Drumsound's January Sticky--Please read and comment-Mics...

[drumsound]

Microphones?wrong placement or wrong mic?

How do you make this decision?

I listen to the sound and evaluate if it?s working or not. If not I?ll usually move the mic no more that twice before I swap it out for something else. The reason I say move it twice, is sometime a move will get to the ballpark, but not all the way there. But you can tell that you?re on the right path so then a bit of a tweak in placement and its doing what the track needs. If two separate moves doesn?t get me close, its time to try something else. For me this method is more efficient and effective. Spending an inordinate amount of time moving one mic doesn?t seem to help. I just feel like I?m trying to put a square per in a round hole. Changing the mic al together seems to do more, faster in these instances.

[Doublehelix]

Good point, and a good rule of thumb. I also like to cycle through several mics to see what tickles my fancy, but I usually spend very little time up front moving things around. I'll bring up a mic, and can usually tell if I'm in the ballpark without a lot of gyrations.

I'll create a "maybe" pile and a "no way" pile with a few mics fairly quickly, and then I usually go back and fine-tune the "maybe" pile until I find what I am looking for.

This is of course for clients that are willing to pay for excellence! Those that want to come in and do a quick demo for bottom dollar will usually get my first choice of mic, although I will play with placement since it is critical to the sound.

We all know from experience what is going to get us in the ballpark anyway, and if it is for the "track and mix" crowd, I'll bring up what I think works, move it around a bit, and I'm done. For those wiling to pay, I will experiement with several different choices.

What I have found is that when the clock is ticking, and the pressure is on to get things to tape, especially with the low-budget clients that come in to make a record for cheap, they get frustrated very quickly when I am trying out 3-4 mics for every source.

I guess I am getting cynical in my old age, but when I see clients that could give a rat's behind about changing drum heads or guitar strings, and are watching the clock with every movement...I will make some quick decisions, and then say (to myself) "screw them" and move on. The results are usually pretty dang good anyway.

I seem to be getting more and more of this type of clientele...it really sucks!

Vocals are a different matter however. I will play around with several mics until I find the right one, even for the cheap "track and mix" crowd. It is too important to match the vocal with the mic (and pre) for the vocals to mess around with a mis-match.

Currently I am working on my son's album where they "own the studio" for 2 months for free (!) (December and January, I usually close most of December, and January anyway). In this case, I am picky as hell on every choice I make. It is taking forever, but the product sounds amazing!

I guess the point is that for me, it all comes down to choosing quality vs. who is willing to pay to have that quality. I know that is not the original point of the thread, but it is where it lead me.

[drumsound]

DH,

I hear everything you say loud and clear! The clock-watchers are tough to deal with for sure. I also find that players get pretty antsy and don?t want to wait around to "hear a few things to decide" unless that's been brought up before the session. I just did a vocal shoot-out with some really cool tube mics. The singer was expecting it and he was cool singing the same song six times just to listen to the mics. After we picked one (Sony C37-A WOW) he really wanted to just sing and fix without a lot of stuff in-between. He likes to work fast, not just because of money!

[joelpatterson]

My dirty little secret--I've never set up a mic, recorded something, auditioned it, judged whether it's okay or something else might be better--I don't have anything like the leisure that implies. For a concert, I set up, and then they play. In the studio, the most I'll do is have multiple mics for a source--vocals, guitar amp, whatever--and they play, and I'll track everything. Come mix time, we decide what's best.

Either it's just I have a knack for guessing right, or I'm just so used to making anything work... your scenario sounds so confusing, I mean, how to you know when it's right, when this was better than that, no wait, go back to the other one, no I think...

[joel hamilton]

I just go to the stuff I can count on, and get it right quickly.

Learning what the mics "hear" enables speedy goodness....

I hardly ever move mics after the initial placement. Maybe like 1 out of every 50 times I put a mic on anything these days.

I would rather put three mics on a single guitar amp, and choose between them quickly back in the control room. I wont even print the other two unless they are doing something amazing for me.

Picking the right mic for the job, and having good pre's means I can aim the mic at the thingy that needs to be recorded, and use experience to avoind phase issues and other nightmares, and get on with the recording sooner....

I dont even really think about the mics anymore so much, as i will always have something I know will work just fine next to something more fun, and something experimental... The experiments become the standards and the constants for me eventually.....

