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  #61  
Old 09-07-2015, 07:00 PM
AcousticDreams AcousticDreams is offline
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Originally Posted by DesolationAngel View Post
I've learned more (and gotten better sounds) in an afternoon in the studio with the Phazer than in several months of trial and error with mic placement/track slipping... experimenting with mic'ed and DI is up next.

Also; it sure does make it a lot less work to get a good sound when you're on your lonesome in a studio with an acoustic guitar (it's not like I can 're-amp' a D-28). Set up mics in reasonably decent places. Record. Strap the Phazer as outboard on one of the tracks and sweep to sweet. Print it. Done.
Absolutely love this discussion going on. As I have spent the last two hours fooling with mic placement...and two hours yesterday.. A complete novice in this area...combined with experimenting(probably foolishly) with close mic techniques. Well, it can kind of beat you up.
Thanks to Doug with his articles on phasing and to DesolationAngel for his great input as well...I am starting to learn.
So let me see if I have this right. the Phazer ( I assume this is the product you are talking about.
http://www.sweetwater.com/store/deta...=c&matchtype=b
You can place the mics where ever you want...and even if you have phasing...from this mic placement..you can correct the phasing problem with this device? IF so, then it would seem like this device would really be a great tool as you could now put the mic for where you think is the best tone...instead of putting the mic where you won't get phasing? Is this correct?
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  #62  
Old 09-07-2015, 07:02 PM
sdelsolray sdelsolray is offline
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Originally Posted by DesolationAngel View Post
I've learned more (and gotten better sounds) in an afternoon in the studio with the Phazer than in several months of trial and error with mic placement/track slipping... experimenting with mic'ed and DI is up next.

Also; it sure does make it a lot less work to get a good sound when you're on your lonesome in a studio with an acoustic guitar (it's not like I can 're-amp' a D-28). Set up mics in reasonably decent places. Record. Strap the Phazer as outboard on one of the tracks and sweep to sweet. Print it. Done.
If you use an external analog device when mixing on only one track when mixing two tracks, the one track must go through a DA conversion step, the analog processing step and an AD conversion step but the other track does none of these steps. First, a certain amount of latency will be generated with the OTB track when compared to the unprocessed track. Most DAWs can compensate for both ITB delay and OTB delay, so make sure you employ that feature if you have it. Second, the OTB track will end up different than the original because of the analog processing (I'm leaving aside the loopback effects of DA and AD conversion which also can make a minor difference) even if the phase adjustment control is set to "0".

I would suggest that you (i) run the other track (the one you did not originally use the phase devise on) OTB through DA, the analog phase adjustment tool and the AD and rerecord that track leaving the phase adjustment set of "0" and next (ii) do what you did to the other track OTB but use the phase adjustment to taste. This does two things. First, it eliminates any relative latency difference between the two tracks (same result as DAW settings might provide). Second, it applies the same analog circuit to both tracks.
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  #63  
Old 09-07-2015, 07:13 PM
sdelsolray sdelsolray is offline
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Originally Posted by Knives&Guitars View Post
Absolutely love this discussion going on. As I have spent the last two hours fooling with mic placement...and two hours yesterday.. A complete novice in this area...combined with experimenting(probably foolishly) with close mic techniques. Well, it can kind of beat you up.
Thanks to Doug with his articles on phasing and to DesolationAngel for his great input as well...I am starting to learn.
So let me see if I have this right. the Phazer ( I assume this is the product you are talking about.
http://www.sweetwater.com/store/deta...=c&matchtype=b
You can place the mics where ever you want...and even if you have phasing...from this mic placement..you can correct the phasing problem with this device? IF so, then it would seem like this device would really be a great tool as you could now put the mic for where you think is the best tone...instead of putting the mic where you won't get phasing? Is this correct?
No, you cannot totally correct (i.e., remove) phase differences from a recording with this devise. You can adjust relative phase with it. For example, say your two mic recording has serious phase cancellation at 120 Hz and phase enhancement at 300 Hz. By using the device, you can mitigate both of these, but you will likely create new phase cancellation at a different frequency (say 160 Hz) and will likely create new phase enhancement at a different frequency (say 274 Hz). That may sound worse, may sound better or may not sound better or worse just different. With this example, it will sound better (i.e., more accurate) if the song you are playing has notes at 120 Hz and 300 Hz but does not have notes at 160 Hz and 274 Hz) and vice versa it will sound worse (or so the theory goes).
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  #64  
Old 09-07-2015, 07:14 PM
DesolationAngel DesolationAngel is offline
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I can't even begin to call myself 'expert' in any of this... I literally got the Phazer on Saturday with the intent to actually teach myself more about this stuff. The thing is, unless you've heard phase cancellation then it's difficult to know what it is and what effect it makes on your sound. The nice thing about the Phazer is that you can listen without it–bypassed–and then turn it on. You can flip the phase. Or you can sweep it around and the differences you hear are quite different. As sdelsolray (someone who is well worth paying attention to by the way) states, it does bring it's own issues the way I'm doing it. Radial (a well respected maker of all sorts of clever doodads in bombproof boxes) are not to be sniffed at when it comes to this kind of stuff. But you pay for the privilege. The Phazer isn't as expensive as the Little Labs jobby, but it doesn't do as many things either (it's not a DI for instance).

