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Gear / Technical Help => Microphones & Setup => Topic started by: Sanjay on January 22, 2007, 02:37:53 PM
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I've been thinking of trying to get some recordings of songs i've written recorded just for myself and to remember them. As ashamed as I am to admit it all i've done is record with the built in microphone on the Iriver. Now without buying any extra equipment for the time being i'd like to record with my AKG c34. So my two questions are.
1. What would be the best way to record myself singing and playing guitar with a stereo microphone (pattern (any pattern is available), placement, etc?)
2. My acoustic that I play is quite loud, an all maple Taylor 610. Probably the loudest acoustic i've ever played. What can i do to muffle it down so my playing doesn't overwhelm my voice?
3. What program do some of you use to manipulate recordings to get some compression in and such?
Thanks, I feel like such a newb trying to make studio recordings instead of live ones.
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I've seen an engineer run a "sideways" xy for this setup. The right channel is pointed up towards the mouth and the other at the guitar.
However, I did not like the results as much as other techniques.
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I do this all the time @ home as 'demos' and roughs for new songs.
I'm sure you know how to setup your mic (I like to fool around with various configs but x/y cards is what I've used lately) but I tend to simply set the mics back a few feet, depending on how 'live' the room is. I also orient them about head-high (that is, where my head will be when I'm playing & singing.) The height helps the vocals stand out a bit but, to really overcome your 'loud' guitar; sing louder or play softer.
Think of that 'live' performance as a demo. When you want to get serious, you'll have to re-evaluate and consider recording the vox separately (or, more gear!)
Edit to add:
I've seen an engineer run a "sideways" xy for this setup. The right channel is pointed up towards the mouth and the other at the guitar.
However, I did not like the results as much as other techniques.
I did this once. The results were interesting but I have not tried it again.
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I'm sure you know how to setup your mic (I like to fool around with various configs but x/y cards is what I've used lately) but I tend to simply set the mics back a few feet, depending on how 'live' the room is. I also orient them about head-high (that is, where my head will be when I'm playing & singing.) The height helps the vocals stand out a bit but, to really overcome your 'loud' guitar; sing louder or play softer.
If all you have is a stereo mic then this might be your best bet IMO.
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Excellent! This is basically rough demos so I can find some musicians to work with around here. I'll try both configs.
If its at head height do you think I should still try and muffle the guitar somehow?
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Excellent! This is basically rough demos so I can find some musicians to work with around here. I'll try both configs.
If its at head height do you think I should still try and muffle the guitar somehow?
I wouldn't do anything that is going to change the tonality of the guitar. If you are limited to a single stereo mic (you have other pairs right?) I'd just experiment with the placement until you get it where the balance is natural.
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If its at head height do you think I should still try and muffle the guitar somehow?
probably not neccessary
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If its at head height do you think I should still try and muffle the guitar somehow?
No. After a couple takes you'll know if you're singing loud enough or if you need to lighen up your hand but, as anodyne said, you don't want to alter the tone of your guitar. If it you can't get past it tho, send the guitar to me and i'll let you use my old Sigma... ;)
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If its at head height do you think I should still try and muffle the guitar somehow?
No. After a couple takes you'll know if you're singing loud enough or if you need to lighen up your hand but, as anodyne said, you don't want to alter the tone of your guitar. If it you can't get past it tho, send the guitar to me and i'll let you use my old Sigma... ;)
oh yeah like that's a good deal... ;)
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If its at head height do you think I should still try and muffle the guitar somehow?
No. After a couple takes you'll know if you're singing loud enough or if you need to lighen up your hand but, as anodyne said, you don't want to alter the tone of your guitar. If it you can't get past it tho, send the guitar to me and i'll let you use my old Sigma... ;)
Or my Breedlove isn't too loud, I could swap you too. ;)
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haha my guitar is a bit road beaten. Its 23 years young and its got its fair share of scratch and dents. Not exactly a beaut, but I love its sound.
What type of breedlove do you have out of curiousity. I've always been intrigued by them.
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haha my guitar is a bit road beaten. Its 23 years young and its got its fair share of scratch and dents. Not exactly a beaut, but I love its sound.
What type of breedlove do you have out of curiousity. I've always been intrigued by them.
I have an Atlas series. SC25 actually. It was a gift from a friend who is an acoustic guitar nut. I was in love with his 314 Taylor and this was the closest thing that he could find to the Taylor's sound at a low price point (he was working in a shop and got guitars at cost). He did have one of the actual custom shop Breedloves for a while, and I can't remember what model it was, but it never really did anything for me. It was way too mellow and very tempermental. Always in need of adjustment and very particular about what brand and gauge strings were on it. I think he ended up trading that one for a Collings or an Eggle. Conversely, there was a guy that used to record in the studio I worked at all the time with his Breedlove and I never heard it sound bad, and according to him, it always played the same.
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Excellent! This is basically rough demos so I can find some musicians to work with around here. I'll try both configs.
If its at head height do you think I should still try and muffle the guitar somehow?
