recording drums

[T.J.Hooker]

Hey Dudes and Dudets, Say I wanted to record my drums. I want each drum on it's own track. Do I need a seperate gate for each drum(mic)? Thanx, T.

[Sabith]

yap...... U would because if U mixed the signal down and sent it to the gate like that, the gate would almost never activate due to the fact something would be over the threshold..... whether it be a cymbol, snare, whatever....

Thats what I think,

Sabith

[bvaleria]

I've worked with ungated drum tracks before (clients having recorded drums in other studios, then coming to me...) and it is A BITCH (but not impossible!) to try and clean up bleed-thru after the fact. Much better to gate individual mics as you're tracking the kit, if at all possible....

Bruce Valeriani
Blue Bear Sound

[Shailat]

Originally posted by bvaleria
Much better to gate individual mics as you're tracking the kit, if at all possible....

Bruce Valeriani
Blue Bear Sound

I would actully be carefull and not gate during tracking but rather during mixing. You cant undo the gate when you come to mix.

A gate used on all tracks might result in a unnatural overdone clean kit.

[T.J.Hooker]

Hey These are all great ideas I thank you all very much. I especially like sonusmans response. Is there a book or peice of literature I can get that explains this procedure in greater detail, Or would you suggest trial and error.That's how I've learned everything else, but it's very time consuming on a solo project if you know what I mean. What kind of triggers do you use , Midi triggers?
Thanx Alot, T.

[jamiecer]

I think what sonusman is suggesting (please let me know if I am wrong is by having a trigger on let say the snare. This would be connected to the key input of the snare's gate. The snare mic is then connected to the input of the gate channel. When the trigger detects the sound (and the external key is selected) this causes the gate to open then close to whatever you have adjusted it to. This would be a much "safer" way to gate your drums because you can focus on the mic'd sound get that how you want it, then switch to key listen and get the key to work correctly. (eg. threshold, attack, hold, release )

FYI. You can also use this in a mixing application. Use a mult of lets say the kick drum. Plug that into the key input of a gate. Run a 40hz tone into the input of the gate. Now every time the kick drum is hit the gate is opened and a burst of 40hz goes through. You can really beef-up a poorly recorded or weak sounding kick drum. Other things to try are "keying" a snare drum mult and and sending white or pink noise through the gate. Or you can tighten a bass and kick by having the kick drum mult be the key input and a bass mult going into the gate. Use the gated bass sound for the attack on the bass and have your non-gated bass track do the rest of the playing. You'll need to play with the settings but your bass and kick will be locked.

If I have done a poor job with the details just reply to this and I'll get back to you.
j

[bvaleria]

Sheesh guys... I didn't think I had to mention that I'd set gates during tracking only enough so that I don't lose or cut-off any notes!!

When I do track with gates, I'm primarily interested in a clean snare and kick - the rest of the kit usually takes care of itself without gating........

Bruce

[Shailat]

Originally posted by bvaleria
Sheesh guys... I didn't think I had to mention that I'd set gates during tracking only enough so that I don't lose or cut-off any notes!!

Ahhh but the resonance plays an important part as well.Not just the notes.
I'm sure you mean that as well.

I find it hard to decide during tracking to make desicions on how exactly will my snare sound before I have all the tracks laid in front of me.
The only place I would track (other then using a trigger). with a gate would be if I don't own enough gates and would need more then I have during the mix.
Then I would consider using a gate to free it up.

[John Sayers]

I'm with Ed and Shailat - I don't gate till the mix then I use automation on the toms instead of gates. I'll gate the kick and snare but only in the mix so I know I've got then set right. Plus I'd probably use a sample for kick anyway.

Cheers
John

[Shailat]

John,
I'm curious as why youtend to use a sample anywhy?.
You mean triggering a sample instead of the original correct?
I use a sample when I just can't work with what I have. But remember the dynamics are not in a sample. Every kick would be the same velocity.
Doesn't that bother you?

