Taperssection.com
Gear / Technical Help => Microphones & Setup => Topic started by: Gutbucket on March 12, 2008, 08:13:47 PM
-
Rycote style dead airspace wind baskets on the cheap?
Knocked together these baskets for Langerado. The support structure is a snap together 'plastic canvas' embroidery ball for making needle point Christmas tree ornament balls I guess. I cut two circles of some woman's nylon hose material to cover them and used a small binder clip to secure the stretched fabric. I didn't plan on using them, but the wind was so strong that I added the baskets over the big foams as you see in the pics. Ideally I'd suspend the mic in the basket without the foam windscreen for better sonic transparency while still killing the wind with the dead airspace around the mic. Fake fur would be the obvious next line of defence. Wondering about the most sonically transparent non-fur covering material. What's on the real deal Rycote blimps?
I may cut out every other plastic intersection to make the holes in the plastic canvas bigger to block less sound entry / diffract less. The plastic structure should support the fabric just as well.
The plastic balls are 2-3/4" interior diameter, so they should fit 'compact' style or active mics. The 1-3/4" foam baffle balls I was experimenting with on the 4060's allow a nice 1/2" air gap all around the ball (in this case that was taken up by the foam screen).
-
Application of the stocking nylon-
-
Found these plastic hair curler forms at the dollar store. They could work for small diameter 'pencil' mics and reduce the outlay from about $10 per pair for the balls, nylon and clips, to about $3 per pair ($1 for nylons, $1 for curlers, $1 for clips and rubber bands). I splurged and spent $2 for a pack of both the small and large size. ;D
Pink curlers for your mics, anyone? :P
[edit- the black ones on my hand are probably a bit small for most mics, but I was making these for my 4060's so I don't need much space]
-
"Are those mics up there?"
"No, I just didn't have time to take out my curlers."
:P
-
I saw Lee's rig at Langerado.....as a purveyor of ghetto-ness myself...I gotta say. Great idea and nice looking also.
Plus T for innovation and general ghettoness
k
-
Thanks Mike & Kevin. Approval from fellow dollar store, garage builders means alot! I'll post pics in another thread of the whole 'bug eye' rig I flew at Langerado in a bit.
Check out this HRTF multi-mic array! (http://www.houseofchuckles2.com/lf/28-0145.gif) ;D
To recreate something for normal sized mics, I'd think you could use the ordinary plastic canvas sheet material to form a cylinder and using the half spheres as end caps, make a true blimp.
-
+T!!!
Lovin' that multi mic array, too!!! LMAO!
-
that chick has the stealthiest surround sound mic system around....she was definintly waaaaaay ahead her time.
What are teh chances of me asking my wife to do all the stealthing now with the curlers left in??? :hmmm:
my grandma would be the ULTIMATE surround sound stealther. She rocks the curlers w/ mad skillzzzz
-
Rycote style dead airspace wind baskets on the cheap?
+T nice work.
I am a little confused however, you seem to have put the basket over an existing foam windscreen? I would expect the mic to go inside the basket 'naked' then the ball then the stocking cover + faux fur?
digifish
-
+T nice work.
I am a little confused however, you seem to have put the basket over an existing foam windscreen? I would expect the mic to go inside the basket 'naked' then the ball then the stocking cover + faux fur?
digifish
Yes, you are right, that's exactly the idea. I just put them over the foams because the wind was getting through the foam and I hadn't yet devised a method to suspend the mic inside the basket (or suspend the basket around the mic), so leaving the foam on did that, with what I had out in the field.
-
Here's a link to the thread with photos explaining the full 'Bug Eye' rig that I use these things on-
Oddball mic techiques that worked - evolution to 'Bug Eye' rig (http://taperssection.com/index.php/topic,96009.msg1338924.html#msg1338924)
-
Here's a link to the thread with photos explaining the full 'Bug Eye' rig that I use these things on-
Oddball mic techiques that worked - evolution to 'Bug Eye' rig (http://taperssection.com/index.php/topic,96009.msg1338924.html#msg1338924)
That's an awesome looking rig ;D
Great write-up.
Makes me think of a rig based on an umbrella frame and music stand base...thinking ::)
digifish
-
...Makes me think of a rig based on an umbrella frame and music stand base...thinking ::)
digifish
While I was putting that together I was listening to the DPA surround demo disc they sent in the mail- 5 spaced sub cards and a telescopic 5 armed surround tree mount with integral wires. Sounds gorgeous and costs as much as a small car. I figured if this thing works and if I ever move on to recording in surround, an umbrella frame could work niclely for these small mics. Pop it open and go.
-
I figured if this thing works and if I ever move on to recording in surround, an umbrella frame could work niclely for these small mics. Pop it open and go.
That is a really cool idea. Your have rockin ideas! :)
-
Reminds me of the old Popular Science "Wordless Workshop" and the very early days of Popular Electronics when shit was made from all sorts of ordinary materials. Like a speaker cabinet out of Cel-O-Tex with an octagonal speaker hole on the assumption you had a saw but no 10.5" hole cutter. Great stuff and great thinking. And I thought al you could devise was wonderful earphones.
-
These egg shapes could work great for standard body mics with a hole cut in the pointy end for the mic body to pass through, maybe.
(http://www.craft-stop.com/images/plasticcanvasegg.jpg)
Bought mine locally, but found those and the globes for $2.50 ea, 1/2 way down this page I frequent (http://www.craft-stop.com/store/productprintdetail.cfm?ProdCatID=41). :P
-
Update- Don't bother building these for pressure omni mics.
I now never use these for the DPA 4060s I built these for. The small foam screens work very well even in relatively windy conditions. When I use the ball-shaped DIY acoustic pressure equalizer attachments with those mics to give them increased directionality, generic foam ball windscreens designed to fit over Sure SM-58 type ball mics works well. I trim them down to form half spherical foam shells that fit over the APE spheres and protects the flush capsules from wind.
Today a found a TS thread titled 'Everything you ever wanted to know about windscreens' (http://taperssection.com/index.php/topic,2599.0.html) with a link to a c.1991 article from Jörg Wuttke of Schoeps analyzing windscreen performance and confirming my suspicions. His conclusion is to always use a foam windscreen on pressure omnis. He also recommends foam screens on directional mics where ever possible, as long as the foam offers enough protection for wind turbulence. The high-frequency loss with a foam screen can be generally compensated for with EQ. Basket types suffer from internal reflections and complicated response errors at higher frequencies, but can offer more low frequency protection for more problematic wind with directional mics.
Interestingly, he explains that ANY windscreen reduces the directivity of a directional mic. The more effective it is at wind noise reduction, the more it screws with the polar pattern of the mic. Is I understand it, since the job of a windscreen is to reduce air velocities of turbulence around the capsule + vents, it also tends to reduce localized differences in pressure between those points which directional mics use for achieving their patterns. He explicitly warns against trying to increase effectiveness by putting a foam screen inside a basket screen when using directional mics because of the significant loss of their normal pattern.