Topic: Noobie Question re: mic placement

[ravingandrooling]

Looking for some advice on mic placement for cards (AT943's).  I'm going to a show in a few weeks where I have tickets in the upper deck, 1st row, mid ice, in an arena venue.  Quad sound, but the majority (I think) comes from ceiling hung stacks in front of the stage.  You can probably guess the artist.  I have only used binaurals up to this point so my question is - how would you configure the cardioids for the best capture in this less than optimum location? 

My original thought was to use some gaffers tape to attach mics to the railing in front of me but not sure if I should:
a)  point one mic at each stack
b)  point them both between the stacks
c)  use an x/y config pointed at

This is probably a pretty basic question but I was hoping that those with more experience than I, could help save me the pain of learning the hard way. 

Any help is greatly appreciated.

R&D

[su6oxone]

Sounds like your seat is kind of high, but since you're in the front row of the section you can possibly just clamp the mics to the railing in either PAS ('point at stacks') or DIN (90degrees/20cm apart) or DINa (90degrees/17cm apart).  I like DIN and DINa because you get a nice stereo separation and 'depth' to the tape that I feel is lacking when you point at the stacks.  Some tapers love XY but I've never used it so I couldn't really say.  I would try to use a shock mount if possible because when attaching to a railing (by clamp or tape), you can get a lot of vibration noise that gets transmitted to the mics and to your recording that can sometimes ruin an otherwise good tape.  Oh, and I would use cards or hyper caps if you have them. 

Good luck and let us know how it goes.

[newplanet7]

Not sure that will work.
He's mid ice, so off to one side of one stack.

[su6oxone]

Not sure that will work.
He's mid ice, so off to one side of one stack.

Ah... I figured there were probably several hanging stacks in the middle of the venue (like oftentimes there are in those types of big sports venues), in which case that's probably what I would try, especially since at mid-ice he might be closer to the stacks than at the long ends of the arena.  Pointing at the stacks is always a safe way to go, though, if farther off or there's more concern about crowd noise or 'boominess.'

[acidjack]

In a hockey arena, in your situation, I would abandon all pretense of quality stereo separation and all that and just point those mics on the railing at the stacks.  Maybe try and get a foot or two split between them so you get kind of an A-B stereo effect... I say this only because a hockey arena is going to have crazy amounts of room reflections, and the wider your pattern, the more of that you'll get...