128kbps... Aah! That's what I said: you can't hear nothing. I mean, this is not easy to say "yeak! That Kick sounds great..." listening to a 128kbps mp3 file, nahmsayn...? Wanna hear more of your stuff.
Which preamp do you use?
haha, none...the mics ran straight into the L&R inputs on a tapedeck, i listen with the headphones in the headphone jack
ive done really nice recordings with just a boombox before...ill try to find one.
where are you placing your overhead mic? and what kind of room are you in?
this is the same set up i use as well, one mic in the kckdrum, one mic a little lower than eye level where the floor tom would be.
128kbps... Aah! That's what I said: you can't hear nothing. I mean, this is not easy to say "yeak! That Kick sounds great..." listening to a 128kbps mp3 file, nahmsayn...? Wanna hear more of your stuff.
Which preamp do you use?
haha, none...the mics ran straight into the L&R inputs on a tapedeck, i listen with the headphones in the headphone jack
ive done really nice recordings with just a boombox before...ill try to find one.
where are you placing your overhead mic? and what kind of room are you in?
this is the same set up i use as well, one mic in the kckdrum, one mic a little lower than eye level where the floor tom would be.
its a large concrete room, one mic just outside the kick and one placed slightly higher than my rack tom.
where are you placing your overhead mic? and what kind of room are you in?
this is the same set up i use as well, one mic in the kckdrum, one mic a little lower than eye level where the floor tom would be.
its a large concrete room, one mic just outside the kick and one placed slightly higher than my rack tom.
where are your cymbals placed? i guess at my setup (crash+splash to the upper left, two rides to the right and upper right where other ppl have their 2nd tom) the cymbals will crash the sound of the 2nd mic. but i'll give it a try.
where are you placing your overhead mic? and what kind of room are you in?
this is the same set up i use as well, one mic in the kckdrum, one mic a little lower than eye level where the floor tom would be.
its a large concrete room, one mic just outside the kick and one placed slightly higher than my rack tom.
where are your cymbals placed? i guess at my setup (crash+splash to the upper left, two rides to the right and upper right where other ppl have their 2nd tom) the cymbals will crash the sound of the 2nd mic. but i'll give it a try.
i got rid of my crash so all i have now is hi-hats and a ride, in the usual places (hi-hats left of the snare, ride right of the floor tom)
Ako, great sounds! Performance is king. A solid drum performace is pretty hard to record badly, even if you try. They are so many variables in a drumset, let alone the recording of it, that it's easy to lose sight of the actual performance.
The order of importance is probably something like this:
It depends what kinda sound you want. If you want to sound like Metallica you should use other technics than if you want to sound like Clyde Stubblefield. What I learned is that it doenst matter what kind of equipmenmt you use, it is what you are able to get out of it.
I record my drummer with Radioshack mics that I bought for a buck or two. The main thing is the placing and the number of mics you use. The more mics you use the more it sounds modern. I record with one to two mics. One for bassdrum one for the rest. You can place this one mic that schould record the rest whereever you want. Experiment with it and find the nicest spot for you listening enjoyment.
What Ako did with his tapedeck is the same waht I'm doing. Fuck tube amplifier, fuck compressors and fuck condenser mics, the only thing you need is plenty of tape compression.
Roll of the bass before you record onto the tapedeck, because the bass will distord before the highs will get compressed enough. I roll of the bass between 6-15 db. Than I record the drums with 6-x db over 0. THan I listen back to the drums how they sound. They are nice if the hihats and the cymbals have a nice distortion which instantly reminds you on your favourite funk 45. Than I push the bass frequencies back with the same amount of db as I rolled of before.
i agree with the fewer mics are better theories... in my experience more mics equals more time fucking around with eq / compressors and worse - gates... and in the end i usually end up with a snare mic annd the room mics.
here's some little to no mic recordings:
one sm57 on the snare (right around the hole o nthe side) - i usually put my mic on a boom and feed it between the toms above the kick and then adjust the distance to the snare
because most of my stuff is 4 on the floor aka house music i tend to not stress much about the kickdrum recording ... instead of super duper compression and eqs to bring it up i usually layer in a kickdrum from a drum machine to give it that PUNCH.
i was just thinking about buying some microphones for drumset recording and was wondering if some of the drummers around here have any suggestions or knowledge to drop on that issue?
my drumset is kinda standard jazz setup (less toms, more cymbals) and i was thinking about the usual hihat/snare/bass/overheads combination of microphones. any mic recommandations?