What about doing two tracks do your acoustic parts first, then your Vocal parts. Then you have the best of both worlds its very hard to get one mic to sound very good in a studio type situation for two sources. I was was going to do it I would use an omni, but that's just me. I would not change anything with the guitar. I would also try setting up on your bed it acts as a great sound absorber and adds a lot of warmth to the sound. I would monitor with headphones so you can move the mic around and hear the changes right away. Add a bit of reverb around 2.0 sec and your in business..
Chris Church
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Chris is right. I find it almost always produces better results to lay separate tracks or at the very least spot mic the guitar and use an LDC as a dedicated vocal mic, hard pan and mix, monitoring with headphones.
Plus, I'm pretty sure you will run into some weird phasey type stuff using a stereo mic for vocals at the same time you're using it on the guitar. So I'd be inclined in your case to lay down a stereo guitar track and then a mono vocal track. I have no experience with stereo mics, but if it's possible I would just not power one of the capsules and sing into the other one.
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I find it difficult to play and sing separately with the same musical vibe. I used to multitrack friend's vocals and playing separately back in my 80's cassette 4-track days, but as I've progressed as an amateur musician, I find my self understanding why they would often complain about it not feeling natural or capturing the emotion of playing and singing like they normally would.
If you are only using two mics (or one stereo mic) to record and are not overdubbing, you're probably better off treating it like a 'live recording on stage' situation and mic'ing (X/Y, blumlien, whatever works best depending on your room, tone, sound balance) in front of the player (you) as discussed and trying to get a good balance of guitar & vocal. It can be simple, effective and very natural sounding (maybe too much so if you need embelishment) ;).
I do this at home for the same type stuff playing my Taylor 514, which is not so very loud, but is still more powerful than my weak untrained voice. I use my low-profile live mobile gear (4060>MMA6k>R-09) and tape the mics to either side of a 7" dense foam ball hung from the ceiling about midway between head and guitar. The foam ball acts as a head sized spherical baffle and works really well for a quick no-nonsense set up for one to several acoustic players in a tight circle. Nice sound stage as the back half of the circle flips over to the front on playback. Alone, you can get in close for a bigger, fuller sound that eliminates more room. Placement in the room and the room itself are important of course. Experiment and move around.
The 'vertical X/Y' you mention works best with the mic's set to fig-8 and the null points pointed at the sound hole of the guitar and the singers mouth, respectively. More like a 'vertical Blumlein' actually. The whole point of doing this is to try to get as much isolation between vocals and guitar as possible so that you can treat each differently with compression, reverb, etc. In that way it's more of a multi-tracking type technique. Of course the best isolation without compormising mic placement is laying down separate instrumental and vocal tracks like Chris & Ryan mention.
My gear selection is currently limited, but after I find a computer interface, I plan on using the same setup as above as a main pair and adding close mics to reinforce and massage the vocal and/or guitar separately as needed. The 'vertical Blumlein' would then be a good potential choice given it's isolation. Perhaps a more typical card on voice and another on guitar (or guitar direct) would work too. It may not work like I imagine, but my goal is more capturing a 'live' event happening between a couple players than assembling a tune piece by piece. Even if you end up tracking the guitar and vox separatley, you may find it hard to adapt to playing and/or singing while listening through headphones. It's a bit of a learned skill. Good closed 'phones are essential in setting up and positioning you and your gear when you are playing both engineer and talent, but if it hinders your performance, get it sounding right, then ditch the phones and nail one. You're the only one so it's not like you wont be able to hear over the drummer or something. Put on your engineers hat and get everything set, then relax, forget about the technical stuff and catch the magic and emotion.
That's what i've been thinking anyhow, but my quirky ways & opinions don't work for everyone. Let me know what ends up working best for you.
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..Good closed 'phones are essential in setting up and positioning you and your gear when you are playing both engineer and talent, but if it hinders your performance, get it sounding right, then ditch the phones and nail one..
Only if you're not tracking guitar & vox separately of course, or only for the first instrumental pass if you don't need a scratch vox&guitar for reference of course.
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Chris is right. I find it almost always produces better results to lay separate tracks or at the very least spot mic the guitar and use an LDC as a dedicated vocal mic, hard pan and mix, monitoring with headphones.
Plus, I'm pretty sure you will run into some weird phasey type stuff using a stereo mic for vocals at the same time you're using it on the guitar. So I'd be inclined in your case to lay down a stereo guitar track and then a mono vocal track. I have no experience with stereo mics, but if it's possible I would just not power one of the capsules and sing into the other one.
Of course, it's ideal to track them separately; if you are looking to produced a 'finished' clean cut. But he's just looking to rock a demo so he can keep a feel for a new song. A simple stereo recording, not much different from the way many folks on this site might record a solo performer from the edge of the stage in a small room, is a quick, easy way to do this.
It's not sonically perfect but, he did indicate that he's not inclined to get into more gear at this time.
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Chris is right. I find it almost always produces better results to lay separate tracks or at the very least spot mic the guitar and use an LDC as a dedicated vocal mic, hard pan and mix, monitoring with headphones.
Plus, I'm pretty sure you will run into some weird phasey type stuff using a stereo mic for vocals at the same time you're using it on the guitar. So I'd be inclined in your case to lay down a stereo guitar track and then a mono vocal track. I have no experience with stereo mics, but if it's possible I would just not power one of the capsules and sing into the other one.