[T.J.Hooker]

Man, you guys sure know alot about gating. How many gates would you say one should have on hand in the average studio ?
I have a five piece drumset. Maybe I should allocate six tracks for six mics. Snare, kick, mounted toms, floor tom, Hi Hats, And overhead for cymbals and ambience. Would you guys agree or is that maybe overkill. I'll do more I'm crazy with this shit, whatever sounds best, but that's in my own head I guess. I would like to set it up so it's all set all the time just plugin and play. I'm runnin a mac system with cakewalks metro. The metro is kind of cumbersome and limited, but it was a good deal, and I was eager to get started. I am hopefully soon going to upgrade to MOTU'S 1224 system. That should be big help. Thanks alot guys, T.

[kristian]

i always though that gating and compression was bad during tracking? i dont see how you couldnt gate during mixdown unless you are micing from miles away. ive never actaully mixed down with a gate (behringer multigate soon though hopefully, its getting close to the top of the want list) but kick, toms, and snare are all pretty closely miced and the difference between left rack tom and right rack tom in the left rack tom mic is pretty significat in dB from what my meters say. or are gates supposed to be used a waAAAAAAAaay lower dB. which thresholds do you usually run yours at? and T.J. i dont think its common to gate overheads because if you are looking for ambience its supposed to pick up room echo all the time.

[T.J.Hooker]

That's correct Kristian, I would not gate overhead.

[T.J.Hooker]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by jamiecer
[B]I think what sonusman is suggesting (please let me know if I am wrong is by having a trigger on let say the snare. This would be connected to the key input of the snare's gate.






What do the triggers consist of and where can I find them ? Are these midi triggers?
T.

[John Sayers]

Shailat - I've been doing country mainly recently and I find adding a sample is tighter. I trigger off the kick with a D5 and record the midi version in a sequencer.

I can then go through the midi and remove the bad or missed triggers and I can also adjust the velocity.

I then line up the midi version with the original and advance the midi track (to make up for the trigger delay) so the two tracks phase. I can then mix them together with the sample adding the edge and punch and the original the body and air of you know what I mean.

Cheers
John

[T.J.Hooker]

Originally posted by sonusman
I think that if you play with your mic placement, and are using good mics and preamps, and have good monitors, you will find that in most cases the wide open drum sound is more pleasing to the ear.

Good luck.

Ed [/B]

Boy! Thanx alot Ed. I hope your typing hand isn't sore, and I look forward to hearing that story. Hey if I remember correctly I think I heard once about someone making triggers with headphone speakers. Well anyway, when you say "the wide open drum sound", do you mean like, one carefully miked stereo track ?
Because I have had decent luck with that, I just always strive to do better. Or always look for more flexibility at mixdown. Maybe I'll just gate the snare and kick with thre drum tracks. Even if I can't get the results I am seeking, I am eager to try the trigger deal. Just because it sounds cool. Thanks alot dudes! T.J.Hooker

[bantos]

Ed....

Would that happen to be the 750kHz piezo buzzer? May be a dumb question but there are 3 different buzzers(according to the radioshack site).

[bantos]

Hate to bug you again Ed, but I will anyway!Just kiddin'. Besides using one of those bad boys for a trigger, have you tried using them for anything else? Or are they just too cheezy?

thanks,
Brett

[bvaleria]

Originally posted by Shailat
Ahhh but the resonance plays an important part as well.Not just the notes.
I'm sure you mean that as well.

I find it hard to decide during tracking to make desicions on how exactly will my snare sound before I have all the tracks laid in front of me.

Well, I've found that by gating ONLY the snare and kick, a lot of crud gets cleaned-up and any potentially resonances still come thru naturally from the remainder of the ungated kit.

But as I posted earlier, I've had more trouble trying to work with clients' previously recorded drum tracks and having to gate-out the crud than any loss I would have had if I'd gated during tracking. Mind you, a lot of that problem has to do more with poor mic'ing technique used on the drums to begin with (ie, phase issues, excessive bleed), necessitating gating as a "fix". If they had come to me in the first place, well you know....!!!

Bruce