I've experimented with a lot of differnet microphones, placement techniques, and variations of microphones (count, type, etc.), and I would suggest reading some basics about mic patterns, mic types, and sound design, then experiment and see what you like.
My general thoughts:
Every situation is different. Close mics on a drum kit have the tendency to separate individual drums. This is not always a good thing, and you may try -- for simplicity's sake -- a stereo mic in front of the drum kit (navel high, so as not to exaggerate the cymbals), with a close mic on the bass drum for balance adjustment. If the simple setup leaves you wishing you had finer control, then try the same setup with a couple more close mics.
For jazz drumming, the individual drums are less important than the overall impression the drums make, so you may find the simpler setup suits the music better. For rock or funk music, where patterns are important, it's usually better to have control of individual drums.
It seems counter-intuitive to me to record a sound you know you don't like with the idea of "fixing" it later with EQ, compression, or tape saturation. It makes more sense to me to achieve the sound you like before you commit it to tape. Lest you should have to settle on something you don't like later when you realize you can't "fix" it.
While fewer mics may be easiers, as most folks in this thread have said, there are advantages to using more than two mics, with spectacular results. If you familiarize yourself with the different applications you'll find it's not terribly hard to manage.
When using mics for ambience or stereo, there are several different specific configurations that produce different results. Read more about Blumlein, ORTF, X/Y, and Mid-Side (M/S). Here is a good primer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microphone
Experiment, but do it with a purpose.
MICS[/b]
For Kick Drums:
AKG D112: The most common bass drum mic. The D112 has a peak in its response at 3-5kHz, which is designed to make the attack of the bass drum a little clearer, but (especially if it sees the inside of a drum) can sound like a basketball. It is almost impossible to overload. It is a good choice for general use, although I often prefer an RE20 or Beyer M88.
Electro-Voice RE20: The other most popular choice for bass drum. Good announcer mic, often used on bass guitar and vocals as well (if you want a multi-use mic).
Snare:
Snare drums have a lot of peak energy. I wouldn't have a snare drum showing hotter than -7VU or so. Perhaps start with different condenser mics and see which you like.
Jospehson e22s: This mic was designed specifically for drum recording, and is hands down the best mic for this purpose. They are perfect for drums. They are great on electric guitar amplifiers. They are a first choice for acoustic instruments. They can handle phenomenal SPL. The output transformer is a custom wound wide bandwidth Lundahl device, making these mics suitable for use into any preamplifier on the planet, new or old. You can pound nails with them. List: $1,480.00, so you know.
Overheads and Ambiance:
Audio Technica 4033: Large diaphragm condenser mic. Good bass response. Clear, slightly brittle top. Works well as an ambient mic.
Earthworks QTC-1 and Z30X: Condenser mics. Perfect for ambient placement.
Coles/STC 4038: A favorite of mine. Originally designed to be a general-purpose high quality mic for use by the BBC. I bought two from Wes Dooley 8 or 9 years ago. They were about $2000 each, but well worth it. Versatile, they can be used on guitar cabinets, horns, brass, drum overheads (takes additive HF EQ very well) and strings.
PZM Mics: By definition, a PZM (Pressure Zone Microphone), or Boundary mic, is an omnidirectional capsule against a boundary (floor, wall, metal plate that is built into a Realistic or Crown PZM).
The boundary effect is exploited by the PZM microphone in a special way: The microphone element is very tiny, and placed in a small air gap above a plate. Since this air passage is so small, it is operating in a pure pressure mode, with flat phase response up to a very high frequency. This concept was presented at Syn-Aud Con in the 1970s, first manufactured by Ken Wahrenbrock.
Other mics for consideration in overhead/ambient application: Ribbon mics: as overheads; Royer 122, Beyer 160s. Also the Neumann SM2 or SM23c. Kick drums: Large-diaphragm condenser mics: fet 47s, Sony C48, Sony C37.
PHASE[/b]
Any time two microphones are hearing the same sound, there will be a phase difference between them, not only that caused by the physical distance from the sound source between the two being different, but because the microphones will respond different dynamically, and have different additional electronics behind them.
That said, most of these "additional" differences are small, affecting only very high frequencies, and the most significant ones will relate to positioning.
Once the microphones have arrival-times differences larger than, say, one-half-cycle of the lowest frequency of interest, you can essentially pretend the phase relationships are "random," and go by ear. Try reversing the polarity of the distant one, and if you prefer it, then you prefer it. If you don't like it in either position, then move it. In either position, there will be comb-filtering, and by reversing the polarity, you make the peaks into dips and vice-versa.
