would work as a start and they are cheap..and work great for most every other thing.

THOUGHTS ON MICS

dynamic mics usually need to be fairly close since they arent powered among other things im sure..  i also found i had to turn up the gain ( think volume or power ) to signal which added alot of this sssssssssss to the backround that drove ME nuts.  may not be an issue for everybody.

SO.. i finally decided i like this stuff and want to go deeper and contacted a sweetwater sales person.  He gave some violin mic type suggestions.  the lowest price and one people seemed to like was a royer R10 ribbon. 

another thing i added with the royer is an inline cloud lifter or amp type device.  you power it with the phatom power and it takes the incoming signal from mic and boost it.   keeps my gain fairly low on interface instead of having it cranked up more.  you could also look at the SE electronics vr2 which is phantom powered do bypass that inline amp need.

The R10 is pretty much all im using for violin right now.  I have used it paired with a lauten small diaphragm condenser in different setups for stereo. Usually  if the violin is by itself in a recording ill do it stereo.  if its with anything else ill just do mono on it with the r10.  personal prefrence and it changes...

A LITTLE MIXING THOUGHT

Theres other things like panning ill do to place it.  One thing to note is that most listen on their cell phone speaker which is mono anyway so if you do much stereo mixing its probably a good thing to listen in mono and adjust ..all that work you do making a good sound in stereo could be lost and you only hear the loudeat parts...thats down the road..

SUGGESTIONS

You can record audio using cell phone then. transfer that wav or mp3 file into a free daw and experiment if you like this kinda stuff before buying things.  I do but most may not and it may take away the violin playing part and actually hurt more than helps.  Ive found when i record and start adding tracks i think about...hmm what may sound good here.  also find things like...i hit that note too hard or out of tune...i need to record that again.   It also keeps my foot in playing some of the other instruments since violin takes so much time.

LOOK at what the software will cost you to upgrade to full version if you like it.   does it have an annual renew fee?   check out their support and user forum..is it active?  does support respond?

IS YOUR COMPUTER able to handle the software?   do you have enough disk space?  dont think you can load on a windows xp computer bought in 2001 and it be an enjoyable experience.  as long as your computer meets the RECOMMENDED specs NOT the minimum...you should be ok.

WHAT ID SUGGEST IF YOU DO BUY STUFF

I know thats alot of blab but seemed like a good time place to add it again.   LOOK FOR A BUNDLE.  youll want an interface with at least 2 inputs.... the quieter the preamp the better...youll want a mic stand or 2 if doing stereo and possibly a stereo bar mount... cables xlr youll probably be close but id still get at least a 10' in case... any longer and the extra cables start getting in the way...  stay away from a mixer..go with an recording interface...and a set of CLOSED back headphones to start.   ear buds will work but down the road if this is something you like youll see they have some limitations.

There are several brands on sweetwater with bundles.  you can get a mic a stand headphones interface and a key to download install software.   I prefer presonus because its what i started with and my interface and software all just work together...updates are flawless..if im limited i dont know it..ignorance bliss thing.  

brands dont matter though..they all are great..especially at our level of using the stuff.  once you start experimenting things like room noise and echos stuff like that will come into play.  i have thoughts on what ive found there but this is already way too long.

@SharonC thats a great camera actually made with muscians in mind.  If you look in the cooleys party i started its what i used there.  ive used the phatom power before and im trying to remember if you can used the power adapter while its recording.   One thing thats cool is if you have a backing track you can run that in as one of the tracks listen on headphones out of the camera and play along.  the tracks pretty much will be matched.  I dont use it like i do the canon now because of the video, but as long as youve some extra lighting it works great..especially the audio.  Im planning on doing something with it as a second camera or possibly third with cell phone to kinda mix up videos.  do different angles.  just havent spent the time on it yet 

heres an old one where i ran the backing track into the q8 and played along with the les paul.  all this was done without computer or daw.  the guy that made these backings had a ton of great stuff the youtube changed how people can monetize videos.  Id link the track but its not there anymore.  shame.  he made quality stuff. the original link is in the description but think it just says video not found.

q8 example

new gadgets software even instruments can just be a distraction from the original goal of learning whatever instrument youre trying to get up to speed on.   You can spend time and money on stuff that doesnt help for sure.  You kinda have to balance everything.  Recording can help ..but you dont need anything other than a phone to do that.  Its not like youre sabotaging yourself by not jumping into daws or amps more equipment..  people learned to play violin long before all this stuff was around so dont beat yourself up over it.  just focus on what youre doing.

check it out!