Topic: Built-in mics baffle

[Billy Mumphrey]

Hmm so I gather that:

Omni's placed close to hard-surfaced baffle tend to sound "brighter".

Omni's placed further from a absorbing-surfaced baffle tend to sound "darker".

The "darker" baffle recordings can be EQ'd if you don't like that "darker" sound.


I found my results in the above test to be on the "dark" side when I first listened in the car, but better on monitors. Definitely something weird in there. My mastered sample attempted to brighten the results, and I wasn't too thrilled with those results either haha. Regardless it was a fun experiment, which I will continue with a larger baffle when the time is right. Not a priority, so we'll see.

My whole point is that I got a recorder for $20 that I want to keep in my car for emergency taping scenarios. I was hoping a small baffle would increase the stereo image of the 2 closely-spaced built-in omni mics (with odd results, IMO).
The first time I used this recorder was at this same venue, for a similar jam, but I simply taped the recorder to a support post in the sweet spot (no baffle). That recording sounds fine and is certainly listenable, but pretty mono-ish. *shrugs*
Any recording is better than no recording.

[Gutbucket]

Yeah that pretty much.  Except that a sonically absorbent surface near the mics will sound darker regardless of the microphone's distance from the baffle surface, and is likely to sound darker the closer the mics are to it.

Sounds like the recorder is a win as a $20 emergency taping option as is.  But if still interested in making it better, try something larger, smooth and flat that fills the space between the mics sometime and see if that improves things.

I've still not had a chance to listen to your original recording, will try to do that one evening.