Mixing

[Guest Tam o' Shantie]

10 Easy Wishes on MySpace Music - Free Streaming MP3s, Pictures & Music Downloads

samantha marson was done at the byre

[Jeid]

As it turns out, my band recorded at the Byre too.

Astronot - Recording Soon! on MySpace Music - Free Streaming MP3s, Pictures & Music Downloads

It was a good experience, but I wasn't majorly impressed with the final results

[Guest Tam o' Shantie]

might add that mark thomas (on here as MTA) did preproduction & engineering for us as part of that 300

have no experience of recording with the guy who actually owns the studio, but he does post on here under username THE BYRE. nice guy either way, if a little eccentric!

[Jeid]

Mark did the stuff with us as well.

How awesome were the huge dogs? haha

[HairyScaryMark]

Just curious, why's that?

Yeah definitely.

I'm no expert but my understanding of this is that while you may be alligning two tracks at one part of the frequency spectrum it will still leave other frequencies out of phase so when there are two microphones on the same source this will never be 100% in phase. It is usually possibly however to get them close enough. There are phase allignment plugins available which claim to examine the audio across the frequency spectrum and allign them at different parts.

Not enitrely true. This is why they build stereo pairs and provide phase reversal switches on desks. Also look at the 3.1 rule in mic placement. If you're home recording, you're not likely to have a desk with a phase reverse switch but a good DAW will have them.

You can also eliminate phase by using a delay line, but as most budget/mid range delays take at least a millisecond to react, at anything less than six inches mic placement distance, don't bother.

If you want big guitars, use one mic touching cloth, then double or treble up the track in the DAW and re-amp the two copies and use radical on them.

Phase Reversal is not the same as phase allignment.

Phase reversal allows you to flip the polarity of a track 180 degrees. It does not however effect time which is the problem with phase allignment. Incidently, if you recording one mic above the snare and one underneath, you should reverse the polarity of your bottom mic as it will be creating a - when the top one creates a + and therefore cancelling it out.

The 3:1 rule is relevant when micing a source at multiple distances but a lot of guitar cabinet multi-micing is done purely with close micing so it is hard to really achieve this.

For example. Devildriver studio guitar micing.

A Sennheiser MD421, Royer R-122 and Shure SM57

or example from sound on sound using 5 mics (a bit excessive)

I agree about double tracking (if you record heavy music) rhythm guitar tracks and even bass tracks an octave higher or lower can be useful when mixed wellShort delays can help give a 'bigger sound' also.

[Tooms]

i guess my question is: why if you're using two mics (and lets say they're identitcal mics for the purposes of this question) to record one source, do the frequencies change from one mic to the other?

Now obviously depending on placement you have phase issues regarding (essentially) the time at which the sound wave hits mic 1 compared to mic 2.

But if you can use your DAW to move (in time) one of your recorded tracks so that it alligns with the other (eg get them to both start at exactly the same time), why would there be frequency phase problems throughout the tracks?

Not trying to be difficult, just wondering.

[threeornothing]

Spot the deliberate mistake in that photo with 3 mics on the cab....theres no chance in hell they ruined the awesome tone they got off the Royer by blending it with the 421 or (spit) 57!!

[soundian]

i guess my question is: why if you're using two mics (and lets say they're identitcal mics for the purposes of this question) to record one source, do the frequencies change from one mic to the other?

Now obviously depending on placement you have phase issues regarding (essentially) the time at which the sound wave hits mic 1 compared to mic 2.

But if you can use your DAW to move (in time) one of your recorded tracks so that it alligns with the other (eg get them to both start at exactly the same time), why would there be frequency phase problems throughout the tracks?

Not trying to be difficult, just wondering.

In theory, speakers are a point source. In reality they're not. Off-axis sounds are going to be slightly different to on-axis sounds.

Look at the polar charts for mics (which are basically backwards speakers) and you'll see what I mean.

Then of course you have to take into account that all mics are not created equal (unless it's a matched pair but even then there will be tolerances).

That's why people normally use theory to get the mics in roughly the right place and their ears to fine tune the positioning.

If you flip the polarity on one of the mics there's always a little bit left, the sound doesn't completely disappear as it should, in theory. There you go.

[Hog]

10 Easy Wishes on MySpace Music - Free Streaming MP3s, Pictures & Music Downloads

samantha marson was done at the byre

Cheers..

Very good quality even for a mega compressed Myspace tune.

[HairyScaryMark]

i guess my question is: why if you're using two mics (and lets say they're identitcal mics for the purposes of this question) to record one source, do the frequencies change from one mic to the other?

Now obviously depending on placement you have phase issues regarding (essentially) the time at which the sound wave hits mic 1 compared to mic 2.

But if you can use your DAW to move (in time) one of your recorded tracks so that it alligns with the other (eg get them to both start at exactly the same time), why would there be frequency phase problems throughout the tracks?

Not trying to be difficult, just wondering.

Your DAW gives you a diagram of the peak amplitudes of your audio files. Moving the tracks so the peaks and dips are better aligned will reduce your phase problems but it will never mean they are completely 100% 'in phase'.

In the real world not every single frequency is going to hit the mic at exactly the same time, especailly true when using mics at differnet distances etc.

[soundian]

In the real world not every single frequency is going to hit the mic at exactly the same time, especailly true when using mics at differnet distances etc.

It's not so much different distances, air is a non-dispersive medium (mainly, C02 fucks about above 28KHz) which means each frequency travels at the same speed. What matters is angle down to the fact that speakers aren't a point source, as I said above.