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Advice on Setup for Specific hall and performer?

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melontracks:
Coming up this fall, I have an opportunity to record a great singer songwriter, and I’d really like to get the best tape possible. I have permission from the musician, who will be singing and playing an acoustic guitar with both the vocals and the guitar separately mic’d by the venue, running to a pair of small PAs. The hall is actually the basement of a guitar shop and is maybe 20 or 25 feet across by 50 or 60 feet long, rectangular, with maybe a 10-foot ceiling. The stage spans the entire front end of the hall, elevated about 10 inches, and seating consists of maybe 100 folding chairs. I have permission from the artist to record, and permission from the venue to record, including “a line out from the PA, which you are welcome to tap into. It's RCA type jacks right now, though there is a chance we'll replace our PA between now and then.”

My modest setup includes a Tascam DR-05, a Tascam DR-22WL, Church Audio ST-11 mics (one set of wires with a pair each of card and omni caps), and a Church Audio CA9100 preamp.  I also have a pair of Core Sound LCB omni mics, but rarely use them.

I would be inclined to just run the line out from the PA to the DR-22WL, hang the ST-11’s with the omni caps in an X-Y pattern from the ceiling by a super clamp and magic arm about 15 feet from the stage, run that through the CA9100 to the DR-05, set both recorders so the input is just below clipping and call it good. The last time I saw this guy in this space, the crowd was attentive and silent (all 20 or so of us) so audience noise should not be a concern.

Even though I’ve been taping live music for almost 20 years, my “good” or “great” recordings are always a mystery to me. I’m an amateur in the truest sense of the word. I’d really like to get the best recording possible, so please help me out with any advice you have about how I can improve my chances here.

What would you do with the gear i have in this setting?

Thanks in advance for your tips!

Chris
 

DavidPuddy:
I would take the sbd out and run 3ft spaced omnis right in front of the performer.

melontracks:

--- Quote from: beegar on April 18, 2019, 05:49:15 PM ---I would take the sbd out and run 3ft spaced omnis right in front of the performer.

--- End quote ---

Man, I hadn't even considered that. If you did an A-B like that right on stage, would you also run the X-Y omnis above and mostly behind the audience? I usually covet the sbd line out because i feel like it's an insurance policy against me making a bozo mistake on mic placement.

aaronji:
Running omnis XY doesn't really make sense; it will be essentially mono. I would do beegar's suggestion or, with a good crowd, you could also do the spaced omnis from the ceiling. You might also consider a near coincident arrangement with the cards from the ceiling or stage. If you can borrow a four channel recorder, with two from the board/PA and two from the mics, that would be great, as everything would be time synced. Six channels (omnis, cards, and board) would be even better, as you could mix to taste afterwards...

melontracks:

--- Quote from: aaronji on April 18, 2019, 06:58:15 PM ---Running omnis XY doesn't really make sense; it will be essentially mono. I would do beegar's suggestion or, with a good crowd, you could also do the spaced omnis from the ceiling. You might also consider a near coincident arrangement with the cards from the ceiling or stage. If you can borrow a four channel recorder, with two from the board/PA and two from the mics, that would be great, as everything would be time synced. Six channels (omnis, cards, and board) would be even better, as you could mix to taste afterwards...

--- End quote ---

My thought on the XY above the audience was that I would be using less of those two channels in the mix, so the stereo image wasn't as important as continuity on the two tracks, but that's just me thinking intuitively, and probably incorrectly. I'm kind of limited to the gear i have, unfortunately, so I'd have to dig out the old minidisc or rockbox'd iRiver if i wanted six channels. I've gotten pretty good at cropping, matching, and stretching recordings to correct for clock speed differences between multiple two-track recorders. But yeah, you're right...I should just get a 4-track recorder. Not a starving college student anymore. I had thought about cards in an ORTF arrangement, but this has always been my most hit-or-miss arrangement. I read somebody's post not too long about about pointing cards directly at the PAs. Didn't really get the thought process behind that. Would that be similar to the spaced omnis on the ceiling, only with less audience noise? That's probably something I can find more info about elsewhere in this forum...

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