Topic: What do you think about setting up mics right on stage??

[badsneakers]

I'm going to be tapeing my first show on Saturday with my new rig.  I have an ACM660 and C4's.   I was thinking since I'll be doing my own band that I would set up right on stage.  We are a loud noisy improv based band with few vocals.  I was going to use two kick drum stands and the c4's with omni caps and try to pull the vocals from the PA, thats all that will be going throught he house.  Any tips on where on stage I should set up?  We are a trio, guitar bass, drums. 

Thanks for any help

[§†∑∫åµÞ≥¥]

in my experience, it's been best to aim one mic between each person.

PLAYER^PLAYER^PLAYER
          mic        mic

just run cardioids in a DIN-type configuration. my 2 cents....

[badsneakers]

This is how I was thinking

PLAYER^PLAYER^PLAYER
          mic        mic

I just thought the omnis would be better for no real reason, I just don't know anything yet. : )  I need to do a lot of trial and era and ask more questions.

One of those questions is when I set up like this with the cards  how should the mic be faceing.  Straight up and down with the script and body faceing the band or a little less then a 90 degree angle with the tip of the cap faceing the band and the script faceing the celling?

[§†∑∫åµÞ≥¥]

again, I'm by no means an expert with on-stage/stage-lip taping but have had decent results the few times I've done it. point the cards straight out (ie: horizontal) like you normally would. you may not pick up too much vocal from the monitors though... it's tough with that type of setup. omni may be better if you want vocals. it also may depend on the size of the stage and how close you can set the mics to the musicians. if you're running omni, maybe do a Healy or vertical set-up? just experiment and have fun!! tell us how it goes.

[terrapinj]

i personally think split omnis would sound better, espcially on the vocals unless you are expecting a really noisy crowd. spacing would depend on the stage size but i think just inside of the guitar and bass respectively would be good.

you want the mics, epecially the cards running parallel with the stage so that the caps are pointed towards each player or amp depending on the spacing. i like to line up with the drum kit so you have the drums centered with bass and guitar on either side. either DIN or ORTF should work fine, again spacing/angle dependent on how wide the stage is. search around the rig pics forum and you'll find some onstage photos to get an idea of roughly what it will look like. a lot is gonna be trial and error until you get comfortable with your mics.

[Chuck]

I think it's easier to get a good stereo image with cardioids when recording on stage. Often the best place to put the mics is not dead center. Like when we were taping the Charlie Hunter Trio on stage, we set up way right of center and oriented the mics DIN.
The stage was set-up:

Drums   -  Charlie  -  Horn player

...with the onstage stand and microphones about two feet up off the floor and situated between Charlie and the horn player.
Pete oriented the DIN configuration straight ahead, so the left mic was pointed more at Charlie's amp than the drummer. Doing this we were able to get the ambient sound of the horn (not reinforced by the PA) with plenty of Charlie's amp in the mix. With the drummer off to the left and being the loudest instrument on stage, this set-up worked well and sounded pretty good. The only thing I would do differently would be to run X/Y, because I thought the soundstage was spread a little too wide.