Taperssection.com
Gear / Technical Help => Microphones & Setup => Topic started by: pillowman on April 13, 2017, 01:00:50 PM
-
Heya !
last weekend I had the opportunity to give the 'open taping'
method my first try. I used an home made stand (see the pics)
and a pair of AT853cards (w/4.7 k mod) placed around 3 mtr up
right beside the mixing desk.
When I checked the recording at home I liked what I heard but
for my taste the recording includes to much crowd talk.
So the question is were the mics placed to low or did I used the
wrong capsules ?
What I wanted to capture was some live feeling for an sbd / aud
matrix for further video clips.
So any help what I can do better for my second try :shrug:
any help would be awesome
cheers
pillowman
-
(http://www.bilder-hochladen.net/files/thumbs/h2gk-2i-4cd3.jpg) (http://www.bilder-hochladen.net/i/h2gk-2i-4cd3.jpg)
(http://www.bilder-hochladen.net/files/thumbs/h2gk-2h-c2e3.jpg) (http://www.bilder-hochladen.net/i/h2gk-2h-c2e3.jpg)
-
Generally, the higher you go, the further you are away from people, thus less crowd noise. You're always going to have some; the cards reject sounds from the side and back, but in the front it's not going to reject from "up" and "down".
-
In order to be of much help, I'd need a few other pieces of information:
1) What kind of music was this?
2) What kind of PA, and how loud?
3) What was your location relative to the PA, and how much flexibility do you have in placement?
In general, when trying to tape a PA, you might begin to at one point of an equilateral triangle, in which each PA stack forms another point.
Cardioids are likely to yield good results if set-up properly. You might want to search the forums on the "Stereophonic Zoom."
-
In order to be of much help, I'd need a few other pieces of information:
1) What kind of music was this?
2) What kind of PA, and how loud?
3) What was your location relative to the PA, and how much flexibility do you have in placement?
In general, when trying to tape a PA, you might begin to at one point of an equilateral triangle, in which each PA stack forms another point.
Cardioids are likely to yield good results if set-up properly. You might want to search the forums on the "Stereophonic Zoom."
òla !
here ar some more facts to get a clue what I've done and how, ...
(http://www.bilder-hochladen.net/files/thumbs/h2gk-2j-3f74.jpg) (http://www.bilder-hochladen.net/i/h2gk-2j-3f74.jpg)
from the pic you can imagine how far the stand was placed and how the speakers were placed.
The venues will have around 500 - 1000 peolpe capacity and the stand will always be placed close to the mixing desk.
the concert was l amplified ike this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SktPnKVYg8I
The goal is to record the live sound to give the sdb source more live, atmosphere for the live video clips.
hope this additionally details will help a bit,
cu
pillowman
-
You can take advantage of the cardioid pattern's off-axis pickup, and aim them up, and away from the earth-bound talkers. The music should still "hit" the pickup part of the lobe, not the rejection portion.
I often point my array 45 degrees upwards, especially outdoors where you won't pick up ceiling reflections.
Generally, the higher you go, the further you are away from people, thus less crowd noise. You're always going to have some; the cards reject sounds from the side and back, but in the front it's not going to reject from "up" and "down".
Watch out going too high outdoors, wind is sometimes much worse when there aren't people's heads to block it.
-
Higher mics = less pickup of immediately adjacent audience (specific voices, often the loudest individuals simply because they are close), but won't reduce the overall level of audience pickup by much.
Closer to PA = more pickup of PA relative to the overall audience due to the PA level increasing as you get closer to it, but overall audience noise remaining about the same.
More directional mics = potentially less audience noise if close enough and if oriented appropriately as others have noted.
Morst makes good points about aiming the mics, and about the increased potential for wind or ceiling reflections if positioned very high. Also consider that the response of some PAs changes dramatically with height. Some will have more or less the same sound quality up high as they do just above head height. Others will sound very different up high compared to head-level. And that response difference may be better or worse. Don't assume that it will sound the same just cleaner up high.
Also, as you go higher mic stand stability becomes an increasing concern.
-
thanks for some more help here - will have a chance to tape open next weekend again,
will tell you about the result if you like :shrug:
.
cheers and happy taping
pillowman
-
More specifics regarding change of response with increasing height- Typically there will be somewhat less very low bass reinforcement the higher you go (due to getting further out of the boundary-layer zone near the ground ), and the mid/high frequenceis might change either way- either more enegry from having a clearer line of sight to the PA, or less if starting to get above the high-frequency radiation coverage cutoff angle of the horns in the PA. But those differences are typically more obvious when recording outdoors. Inside, room reverberance often dominates, making those differences less noticeable if present.
-
Very generally, I think you want your mics as low as you can "get away with" -- meaning, that most closely approximates what your ears hear in the crowd (since the show is usually mixed by someone whose ears are at roughly the same height) but avoids "too much" crowd noise (which varies by crowd, type of music, etc.).
Which is to say, there's no hard and fast rule, but you want to avoid things like being too close to the ceiling, or you'll end up with a bunch of unwanted reflections. And of course you have to make judgments about how much crowd noise you'll tolerate, basing that judgment on who is actually around you at the time.
This is also a reason I favor balcony clamps whenever possible... getting the mics out away from the crowd tends to be a big help in crowd noise rejection, if that's an option.