Ultimately, there is nothing "wrong" with phase differences. They are part of what makes sound interesting and complex. The key is to make decisions about which relationships sound flattering or appropriate, and which sound bad.
COMB FILTERING COMMON IN AMBIENT SET-UPS[/b]
The ambient microphones receive both a direct signal from the sound source (this is the first arrival of sound at the mic) and a diffused omnidirectional reverberation from the room reflections. The direct signal is acoustically slightly delayed from the close mic signal (as determined by difference in distance from the sound). These differences create a complex comb-filtering effect which can muddy or hollow-out the sound quality when the two signals (close and far) are added together.
Since sound travels (very roughly) at 1000 feet per second, one foot of distance roughly equals 1 millisecond of delay.
Now imagine a stereo pair of ambient mics on a drum kit at an equilateral distance of 10 feet from the center of the bass drum. The mic on the left side would be only 6 feet from the snare drum, while the ambient mic on the opposite side of the kit would be 12 feet away, but only 8 feet from the rack tom. This creates a mess of overlapping short delays specific to each instrument, and different for the left and right ambient mics.
This is fixed if you delay the two ambient mics by a few milliseconds, which moves them out of the haas effect (the delay range where delays affect sound quality and localization rather than being perceived as ambience) and into the range of perceived ambience. You change the phase relationships by introducing additional delay to the distant mic. You can also delay the close mic to lessen the fundamental arrival time difference. I don't like this technique, as the distant mic usually has significant reflected energy, and
"shortening" the distance this way tends to make the reflections sound un-natural. Lengthening the time usually sounds more realistic to me.
EXAMPLES:[/b]
These are the only mp3s I have on hand. A few different types of the styles discussed above.
"Gutter Music". A rock drum set, tuned to the drummer's taste, then recorded with several of the above-mentioned mics, using an ambient stereo par, through tube mic preamplifiers, to 1" tape.
"Tyranny". This is Adam Pfahler (of Jawbreaker fame), one of my favorite drummers. He's got style. Very precise. This was recorded at some million dollar studio, using Pro Tools. Everything was tracked, then the drums were either replaced or "beefed" up using SoundReplacer and quantized and cleaned through Beat Detective???.
"Out at Night". This song was recorded with a modest set-up. A few "nice" mics (nothing expensive) on a Teac 1/4" 8-track reel-to-reel ($300?). Most of the drums were subbed to tape, to keep channels clear for other instruments.
Good luck. Post some clips and let us hear how it's going.
a couple of things i do alot to my own drums inovlves sheets and covering the snare and toms.. gets that real dead beatles kit sound. i also liek to weave a piece of clothe through the snare wires to adjust the amount of snariness.
i do miss my 4 track cassette though.. recording with the track pitched up is the way to go.. then when you return to normal speed everything is massive.
Comments
where are you placing your overhead mic? and what kind of room are you in?
this is the same set up i use as well, one mic in the kckdrum, one mic a little lower than eye level where the floor tom would be.
its a large concrete room, one mic just outside the kick and one placed slightly higher than my rack tom.
where are your cymbals placed? i guess at my setup (crash+splash to the upper left, two rides to the right and upper right where other ppl have their 2nd tom) the cymbals will crash the sound of the 2nd mic. but i'll give it a try.
i got rid of my crash so all i have now is hi-hats and a ride, in the usual places (hi-hats left of the snare, ride right of the floor tom)
sm-57 on snare
sm-57 where OH usually is, aimed at hi-hat
akg c3000b on kick
recorded in a mostly open basement with a cement wall directly behind me
i'm better off mixing drums than i am playing them.
The order of importance is probably something like this:
-Drummer (technique, etc)
-Drums
-Room
-Mics
-Preamps
-Compression
-EQ
-Record Format (digital/tape)
-Convertors
-Cable?
If you are looking to improve your sounds, it's probably best to move from the top of the list to the bottom.
Mike
I record my drummer with Radioshack mics that I bought for a buck or two. The main thing is the placing and the number of mics you use. The more mics you use the more it sounds modern. I record with one to two mics. One for bassdrum one for the rest. You can place this one mic that schould record the rest whereever you want. Experiment with it and find the nicest spot for you listening enjoyment.
What Ako did with his tapedeck is the same waht I'm doing. Fuck tube amplifier, fuck compressors and fuck condenser mics, the only thing you need is plenty of tape compression.
