Mic-ing The Acoustic Guitar

HOW TO MIC UP AN ACOUSTIC GUITAR

ACOUSTIC GUITAR MIC COVER EXAMPLES



RECORDING ACOUSTIC GUITAR DO'S AND DON'TS

Do

- Place the microphone further away (more than 8 inch from the guitar) / at least a foot to get a balanced sound

Don't

- Record at the sound hole because it has a lot of air and bottom end / too boomy (It's not good for the mix and you have to roll of bass) 

  • The closer you get the more bass response and the further you get the less bass response ( proximity effect ) 
  • Using a condenser microphone has more wider frequency response so it is better than using a ribbon or a dynamic microphone. 
  • Use a DI if the player moves a lot. 

DIRECT-IN VS RECORDING WITH A MICROPHONE 

Direct-in sounds fake, with no real emotions while recording it with a microphone brings out the players emotions, captures its warmth and pick up the picking and strings sound of the guitar. 

ACOUSTIC GUITAR FUNDAMENTAL MIC PLACEMENTS  

Mono

- One ribbon/condenser microphone / a figure 8 setting microphone in front of the 12th - 14th fret
- Good for layering 

*For layering guitars move the microphone back

Stereo


XY

XY

 - Two cardioid condenser microphone  - Mics almost touching in a right angle
- The sound is more focused
- Better mono compatibility


XY Vertical
XY Vertical 

 - 90 degree on a stereo mic bar
- Brighter, narrower stereo spread
- Excellent mono compatibility
Blumline

 Blumline Technique 

 - Same like XY but set the polar pattern to bi-directional
- Pick up the ambiance from the room
- Only when the room is treated acoustically


ORTF

ORTF

 - Spaced 17 cm apart at a 110 degree angle to one another
- Wider stereo image
- Decent mono compatibility


Spaced Pair

Spaced Pair / AB

 - Phase issues and lack mono compatibility
- More stereo image problem, where one side has more bass and the other has more treble
- One side has more level coming in than the other


Mid-Side

Mid-Side

- One microphone below is directed to the source and the top mic is placed side ways (figure 8)
- Don't use it if you're with a full band

Great microphones to try

- Neumann km184 condenser
- Shure SM57
- Akg 460
- AEA R88
- LA 220

EXPERIMENT

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO KNOW ? 

- We would want to get a full clean sounding acoustic guitar sound.

GENERAL PLAN

Before micking the acoustic guitar

  1. Check the strings and tune the guitar.
  2. Ask the player to play first to see how is their playing style like. For example, are they moving their instrument more or they are stationary when playing. 
  3. Walk around the guitar and move the microphone around when it is being played to pin point the best suitable sound to record from. 
  4. If the microphone is bothering the player, move the microphone back to help make the player feel comfortable.

Which technique

We will be using the XY vertical technique and also the ORTF technique. 

MICROPHONES USAGE AND PLACEMENT

XY Vertical
  1. Two condenser microphone, one facing the bottom half strings and the top microphone facing the top half of the strings. 
One Microphone
  1. One SM57 pointing to the guitar's body below the sound hole near the guitar's neck. 

    WHAT WE FOUND OUT 




     XY Vertical
    1. This set up sounded clear and crisp and it is not boomy 
    2. A cardioid setting for both mics
    3. Bass roll off is set to 0
    4. Would use it for future recordings
    (Panned)

    One Microphone
    1. One SM57 pointing to the guitar's body below the sound hole near the guitar's neck. 
    2. We wanted to capture the body of the guitar for this experiment.
    3. It was a little boomy for a clean and bright sound but it has a warmer then the XY Vertical.

    Comments

    Post a Comment

    Popular posts from this blog

    Mixing a live band recording (Dalai Lama)

    Image
    Mixing in general I started off by listening to the drums first and then I flexed the time on the tracks that are needed to be in time. After that I started placing the tracks into summing stacks because I can place plugins to tighten the sound on the stack itself in the later stage. I then add a gain plugin on all of the tracks with mono on. Gain settings on the instruments are -4.8  on the drums and strings, -8.2 on the guitars and -2.7 on the second lead vocals. After that, I added noise gate on some of the tracks (Except the bass, strings and midi) to get rid of some of the bleeds. The threshold are around -42 to -60 and the hold at around 0 - 30ms.  Instrument plugins (Bus 1) Drums - Gain , noise gates, eq , compressor   (Bus 1 ) Bass - Gain , Bass  amp, channel EQ, compressor (Bus 5) Guitar - Gain, noise gate, eq, compressor , enveloper  (Bus 6) Strings - Gain, eq, compressor, pitch correction  (Bus 4) vocals - Gain , eq, compre...
    Read more

    Studio Composition Part 1

    Studio Composition Part 1 Noise (time: 2’00 minutes) Explain the statement that “‘noise’ is a complex and ambiguous social category that is constantly being renegotiated” (up to 200 words): Noise is a complex ambiguous social category that is constantly being renegotiated because of how broad the term ‘noise’ can be from person to person. The reason why it is broad is  because a noise can be something irritating for some, but it also can be a great use or be labelled as music for someone else. For instance, if a person is trying to turn up the music to drown out a car alarm, it can be music to that person but that music could be something irritating for another person, with that it creates a ripple effect and as what Michel Serres a French philosopher says, noise is like a parasite it is inevitable. Noise like static and white noise could also be a distraction for some but It could be great use when a music producer decides to use those ‘noise’ as astatic creativity and inco...
    Read more

    The Making of Jonas Blue - Perfect Strangers

    Image
    Jonas Blue ( Perfect Strangers ) For the low-cut logic plug in, press alt and search in legacy   Instruments  Uses a lot of sounds from Massive and Sylenth 1   Lead Vocals  (Main Track) Mono  Auto-tune ( Auto tune Evo by antares )    Waves REQ 4  R Vox Waves CLA - 76 (Bus 1) Stereo  DeEsser SSL Channel (Waves) EQ & Gate   REQ 4  ( waves EQ) PuijTec EQP1A (S) L2 (Waves) To take out the peaks  (Bus on Bus 1)  Bus 2 Abby Road Plate (waves) Reverb  Bus 3 RVerb (waves) Reverb Bus 4 SuperTap 2 - Taps   Low Cut (Logic)                                                                     Distor...
    Read more