The other thing to note, and the thing that Doug and I were just going back 'n' forth on, is that with electric guitar kinda stuff, there is often a process called 'reamping', which makes it easy to sit with a phase alignment tool like this and sweep it to get the 'best' sound from two sources. But with acoustic guitar you can't record something and then send it BACK to the guitar. So, what I've been fiddling with this afternoon is using the Phazer in my DAW. So the track I'm fiddling with squirts it's signal out to the Phazer and then back in again (using, in Logic Pro, an 'I/O' plugin). As sdelsolray notes, that introduces it's own issues... to that end the Logic I/O plug actually has a 'ping' button that sends an audio signal to the device and back again... in the case of the Phazer, in my set up, it took 12 samples to go and return. Also Logic Pro X has plug in latency compensation features but I have no idea how good they are.

As I said, I'm still an arch amateur and noodler...
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  #65  
Old 09-07-2015, 07:25 PM
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Originally Posted by Knives&Guitars View Post
You can place the mics where ever you want...and even if you have phasing...from this mic placement..you can correct the phasing problem with this device?
Not really. There's a lot more to mic placement than phase. Mic placement is really important, but it's not that hard. I have a pretty standard spaced pair placement - mics about 15-18 inches apart, about 12 inches from the guitar, about even with the soundhole. I sit down, watch the balance meters as I move side to side by an inch or two, and play. Works fine with multiple guitars, etc. Getting a balanced sound means the mics are going to be very close to the same distance from the guitar, which also means they'll be in as much in phase as possible. That's about all there is to it. There are other mic placements, and different people will choose different ones based on the room, mics, guitar and sound they way, but fussing with phase shouldn't have to be a big part of stereo recording, unless you start placing one mic dramatically further away than another and plan to mix them to mono.

These gizmo's can really only adjust phase at a few frequencies, and with a complex signal like the guitar, you'll always be out of phase at some frequency. Altering the phase at some frequency will change the way cancellations occur, and therefore affect the tone - think of what a phase shifter sounds like - that's a phase adjustment tool that's being swept thru different frequency ranges. The Little Labs and Phazer are a bit like a phase shifter with no sweep. Can be useful as a tone tool - anything that you plug in that makes a sound you like is cool! But it's not really a replacement for mic placement.

I hope Desolation will post a demo, so we can hear what he's doing with his. I could post an example with the Little Labs, but since he's reporting good results, it'd be more useful to hear his example.
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  #66  
Old 09-07-2015, 07:30 PM
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Originally Posted by DesolationAngel View Post
I to that end the Logic I/O plug actually has a 'ping' button that sends an audio signal to the device and back again... in the case of the Phazer, in my set up, it took 12 samples to go and return. Also Logic Pro X has plug in latency compensation features but I have no idea how good they are.
Logic's latency compensation works on AU and VST plugins, where it's all in software. It tends to work quite well, you can actually hear it working in some cases- sometimes if you turn on a plugin during playback, you'll hear the phase issue. Stop and start again, and it will be gone. But with the IO plugin, I believe you have to do it manually because it doesn't seem to know about the external hardware.

BTW, voxengo has a simple automatic phase "correction" tool as a VST plugin. Adobe Audition also has a cool processing operation that will "auto-align" a track dynamically, constantly centering a stereo signal for balance and phase. It can really mess up your sound in some cases, but works well in others.
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  #67  
Old 09-07-2015, 07:47 PM
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The Phazer is more like an ax when what you need is a paring knife when it comes to studio recording of most instruments. It is more suitable to a live venue and low frequency alignment. You can do better with simple in the box delays, or a little more fancy with something like http://www.voxengo.com/product/pha979/

And no, the quest is for a good stereo sound, not eliminating phase discrepancies.
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  #68  
Old 09-07-2015, 07:55 PM
DesolationAngel DesolationAngel is offline
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As previously stated... Phazer bought to explore such sonic soupiness... to that end, product working like a charm
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  #69  
Old 09-07-2015, 08:01 PM
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TIt is more suitable to a live venue and low frequency alignment.
Yeah, I have one, that I used to put in the inserts of my SPS-1 to tweak the phase between dual source pickups. It produced a noticeable effect, but even there, I eventually stopped using it, phase just wasn't the issue, tho I can imagine live sound scenarios where it might be. Mine's in the garage somewhere :-)

