Nice recordings, those.
(just to be clear, none of what follows really has much to do with those examples)
I find cardioids often provide a sort of upper midrange presence and clarity that omnis often don't. It's something I like that 'brings the music closer and clearer', I get more direct detail and a shaper focus on the primary subjects of the recording. It often works much better for compromised listening, yet can work well for uncompromised listening too of course. I find omnis provide an openness and sense of front/back depth that cards often don't. It's something I like that 'takes me into that space' and I get more details of the environment in which the music is performed, the distances to the elements in it, and the other stuff going on. It doesn't work nearly as well with compromised listening, requiring uncompromised listening to be effective.
Of course what I really want is the best of both.
I can sometimes manipulate my omni recordings to get most of the detail and presence I hear in my cardioid recordings. I don't have the same skills to get the omni aspects out of my cardioid recordings in the same way. But that may just be my lack of skills.. and there are plenty of situations were omnis simply are not the right choice at all and cardioids are the easily appropriate choice.
Often the best bet for me is using both, not as two separate recordings (although that might at times be wiser and safer), but setup with the intent of combining them.. or an array of cardioids (or supercardioids and cardioids), which taken together 'sample all directions' something like an omni in an overall multiple channel sense.. or ways of using omnis which makes them directional individually, but something like omnidirectional in combination.. or say four omnis not set up to be directional individually, combined to produce something sort of hyper-omnidirectional in a surrealistic and pleasing sort of way. All different routes to what seems something of a common underlying theme of what I'm looking for in my recordings.
I was an unabashed omni enthusiast before becoming a cardioid and supercardioid enthusiast, and had to invest more to find cardioids of sufficient quality which I was as happy with in comparison to what I could get out of 4060s. I also think that once I cross a certain threshold of quality, I see more benefit from messing around with unusual setups and combinations of mics and channels than I do from going to ever-higher quality microphones, as long as I approach that complexity in a well-reasoned way. But part of that is what I choose to record, what opportunities I have to record, and how I go about recording it, which I fully recognize is somewhat atypical.. and inevitably once I do upgrade mics I find it hard to go back, even though it doesn't change that basic quality/verses/increased-dimensional dynamic, and it ever progresses like a spiral down the rabbit hole.
I dig that we don't all listen the same way or value the same things in music and in our recordings of it, or the ways we use it and enjoy it. Otherwise this place and taping in general wouldn't be nearly as interesting.
Topic: Next step up in omnis from 4061's? (Read 11092 times)