Mic Level Recording Questions

J

josh044

New member
I'm a beginner at recording, and there are a couple things that I'm confused about...

An intro to my recording setup; I have an sm57 hooked into a Focusrite Saffire firewire interface into an older mac.

So, anyhow, all this to lead up to the question; it seems I have to turn the gain almost all the way up at times to get an acceptable level. As I get near the maxing the gain out I notice a sudden difference in the background noise. I go from hearing no background noise, to a lot of background noise. What side of hearing background noise should I record on? Is that background noise reflecting a better accuracy of getting noise, or should I back off the gain once I cross that threshold?

Also, is it normal to have to turn the gain up that high? I heard good things about the pres prior to buying the Saffire, but I'm not sure if this is normal. Should I add another pre-amp into the chain?

I know this is sort of myriad of questions. Any help would be great. Thanks!
 
Describing levels with imprecise terms like "acceptable" and "low" doesn't really say anything useful. Look at the meters in your software and give us some actual numbers with applicable units (for example "-20dBFS peak").

Changing the gain doesn't change the relationship between different sounds that a mic picks up. If the sounds you don't want are 10dB lower than the sounds you do want they will stay that way at any gain setting on your preamp. Set your gain so the signal peaks at or below -12dBFS.
 
bouldersoundguy said:
Changing the gain doesn't change the relationship between different sounds that a mic picks up. If the sounds you don't want are 10dB lower than the sounds you do want they will stay that way at any gain setting on your preamp. Set your gain so the signal peaks at or below -12dBFS.
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Spot on advice. Another thought is that you may need some acoustic treatment for your room or change the mic placement to lower the background noise.
 
Are you hearing background noise, as in noise in the room the mic is in? Or are you hearing a lot of hiss because you have the preamp gain all the way up? They are two different problems.

The SM57 is a low output mic, so it will need more gain than a condenser. If you sing quietly from a foot away from the mic, you are going to have problems getting enough gain.
 
Thanks All,

"Are you hearing background noise, as in noise in the room the mic is in? Or are you hearing a lot of hiss because you have the preamp gain all the way up? They are two different problems."

I don't think the noise if from the noisy room. I'm sure it's not pin-drop quiet, but I think it's a result of having the gain up so high. I just didn't know if this was normal to cross this point where I hear no background noise to suddenly hearing a lot of background noise.

"Describing levels with imprecise terms like "acceptable" and "low" doesn't really say anything useful. Look at the meters in your software and give us some actual numbers with applicable units (for example "-20dBFS peak")."

I'll try to measure some numbers the next time I record. This isn't a number exactly, but I typically try to record to get a signal that maxes out short of the red.

"Changing the gain doesn't change the relationship between different sounds that a mic picks up. If the sounds you don't want are 10dB lower than the sounds you do want they will stay that way at any gain setting on your preamp. Set your gain so the signal peaks at or below -12dBFS."

This seems logical, again I'll check the numbers on this. I'll try to get some recording in tonight, I'll get back to everyone on what the numbers are.
 
josh044 said:
I don't think the noise if from the noisy room. I'm sure it's not pin-drop quiet, but I think it's a result of having the gain up so high. I just didn't know if this was normal to cross this point where I hear no background noise to suddenly hearing a lot of background noise.
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With some preamps, that does happen. It sounds like you are singing too quietly into a low output mic. This is forcing you to have the gain almost all the way up, which can be noisy on certain units


josh044 said:
I'll try to measure some numbers the next time I record. This isn't a number exactly, but I typically try to record to get a signal that maxes out short of the red.
Click to expand...
That's part of the problem. Your levels don't need to be so high. Without getting into numbers (some DAWs don't have numbers on the meters), a good rule of thumb is to have a loud-ish sustained note to sit about half way up the input meter.
 
josh044 said:
"Are you hearing background noise, as in noise in the room the mic is in? Or are you hearing a lot of hiss because you have the preamp gain all the way up? They are two different problems."