I just brought up a track and tried the IBP plugin on it, just to refresh my memory. You can certainly dial in some different sounds with it, tho I quickly found the warmest, fattest, presumably most phase-aligned setting, on my track, at least - off :-)

Also, I mentioned Adobe Audition, and for those interested in phase, it has one of the best phase visualization tools I've seen. Instead of just some overall "correlation" that can only be approximate, it shows you phase at all frequencies and also by time. It can be a great tool for setting up mics (along with the very similar balance view that shows levels by all frequencies), and also makes it very clear that the only way to be 100% phase aligned at all frequencies is to be mono!
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  #70  
Old 09-07-2015, 08:06 PM
AcousticDreams AcousticDreams is offline
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Not really. There's a lot more to mic placement than phase. Mic placement is really important, but it's not that hard. I have a pretty standard spaced pair placement - mics about 15-18 inches apart, about 12 inches from the guitar, about even with the soundhole. I sit down, watch the balance meters as I move side to side by an inch or two, and play. Works fine with multiple guitars, etc. Getting a balanced sound means the mics are going to be very close to the same distance from the guitar, which also means they'll be in as much in phase as possible. That's about all there is to it. There are other mic placements, and different people will choose different ones based on the room, mics, guitar and sound they way, but fussing with phase shouldn't have to be a big part of stereo recording, unless you start placing one mic dramatically further away than another and plan to mix them to mono.

These gizmo's can really only adjust phase at a few frequencies, and with a complex signal like the guitar, you'll always be out of phase at some frequency. Altering the phase at some frequency will change the way cancellations occur, and therefore affect the tone - think of what a phase shifter sounds like - that's a phase adjustment tool that's being swept thru different frequency ranges. The Little Labs and Phazer are a bit like a phase shifter with no sweep. Can be useful as a tone tool - anything that you plug in that makes a sound you like is cool! But it's not really a replacement for mic placement.

I hope Desolation will post a demo, so we can hear what he's doing with his. I could post an example with the Little Labs, but since he's reporting good results, it'd be more useful to hear his example.
Thanks Doug, I am going to fool around with your technique of 15-18 inches apart and 12 inches from guitar.
I have been fooling around with similar....specks... inches apart around 13 inches and only 8 to 9 inches away. So I will try even further like your measurements.
But the best results I have had so far...have been at 10 inches apart..with one mic at the 12th fret and the other..at the beginning of the sound hole( the outer rim of my AT4050 to the outer rim of the Sound Hole) This is at 8 inches...and Of course..at that close distance there are other problems..Very, very critical to moving your guitar from left to right...even an inch..makes a big difference in tone....So I look forward to trying your technique.
Can you Tell me Doug...where is your first mic placed? 12th...10th?
And do you place the mics at 90 degree angles? or Point them inwards a little bit..say at 30 to 45 degrees?
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  #71  
Old 09-07-2015, 08:15 PM
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Originally Posted by Knives&Guitars View Post
Can you Tell me Doug...where is your first mic placed? 12th...10th?
And do you place the mics at 90 degree angles? or Point them inwards a little bit..say at 30 to 45 degrees?
I don't place them by 12th fret, etc. I've never been able to get a balanced sound that I like with that typically recommended placement. I just place them in front of me lined up at an even height, and sit in front of them. Here's two different photos I've taken at different times.

Here's a bird-eye view of one setup, wider, 18 inches apart, I think, maybe 20.



And here's a closer setup, this is probably 12-15 inches at most. The mics look like they're at different heights, but that's because I have one hanging upside down for no real reason (other than a taller stand). The capsules should be more or less lined up.



Angle doesn't really seem to matter much, mics aren't that directional. I may turn them in or out to fine tune the balance in some cases.