Roll of the bass before you record onto the tapedeck, because the bass will distord before the highs will get compressed enough. I roll of the bass between 6-15 db. Than I record the drums with 6-x db over 0. THan I listen back to the drums how they sound. They are nice if the hihats and the cymbals have a nice distortion which instantly reminds you on your favourite funk 45. Than I push the bass frequencies back with the same amount of db as I rolled of before.
Peace
Hawkeye
here's some little to no mic recordings:
one sm57 on the snare (right around the hole o nthe side) - i usually put my mic on a boom and feed it between the toms above the kick and then adjust the distance to the snare
www.prizerecords.com/audio/prize_001_b2.mp3
two mics.. the 57 i nthe same spot as above and a shitty wollensack omni mic from an old reel to reel about 5 feet in front of the kick
www.prizerecords.com/audio/prize_002_a1.mp3
back to the 57 a little further back from the snare.. my wife is playign the drums in this clip
www.prizerecords.com/audio/prize_003_a2.mp3
because most of my stuff is 4 on the floor aka house music i tend to not stress much about the kickdrum recording ... instead of super duper compression and eqs to bring it up i usually layer in a kickdrum from a drum machine to give it that PUNCH.
apologies for the short shitty clips
I've experimented with a lot of differnet microphones, placement techniques, and variations of microphones (count, type, etc.), and I would suggest reading some basics about mic patterns, mic types, and sound design, then experiment and see what you like.
My general thoughts:
Every situation is different. Close mics on a drum kit have the tendency to separate individual drums. This is not always a good thing, and you may try -- for simplicity's sake -- a stereo mic in front of the drum kit (navel high, so as not to exaggerate the cymbals), with a close mic on the bass drum for balance adjustment. If the simple setup leaves you wishing you had finer control, then try the same setup with a couple more close mics.
For jazz drumming, the individual drums are less important than the overall impression the drums make, so you may find the simpler setup suits the music better. For rock or funk music, where patterns are important, it's usually better to have control of individual drums.
It seems counter-intuitive to me to record a sound you know you don't like with the idea of "fixing" it later with EQ, compression, or tape saturation. It makes more sense to me to achieve the sound you like before you commit it to tape. Lest you should have to settle on something you don't like later when you realize you can't "fix" it.
While fewer mics may be easiers, as most folks in this thread have said, there are advantages to using more than two mics, with spectacular results. If you familiarize yourself with the different applications you'll find it's not terribly hard to manage.
When using mics for ambience or stereo, there are several different specific configurations that produce different results. Read more about Blumlein, ORTF, X/Y, and Mid-Side (M/S). Here is a good primer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microphone
Experiment, but do it with a purpose.
MICS[/b]
For Kick Drums:
AKG D112: The most common bass drum mic. The D112 has a peak in its response at 3-5kHz, which is designed to make the attack of the bass drum a little clearer, but (especially if it sees the inside of a drum) can sound like a basketball. It is almost impossible to overload. It is a good choice for general use, although I often prefer an RE20 or Beyer M88.
Electro-Voice RE20: The other most popular choice for bass drum. Good announcer mic, often used on bass guitar and vocals as well (if you want a multi-use mic).
Snare:
Snare drums have a lot of peak energy. I wouldn't have a snare drum showing hotter than -7VU or so. Perhaps start with different condenser mics and see which you like.
Jospehson e22s: This mic was designed specifically for drum recording, and is hands down the best mic for this purpose. They are perfect for drums. They are great on electric guitar amplifiers. They are a first choice for acoustic instruments. They can handle phenomenal SPL. The output transformer is a custom wound wide bandwidth Lundahl device, making these mics suitable for use into any preamplifier on the planet, new or old. You can pound nails with them. List: $1,480.00, so you know.
Overheads and Ambiance:
Audio Technica 4033: Large diaphragm condenser mic. Good bass response. Clear, slightly brittle top. Works well as an ambient mic.
Earthworks QTC-1 and Z30X: Condenser mics. Perfect for ambient placement.
Coles/STC 4038: A favorite of mine. Originally designed to be a general-purpose high quality mic for use by the BBC. I bought two from Wes Dooley 8 or 9 years ago. They were about $2000 each, but well worth it. Versatile, they can be used on guitar cabinets, horns, brass, drum overheads (takes additive HF EQ very well) and strings.