I don't think the noise if from the noisy room. I'm sure it's not pin-drop quiet, but I think it's a result of having the gain up so high. I just didn't know if this was normal to cross this point where I hear no background noise to suddenly hearing a lot of background noise.
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Potentiometers used for gain control don't have perfect response over their whole travel. It's common for them to get a bit touchy at one or both ends. Most likely the ratio between signal and noise doesn't change much so just focus on getting the level right. On DAWs without numbered meters halfway up is a good spot for a strong sustained note with short peaks a little higher.

(There are DAWs without numbers on the meters? That's like a car without numbers on the speedometer.)
 
bouldersoundguy said:
...(There are DAWs without numbers on the meters? That's like a car without numbers on the speedometer.)
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If they don't, find out. In Sonar you can set them to scale about anywhere for example, with or w/o the numbers showing.
Watch out for where they're reading as well -you'd expect 'pre fader/peak on tracking but they could be independent (different) for playback -post, before or after the insert etc
 
Farview said:
With some preamps, that does happen. It sounds like you are singing too quietly into a low output mic. This is forcing you to have the gain almost all the way up, which can be noisy on certain units.
Click to expand...

This is the first thing I thought.

Try getting closer on the mic, singing louder, or using a condenser mic to see how you get on.
 
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bouldersoundguy said:
Potentiometers used for gain control don't have perfect response over their whole travel. It's common for them to get a bit touchy at one or both ends. Most likely the ratio between signal and noise doesn't change much so just focus on getting the level right. On DAWs without numbered meters halfway up is a good spot for a strong sustained note with short peaks a little higher.

(There are DAWs without numbers on the meters? That's like a car without numbers on the speedometer.)
Click to expand...

Interesting, thanks. BTW - I'm currently using Garageband, which doesn't seem to have numbers on the meters (unless there is some option to turn it on). I think I'll be saving my pennies up for Logic.
 
Farview said:
That's part of the problem. Your levels don't need to be so high. Without getting into numbers (some DAWs don't have numbers on the meters), a good rule of thumb is to have a loud-ish sustained note to sit about half way up the input meter.
Click to expand...

It does seem like I do need the levels to be that high though, I already get comments that my tracks are quiet. Any thoughts on this? By quiet - I don't mean over compressed loudness wars quiet, at least I don't think that is what people are commenting on.
 
josh044 said:
It does seem like I do need the levels to be that high though, I already get comments that my tracks are quiet. Any thoughts on this? By quiet - I don't mean over compressed loudness wars quiet, at least I don't think that is what people are commenting on.
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Tracking and mixing are the wrong phases of the process to get your final volume up to what you want it to be. Leave yourself plenty of headroom during tracking and mixing and export a file at full quality (same sampling frequency and bit depth as the project), then work on finalizing that file.
 
bouldersoundguy said:
Tracking and mixing are the wrong phases of the process to get your final volume up to what you want it to be. Leave yourself plenty of headroom during tracking and mixing and export a file at full quality (same sampling frequency and bit depth as the project), then work on finalizing that file.
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Interesting, I always thought that you had to get good volume initially, I didn't think you wanted to bring the volume up too much at mastering, good to know I don't need to worry about it a much.
 
Quiet compared to what? If they are comparing it to commercial CDs, your mixes are not supposed to be anywhere near that loud.

After you render a mix, you can normalize it without any damage to get it a little louder for listening purposes. But the processing that is done in a 'mastering' pass is where the final level is reached.
 
Farview said:
Quiet compared to what? If they are comparing it to commercial CDs, your mixes are not supposed to be anywhere near that loud.

After you render a mix, you can normalize it without any damage to get it a little louder for listening purposes. But the processing that is done in a 'mastering' pass is where the final level is reached.
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I know quiet is a relative term, so I'm not sure. Anyhow, I'll be making some adjustments the next time I record, and I need to figure out what I can sell to fund a purchase of Logic.
 
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