AT4040 / AT4041 placement part 2

[Blessed]

The first thread was educational and alleviated some frustration.

I cannot mix the brands of cables I own as this introduced the phase issues. As recommended, I went back to where I originally tasted marginal success in achieving a satisfactory sound.

SDC 6” @ 12 fret angled slightly toward sound hole
LDC 6” @ body between bridge and edge angled also

I don’t think I’m the “sweet spot” since I haven’t been able to get another player to help expedite that process but I’d like get some feedback for this test run. Please tell me what you hear and what you’d do to improve.

Unprocessed March 28 test.wav (5.4 mb)

Thanks again,

[rick-slo]

Originally Posted by Blessed

I cannot mix the brands of cables I own as this introduced the phase issues.

That should not be a problem. An incorrectly wired cable is pretty unusual. Bad luck I guess. Six inches is quite close for mikes. I will check out the clip later,

[Blessed]

Originally Posted by rick-slo

That should not be a problem. An incorrectly wired cable is pretty unusual. Bad luck I guess. Six inches is quite close for mikes. I will check out the clip later,

Cable: Those were my thoughts exactly. However, the only thing I've done different was pair up the same brand cables for this recording.

Distance: I'm still learning mic distance, placement, levels, etc. The guitar sounds great in person and with my limited recording skills, it seems like close mic'ing captures a more intimate sound. However, this recording is missing some detail that the guitar produces. I'm not really sure how to decribe it since I really don't know have the knowledge or know all the lingo. I'm just hoping to make some improvements.

[rick-slo]

Took a listen and it sounds pretty good (clean and not flooded with proximity and soundhole problems).

It might be an interesting experiment to do the recording again at 6", 12", and 18" (being careful not to aim directly at soundhole) and compare (both raw recordings and tweaked recordings).

[Doug Young]

This sounds much improved, I think you're on your way.

[Blessed]

If anyone could take a few moments and tweak this 30 second clip with whatever processing you deem fitting and then give a quick rundown of what was done and why, I'd be grateful.

[rick-slo]

Originally Posted by Blessed

If anyone could take a few moments and tweak this 30 second clip with whatever processing you deem fitting and then give a quick rundown of what was done and why, I'd be grateful.

I could not do much with it. In the clip the right and left tracks are very much in phase for a spaced pair. Did you pan the right and left tracks towards the middle? If so post the clip with the right full right and left full left.

[Doug Young]

Yeah, I agree with Rick. You must have mixed these somehow? Your track sounds fine, but it's nothing like I'd expect for spaced pairs. It's even narrow for XY, almost mono. What I would do with this is bring up the level, add some reverb, and probably try to widen it a bit. But it'd be a lot better to work with the raw tracks, with no blending between the two mics. Tho the sound isn't bad, there's a bit of thinness to the tone that may come from phase cancelation if you mixed the signals. When using spaced pairs like this, you want to record each mic to its own track (or hard panned on a stereo track) and keep them separate.

[Woodstock School Of Music]

Originally Posted by Blessed

Cable:

Distance: I'm still learning mic distance, placement, levels, etc. The guitar sounds great in person and with my limited recording skills, it seems like close mic'ing captures a more intimate sound. However, this recording is missing some detail that the guitar produces. I'm not really sure how to decribe it since I really don't know have the knowledge or know all the lingo. I'm just hoping to make some improvements.

The more you back off the mics the more natural it will sound for the simple fact that it takes a little bit of distance for the sound to merge and we don't listen to guitars with our ears 6" away from the guitar but of course the more troublesome the phase can be.

Try one mic, there's a lot of engineers that use 1 mic and with a good player/guitar and room there's no reason why you couldn't get a good sound. I have a 4041 and they are nice mics they tend to be a little on the bright side.

[Doug Young]

Micing further away works well if you have great room acoustics. Most us recording at home don't, so close micing is pretty much a necessity. But it's certainly worth trying different distances and see what works. Mono can work, too, tho for solo finger style guitar, using a single mic is pretty rare these days. Stereo almost always does a better job of emulating the complexity of the guitar.

[Blessed]

I thought the track was unprocessed but I did use a template preset when starting this test project in Cubase. Maybe there is some processing taking place when I exported the mix as defined in the preset but there wasn't any knob twisting on my end. I forgot to pan the tracks also.

Doug, what do you recommend to widen the stereo image?

I would like to move the mics back a bit so I don't have to play so stiff. But boosting the levels seems to pick up crickets from miles away.

I'll get another short clip posted.

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by Blessed

I thought the track was unprocessed but I did use a template preset when starting this test project in Cubase. Maybe there is some processing taking place when I exported the mix as defined in the preset but there wasn't any knob twisting on my end. I forgot to pan the tracks also.

Not panning would do it. So you basically mixed the tracks to mono.

Doug, what do you recommend to widen the stereo image?

Most DAWs have some plugin, stereo image/MS that will do it. But you don't usually need to widen a spaced pair track. Just pan both mics hard left and right, and you'll be all set

I would like to move the mics back a bit so I don't have to play so stiff. But boosting the levels seems to pick up crickets from miles away.

Yes, the trick is often trading off between guitar signal to room noise issue. The closer you mic, the less noise relative to the guitar. There are other issues, like proximity effect as you get too close, and in good acoustical environment, the guitar sound may be better backed off a bit. But its all tradeoffs, so you work with what you have!