Topic: Big-Ass SDC Shootout by Mike Jasper

[TNJazz]

I enjoyed the Tape Op piece when it came out and just happened across the full monty today while doing some research.  Thought it might interest some folks here - there are sound samples and lots of good info on the mics.  True it's a studio setting, but a good mic is a good mic for the most part.  If it can capture an acoustic guitar close up, it can probably do well capturing a ratty-ass PA in a club too...

Here's the link in case anyone is interested.   http://www.mikejasper.com/proaudiobay/SDShootout/intro1.html

[leehookem]

thanks for the link.  I haven't read the entire article yet, but looked it over well.  KI especially like the mention of the C1000s at the end.  those were my starter microphones.  nice mod.

[newplanet7]

Nice read. This is how I see shoot outs to be done as rastasean and myself have stated. Mono and a single common signal path.
Whether it be in a live setting or in studio, the main characteristics of the mics are revealed.
I really liked the different categories and the fact he included modded mics in there. Oh to be a fly on the wall.   
Thanks for the link dirk. Good stuff cheap right there.

[newplanet7]

Actually, I hope someone can shed some light on this, one thing I didn't understand was using different mics at different distances from the guitar.
It went like this: "Shouldn't you record every mic at the same distance from the guitar?" No, I don't think so. Just as the acoustic guitar has a sweet spot, so does a microphone. In the real world, you're going to place the mic where it sounds best.

I thought there was a distance standard for mic measurement and their response results?
Maybe i'm thinking of something else but isn't there a specific distance that all manufacturers use to come up with the response charts?

[TNJazz]

Frequency response and placement don't always equate to the same thing.  To keep results consistent on paper you should probably measure at a static distance, yes.  Some mics sound better with a little more distance between them and the source though.

The main reason I found this was I was looking up some additional info on the Nevaton MC49.  I had a client who purchased a pair a few months ago and he recently checked in with me telling me how happy he was with the mic BUT he had a few reservations about the sound of mids and the top end not being quite as pleasing as he had hoped and that he might sell them and keep one of his other pairs as his main pair instead.  Knowing that mic as well as I do I found that really tough to understand, because the smoothness of the mic is what really makes it special.

Then the other day he wrote me back and told me he was selling his OTHER mics and keeping the MC49s because he discovered that adding a little bit of distance from them to the sound source gave him EXACTLY what he was looking for.  He had found the sweet spot for placement of the MC49 for his purposes, and it happened to be different than what it typically was with his other microphones.  It may have something to do with the dual diaphragm design, I don't really know.  The MC49 sounds better slightly farther away; that's what makes these microphones so good for field recording.  So there's a real world example.

Some mics sound great up close, some need a little more "room to breathe" I guess...

[newplanet7]

Wow, thanks Dirk and John for the explanation.
And john, that 1m is what I was thinking was standardized.
Good to know fellas, and great article.

-todd                                                             

[DSatz]

To reveal anything about microphones relative to each other, a comparison test has to keep the sound source and all other conditions strictly the same. If the microphones are set up at different distances from the sound source, the preference of the person deciding the placement adds a huge additional variable to the equation. You can get plenty of impressions from such tests, but no real information.

--About measuring distances for microphones: As mshilarious says, there is no standard distance as such; microphones are supposed to be measured under "plane wave" conditions which would, among other things, not create any proximity effect at all in pressure-gradient microphones. But that's a theoretical construct that can only be approached in the real world, since for any practical sound source that can generate more than one frequency of sound, an infinite distance would be required for the wavefronts to straighten out completely. And mshilarious is also right that a one-meter distance is generally used (or actually, a considerably greater distance is generally used--but then the results are "corrected" to make them equivalent to a one-meter measuring distance).

Unfortunately, one meter is not quite far enough away to make proximity effect insignificant. As a result, published frequency response graphs for pressure-gradient microphones show stronger, more extended low-frequency response than is actually available, given a semi-distant mike setup such as most people here typically use. And it especially makes supercardioid, hypercardioid and figure-8 microphones look as if they have better low-frequency response than they really have for sound sources beyond 1 meter, since those types of microphone have stronger proximity effect than microphones of lower directivity such as cardioids.

The well-known manufacturers all, so far as I'm aware, deviate from the standard in this respect, quite consciously. It would be against their commercial self-interest for any of them to publish curves that really comply with the standard. I want to know how much influence there is from proximity effect when I look at a frequency response graph, but in most cases I can only guess. There is even one well-known microphone manufacturer (they're mentioned in the test article) that has used an effective measurement distance of about 14 inches. It's a manufacturer that could certainly get that right if they chose to; I won't identify them since I'm not sure whether they're still doing this or not, but the point is that you really have to keep some grains of salt handy.

--best regards