[cgarges]

I have a really good relation ship with my mics, and I like to work in studios that have a decent collection of stuff I know. Between my own collection (close to 70 mics) and whatever's there that I know, I make decsions based on how the mics will flatter the source. Positioning is ALWAYS more important than mic selection (most things being equal), so as long as the general charateristic is flattering to the source at hand, I'll move the mic a couple of times. Like Tony said, if the mic requires movement, it may be once for a more general thing and once more for a more specific result. Any more tweaking than that and it may be time to switch the mic, the pre, or add some EQ or compression or aural exciter or expander or filter or whatever.

Most of the time, the mic tends to be either right-on or close to it. For me, spending time listening to the source from a potential mic position is all that is required. It's easy to forget that most mics are capturing a piece of air about 1" in diameter or less. That's why positioning is so incredibly important to me. Moving your head (or more specifically, your ear) around a source will tell you much more about what the mic will hear than anything else. Once you've determined where the source is eminating what you think you will need, just select a mic that won't fuck that up and you should be good to go. Obviously, there are times where certain situations take precidence over absolute sonic considerations (mic rejection, pickup pattern, mic and preamp sensitivity--most of which involve rejection or phase coherence), but for the most part, finding the spot that works is the magic bullet for me.

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

[Doublehelix]

but for the most part, finding the spot that works is the magic bullet for me.

Amen brother!!!

[markee2004]

I'm afraid you're all wrong. You should approach each recording session as if it was your first, and try out lots of things initially, no matter how well you think you know your equipment. I am constantly surprised by how my equipment reacts to differnet sources, no matter how much I use it.

[cgarges]

I'm afraid you're all wrong.

Nice.

You should approach each recording session as if it was your first, and try out lots of things initially, no matter how well you think you know your equipment.

I have clients who aren't in a position to pay me to experiment on their dime. Not all of them, but a good deal of them. The time for me to experiment is on my own sessions or the ones where the clients want to do so. Applying what I learn during these kinds of sessions is what enables me to work efficiently when the session demands that I do so. I know if I showed up to play on a session and the engineer behaved like he had never used any of the mics he had out before, I'd be pissed.

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

[drumsound]

Like Chris, my clients expect me to work with a certain sense of efficiency and professionalism. There are definitely times to experiment, but not every single time I'm working in the studio.

markee2004,
Are you working on only your own music in your own room?

[NewAndImprov]

For a long time at my home studio, I only had 2 mics, an SM57 and an AKG C3000. So, my decision was, dynamic or condenser? Made me work on placement a lot. Then I got a couple of Beyer 260's. I just got a Shinybox. So, now, it's option anxiety!

Actually, I'm not so lame as I sound, I have raiding rights on a friends mic locker, has lots of nice mics that I could borrow for projects. Plus, I only really do overdubs here, so I'm usually only doing 1-2 instruments at a time.

Still, I fell like I have a limited pallette of mics I know well, and it makes me work on placement. I try to set up 2-3 mics , get them sounding good pretty quickly and track them all, and then decide in mixing which one, or what combination to use.

[joelpatterson]

You should approach each recording session as if it was your first....

In that case... I'm gonna have to get my hands on the old mono reel to reel my dad brought home one day... 3" reels? What the HELL was the name of that... started with an "M"?... "W" maybe? "Wollensack"?

[markee2004]

Like Chris, my clients expect me to work with a certain sense of efficiency and professionalism. There are definitely times to experiment, but not every single time I'm working in the studio.

markee2004,
Are you working on only your own music in your own room?

No actually, quite the reverse.

[drumsound]

I asked not to be a smart ass, but because the worlds are very different.

[Doublehelix]

I'm afraid you're all wrong. You should approach each recording session as if it was your first, and try out lots of things initially, no matter how well you think you know your equipment. I am constantly surprised by how my equipment reacts to differnet sources, no matter how much I use it.

I understand where you are coming from here, and in an ideal world...

But reality dictates that this is not going to happen on most sessions, at least for me in my studio.

Either you have very rich clients that are willing to pay for all that time, or you work a lot for free!

Unfortunately, there are times when I am working with some bands where it really does feel like "work", and it becomes more like work-a-day drudgery, which really sucks. Other times, the magic exists, and I know why I do this crazy stuff!!! Deep down, I love the recording side of this business. I was on the musician end for a very long time, and I try to never lost sight of that perspective.

Our clients are (quite often) excited about their music, and I know that I should be too, so to aprroach it like it was my "first time" is a great concept, but unfortunately, reality kicks in and you have to pay the bills, and the clients are here on the cheap, etc., etc.