Last edited by Doug Young; 09-07-2015 at 08:43 PM.
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Old 09-07-2015, 09:02 PM
AcousticDreams AcousticDreams is offline
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Thanks so much Doug for the nice pictures...Very Helpful. I really appreciate it!
So I see you are using LDC in both cases.
Again...I am a total amateur...can barely operate Logic...as only had a couple of weeks on it.
So mostly out of curiosity for the future, as my budget will be on a hold for now....But what are the two sets of Mics you are using?
And did you choose LDC over SDC...as you like the more body sound from LDC's?
It seems to always be a tiny bit of always a compromise...SDC offer something and LDC's offer another.
It is a whole new world of Microphones now. In the old days..it seemed like mics frequency graphs were designed more on the flatter side. Now I see most mics with frequency boost in the higher end.
Oh..and what is that funny looking black thing in the middle?...you got me on that one.
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  #73  
Old 09-07-2015, 09:19 PM
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Originally Posted by Knives&Guitars View Post
Thanks so much Doug for the nice pictures...Very Helpful. I really appreciate it!
So I see you are using LDC in both cases.
Again...I am a total amateur...can barely operate Logic...as only had a couple of weeks on it.
So mostly out of curiosity for the future, as my budget will be on a hold for now....But what are the two sets of Mics you are using?
And did you choose LDC over SDC...as you like the more body sound from LDC's?
It seems to always be a tiny bit of always a compromise...SDC offer something and LDC's offer another.
It is a whole new world of Microphones now. In the old days..it seemed like mics frequency graphs were designed more on the flatter side. Now I see most mics with frequency boost in the higher end.
Oh..and what is that funny looking black thing in the middle?...you got me on that one.
I have both LDCs and SDCs, I don't really notice a difference as a class. Some mics sound different, but at least for solo guitar, I don't hear something I can attribute to LDCs vs SDCs. Maybe I don't know what to listen for, but I tend to just say "that mic sounds good, so I'll use that" :-) I have some SDCs, Schoeps CMC6 with various capsules and a pair of KM184s. The black mics are AT2020's, roughly $100 each. The silver ones are Brauner VM1s, tube mics that cost , uh :-) more. I use whatever strikes my fancy when I decide to record something. I used the Schoeps in MS for my most recent recording project. I normally have the Brauners set up in my studio, and the Schoeps set up in a spare bedroom for You Tube videos (mostly because they're smaller and don't get in the way of the video). I use the KM184s for live micing, usually, tho I have used them for recording. Any of these mics work just fine for me.

The big black thing is an AEA R88, stereo ribbon mic, which I usually use in MS, and mix in with the Brauners or Schoeps to taste. It's a very different sounding mic, and adds its own flavor to a recording. It's a bit dark on its own, so I prefer it blended in with something brighter.
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  #74  
Old 09-07-2015, 09:48 PM
DesolationAngel DesolationAngel is offline
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Some of my guitars sound good with mic X, some with mic Y... some work for M/S... some don't... some work here, don't work there. There seems to be endless permutations. My boomier guitars like the crisper mic, the crisper guitars sometimes like a less toppy mic (like a ribbon). Sometimes it's nice to put more mellow LDC up the neck where the sound is 'thinner' and combine it with an SDC pointing at the bridge or lower bottom where the sound is 'thicker'. One of the best results I've had with a Martin CEO-7 was an SDC pointing towards the 12th fret and a Royer 121 coming over my shoulder. Another thing I like doing is recording an LDC in omni, to pick up some room, and then introduce some tight sound from a close up KM184 (or even a DI). Sometimes even introducing a tiny bit of 'hair' on that second track to give a fuller sound. Again, a lot of is down to the 'feel' you're trying to produce. Listen to a band like Wilco and you'll realize that there is no such thing as an 'acoustic guitar sound'. Different song, different guitar, different treatment.

Been reading a lot of production books of late (notably Vols 1 and 2 of Behind the Glass, Glyn Johns' book and Phill Browns') and there are a quite a few engineers who NEVER use more than one mic on an acoustic guitar... or on electric... Some argue that an acoustic guitar is a pointless instrument to try and record in stereo because the instrument itself doesn't have enough separation. If the guitar needs to sit in a mix with other instruments then it might work better with a completely different sound to that which you might consider for a solo guitar performance...

There are a million ways and none of them are 'wrong' if they sound good to you and they serve the music you're trying to convey... (and as long as they don't 'break' if summed to mono or shred someone's speakers )
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  #75  
Old 09-07-2015, 10:12 PM
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You have to keep in mind the context when you read about various engineer's methods. If you're mixing an acoustic with a lot of other instruments, mono makes perfect sense. Not sure I get the "pointless" aspect of the instrument, but I can get that it's simply not useful, and maybe even in the way, in typical rock/pop multi-track mix where the engineer wants to create their own artificial soundstage. For the type of music I record - solo fingerstyle guitar, it's extremely "pointfull" :-) It makes a huge difference, which is why virtually any solo guitar recording you hear will be in stereo. But I totally agree with your main point - there's very few rights or wrongs, music's an art, so if it sounds good to you, how you got there, or even what it sounds like makes no difference.

That's one reason I wish more people would post sound files in these types of discussions. It's helpful to say "Doing X sounds like this. Doing Y sounds like this". Saying "X sounds good" is almost meaningless because everyone's taste, style, goals, etc, is different.
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