Topic: ZOOM H4 Recording Live Music - Hollow Vocals Problem

[magfester]

Tested out my Zoom H4 at an outdoor music festival  ...wondering what happened.
I consider the vocals having that hollow "down in a well" sound.

Is it just mic placement or something else?

Here is a short audio sample (mp3 and wav)
http://24by7tours.com/puppies

*****************************************************

1) Zoom H4 on mic stand/tripod;  about 7 feet high
2) Zoom H4 was positioned about 3 feet behind several other tapers' mics
3) Other tapers' mics were about 15 feet in front of the sound board
     and about 5 feet to the left of the soundboard, facing the stage
4) Total distance to stage from my Zoom H4 was about 60 feet

DuhksShort.mp3 is about 250 K, DuhksShort.wav is about 5.5 MB
I used Audacity 1.3.2 with no modifications to output the mp3 and wav files

Zoom H4 settings used:
level             100
phantom        off
monitor          off
auto gain       off
mic model      off
comp/limit      off

mode: stereo recorder
recording format: wave, 44.1, 16bit

[Brian Skalinder]

How did it sound at the festival?  How did the other recordings turn out?

Little tough to tell from the short sample of banter, but sounds like all too typical poor-PA-amp'd vocals recorded from a distance, to me.  Sounds like this was an acoustic set.  SPLs are often much lower for acoustic music, which makes it all the more imperative to get closer to the sound source, if possible.

[magfester]

How did it sound at the festival?  How did the other recordings turn out?
[...sounds like all too typical poor-PA-amp'd vocals recorded from a distance, to me.  ]

>How did it sound at the festival?
Festival sound was good.  The human ear did NOT detect "hollow vocals" coming from stage.

>How did the other recordings turn out?
This recording was closest to the stage and was the better of the other recordings.
The other recordings (further from the stage) had even more "hollow vocals" distortion.

>all too typical poor-PA-amp'd vocals recorded from a distance
Great advice ... will position my mic closer next time.  Thanks.


I've uploaded a longer audio file (DuhksLong.wav) to http://www.24by7tours.com/puppies
By the way, I may upgrade the Zoom H4 firmware from 1.3 to 2.0 and check again for improvements.

I realize that the Zoom H4 is not equivalant to dual (high-end) mics + preamps + XLR inputs + mixer + laptop, etc...  but I want to remain "simple".  Would you encourage/discourage adding a single AT822 to the ZOOM H4 for live festival recordings?  I want to increase the quality of the sound.