PZM Mics: By definition, a PZM (Pressure Zone Microphone), or Boundary mic, is an omnidirectional capsule against a boundary (floor, wall, metal plate that is built into a Realistic or Crown PZM).
The boundary effect is exploited by the PZM microphone in a special way: The microphone element is very tiny, and placed in a small air gap above a plate. Since this air passage is so small, it is operating in a pure pressure mode, with flat phase response up to a very high frequency. This concept was presented at Syn-Aud Con in the 1970s, first manufactured by Ken Wahrenbrock.
Other mics for consideration in overhead/ambient application: Ribbon mics: as overheads; Royer 122, Beyer 160s. Also the Neumann SM2 or SM23c. Kick drums: Large-diaphragm condenser mics: fet 47s, Sony C48, Sony C37.
PHASE[/b]
Any time two microphones are hearing the same sound, there will be a phase difference between them, not only that caused by the physical distance from the sound source between the two being different, but because the microphones will respond different dynamically, and have different additional electronics behind them.
That said, most of these "additional" differences are small, affecting only very high frequencies, and the most significant ones will relate to positioning.
Once the microphones have arrival-times differences larger than, say, one-half-cycle of the lowest frequency of interest, you can essentially pretend the phase relationships are "random," and go by ear. Try reversing the polarity of the distant one, and if you prefer it, then you prefer it. If you don't like it in either position, then move it. In either position, there will be comb-filtering, and by reversing the polarity, you make the peaks into dips and vice-versa.
Ultimately, there is nothing "wrong" with phase differences. They are part of what makes sound interesting and complex. The key is to make decisions about which relationships sound flattering or appropriate, and which sound bad.
COMB FILTERING COMMON IN AMBIENT SET-UPS[/b]
The ambient microphones receive both a direct signal from the sound source (this is the first arrival of sound at the mic) and a diffused omnidirectional reverberation from the room reflections. The direct signal is acoustically slightly delayed from the close mic signal (as determined by difference in distance from the sound). These differences create a complex comb-filtering effect which can muddy or hollow-out the sound quality when the two signals (close and far) are added together.
Since sound travels (very roughly) at 1000 feet per second, one foot of distance roughly equals 1 millisecond of delay.
Now imagine a stereo pair of ambient mics on a drum kit at an equilateral distance of 10 feet from the center of the bass drum. The mic on the left side would be only 6 feet from the snare drum, while the ambient mic on the opposite side of the kit would be 12 feet away, but only 8 feet from the rack tom. This creates a mess of overlapping short delays specific to each instrument, and different for the left and right ambient mics.
This is fixed if you delay the two ambient mics by a few milliseconds, which moves them out of the haas effect (the delay range where delays affect sound quality and localization rather than being perceived as ambience) and into the range of perceived ambience. You change the phase relationships by introducing additional delay to the distant mic. You can also delay the close mic to lessen the fundamental arrival time difference. I don't like this technique, as the distant mic usually has significant reflected energy, and "shortening" the distance this way tends to make the reflections sound un-natural. Lengthening the time usually sounds more realistic to me.
EXAMPLES:[/b]
These are the only mp3s I have on hand. A few different types of the styles discussed above.
"Gutter Music". A rock drum set, tuned to the drummer's taste, then recorded with several of the above-mentioned mics, using an ambient stereo par, through tube mic preamplifiers, to 1" tape.
Drums isolated. Same session.
"Tyranny". This is Adam Pfahler (of Jawbreaker fame), one of my favorite drummers. He's got style. Very precise. This was recorded at some million dollar studio, using Pro Tools. Everything was tracked, then the drums were either replaced or "beefed" up using SoundReplacer and quantized and cleaned through Beat Detective???.
"Out at Night". This song was recorded with a modest set-up. A few "nice" mics (nothing expensive) on a Teac 1/4" 8-track reel-to-reel ($300?). Most of the drums were subbed to tape, to keep channels clear for other instruments.
Good luck. Post some clips and let us hear how it's going.
~B
this was a live recording done at my buddies studio.. im on drums here
the kit was micd on every single drum (top and bottom for snare) plus room mikes... like 9 tracks of drums.
ended up just using the overheads.
www.prizerecords.com/audio/designerdreams(roughmix).mp3
a couple of things i do alot to my own drums inovlves sheets and covering the snare and toms.. gets that real dead beatles kit sound. i also liek to weave a piece of clothe through the snare wires to adjust the amount of snariness.
i do miss my 4 track cassette though.. recording with the track pitched up is the way to go.. then when you return to normal speed everything is massive.