Of course, it's ideal to track them separately; if you are looking to produced a 'finished' clean cut. But he's just looking to rock a demo so he can keep a feel for a new song. A simple stereo recording, not much different from the way many folks on this site might record a solo performer from the edge of the stage in a small room, is a quick, easy way to do this.
It's not sonically perfect but, he did indicate that he's not inclined to get into more gear at this time.
That's true. But I find that in order to get really good sound with a single mic Any mic you need a really good room and a really good balance. One other solution would be to use the stereo mic for the guitar ( up close ) and seperate close mic for the vocal that will give you "some" separation and allow you to balance the tracks better then a single stereo mic. If I had a perfect sounding room you can pull it off with just one mic but the balance has to be perfect, and from what Sanjay is saying his guitar is very loud. As a guitar player if your song forces you to really hit the guitar hard laying back to get a better balance would be worse then doing multitrack IMO.
Chris Church
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Thanks Chris. That's what I was trying to get at too. Since he just has the stereo mic with the loud guitar it's going to be somewhat tough to get a decent isolation of the voice just setting the mic up in front of him.
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how hard would it be to mix vocals in post? I have no real experience with sound editing programs other than to normalize track and split. I have sound studio for mac and audacity.
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It really isn't tough at all. You just insert the vocal track into the multitrack recording. From there you can adjust it's presence in the mix and add effects. Then to get a final stereo file once you're happy with it, just let the software mix it down for you. I have used Audacity in the past and I know that it isn't a tough thing to do, though I can't remember off hand the exact flow of it and can't look right now because I'm at work. If no one beats me to it, I'll check it out when I get home.
Play around though, you can kick it out pretty easily. Good luck, +T.
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how hard would it be to mix vocals in post? I have no real experience with sound editing programs other than to normalize track and split. I have sound studio for mac and audacity.
Its very easy you simply open up multitrack view select the tracks you want to record and record the guitar first. Then unselect the guitar tracks and select a new track for vocals IMO, I would not record the vocal in stereo! I would record it in mono and process it in stereo with a nice reverb. Stereo vocals do not "sit" properly in a mix especially if you only have one vocal track. You want your vocal to hit you dead center so mono is your friend. Well not really you friend if you have it but you get what I am saying :) Stereo guitar is ok because it gives the guitar more space and allows you to get both the sound hole and the finger board. Get the mic in close but not too close to the sound hole because it gets boomy really quickly but again you have to experiment with that. Use your headphones. And remember when its all done reverb is your friend :) Find a nice plugin for reverb and use it.
I never really eq vocals I just put a high pass filter in around 60-100hz and call it a day. sometimes I will push 12k with a q of about .5 or so and give it about a 3-4 db boost but this depends on your mic. I also sometimes cut 400 to 800hz no more then about 3-4db and again this depends on the source.
For acoustic guitar I like to use a compressor but not when I track. I like to pull out around 100-150hz to get rid of the tubby sound and pull out anywhere from 400 to 1.5k and again do a nice boost up in the sibilance range of 12k or so but again this depends on your guitar. I don't like to record anything below 60hz on the acoustic guitar unless I have too. Then when that's all done I play around with compression on the guitar tracks. You will find you can even your guitar tone out with out even touching the eq with good compression it will help even the low end and high end out. But again too much and you will lose your top end, I use a ratio of around 1:2 to 1:10 depending on what sound I am going for and how it sits in the mix.
Its not a huge deal here because all you have is your vocal and the guitar. In this case I try to make everything as wide sounding as I can "fat" because you can over process always start with less processing and add or take away as you see fit. And remember just because there is an eq does not mean you have to use it. Less is always more. These tricks have served me well in the last 20 years or so. I am sure you can pull this off. I have a new toy you might want to check out to be honest its the best sounding little recorder I have ever used for the price. and it has a built in microphone that sounds unlike anything I have ever heard for a built in mic Its called the micro br and it can do some very cool shit. Check it out.
It has built in effects over 30 of them built in guitar input stereo line in or stereo mic in with plug in power. It has a built in drum machine, built in guitar tuner and it sounds great I will record some vocal tracks on it and let you have a listen to the built in mic! its pretty dam cool.
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wow chris thanks for the instructions :D big +T and to everyone else.
Now I don't have a USB interface so could I import it from my 671? Or would it be easier to buy a cheap USB interface? Also I have USB 1.1 is that a problem?
I can't wait to do it, these songs have been waiting to be recorded for years!
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Just use the 671. That thing will sounds worlds better than almost all the USB interfaces out there.
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I don't have a 671 but, if it operates as any standard 2-channel recorder, it seems that it'd be tricky to record guitar & vox separately and get them synced after-the-fact. It doesn't have any features for monitoring/overdubbing, does it? That's where an H-4 would actually come in handy...
I do a lot of home recording and I've been constantly hedging between my desire for field-ready gear and more powerful/feature-rich studio gear. I think I've finally decided which way to go (studio) but that leaves me a long long way from an OADE ACM HDP2.