Headphones & Headphone Amp

[cincy_kid]

2 part Question here:

1) Headphones - I currently own a pair of the More-Me's which I love and cant believe the quality vs the price, thanks again harvey! I usually record some sort of drums with some guitar and then will sing over top of the current music tracks. When I do that (using my Studio Projects B1), you can hear the music tracks on the vocal track itself, so its bleeding over.

When looking through the forums, most people had recommended the More-Me's for good isolation / tracking, so am I just doing something wrong or have the tracks up too high since I am using a sensitive mic? I dont want to invest $100 on a new pair (of say Sennheiser HD 280 Pro's) if the bleed will be as bad or worse.

Any thoughts?


2) Headphone Amp - Currently I am running my headphones from my board that only has 1 headphone jack. Since I will be tracking in a different room than where my mix desk is, I recently got a snake to run from the board to that room. It has (2) 1/4" jacks so I can plug the one end into the board and the headphones into the snake in the room (I hope).

So what if I want to have 1 person playing/singing in the room (with headphones on), and I am at the mix desk and I want to hear the mix (with the tracking person as well) too? Do I just need a headphone amp to accomplish that?


Thanks again for any suggestions ~

[Harvey Gerst]

No headphones will completely cut out the sound bleed, but if you sing softly, close in to the mic, and you have the music cranked in the phones, it could be bleeding into the mic.

You can try adding some more padding inside the phones, or open them up and pour some rubber cement into the back part of the phones to damp them even further. Lemme know what yo try.

[Minion]

I would Turn the Volume of the Phones as low as you possibly can, and while singing hold the Phones close to your head to help drown out the bleed and maybe also step back a bit from your mic...I"m sure any one or all of these things would help to some degree....

[Harvey Gerst]

I'm also about to add two new products to the MoreMe line:

Shooter's Isolation Hearing Protectors; they should knock down the bleed by about 22 dB. They're similar to the Vic Firth models, but less expensive.

Isolation Earbuds; these will knock down the bleed some more, so you put in the Isolation Earbuds, then put the Hearing Protectors over them.

[Shadow_7]

Ear buds with a pair of isolation headphones over them should isolate pretty well. But the artists will likely need some sort of feedback from the mic so they can hear what they're doing. If the person getting recorded has one ear muff turned out or off ear, it might be the source of the bleed. I tend to listen to two headsets myself. The buds handle the bright stuff, the over ears take care of isolation and boosts the lows. I'll probably get a set of electrostatic phones right after I win the lottery.

You could get by with just a spliter jack. But you'll likely lower the signal level to the other headset. A headphone preamp would probably be better. They're relatively cheap compared to everything else. Unless you want special features like talk back and custom mixes per headset out.

If the recording interface isn't full duplex, it could also be the source of the bleed. If I try to use my laptops builtin soundcard in full duplex, I get something like a 40% bleed. Even if there's no headphone plugged into the headphone jack. And the PCM out mixer levels are 0.

[cincy_kid]

thanks for the replies guys.

Keep me posted on those 2 new products Harvey, for now I am going to try and back off the mic a bit and lower the volume and see how it goes.

also is the headphone amp what I need to get to accomplish what i asked?

[Harvey Gerst]

Yup, a simple headphone amp is what you'll need.

[Nick98338]

As for the amp... I went with the Alto HPA4 unit. Does a good job for me.

[Harvey Gerst]

Originally Posted by cincy_kid

Keep me posted on those 2 new products Harvey.

OK, here they are. They're at:

MoreMe Stuff

[cincy_kid]

Thanks again Harvey, I dont know if I want to be wearing the earbuds and war cans while singing but they are nice for drummers for sure

also, when you said a simple headphone amp is all I need, will something like this work for me?
http://www.zzounds.com/item--BEHHA400

Thanks ~

[starbuck26]

I'm surprised no one has suggested putting a gate in the chain. I just turn the headphones down as much as possible and then put a light gate in front. Gets rid of most of it.

[Harvey Gerst]

Originally Posted by cincy_kid

Thanks again Harvey, I dont know if I want to be wearing the earbuds and war cans while singing but they are nice for drummers for sure

also, when you said a simple headphone amp is all I need, will something like this work for me?
http://www.zzounds.com/item--BEHHA400

Thanks ~

Well, they will give you very good isolation.

The Behringer headphone amp should work fine for your needs.

[kylehughes1@mac]

i've got no new suggestions, but i will say backing off a bit and lowering the headphone volume helps a LOT... i used crappy headphones for a long time that would bleed and bleed... usually i looked and saw that my volume on the headphones was so high it was even hurting my ears a little. finally, i got some vic firth isolation headphones, and now i can lower the volume and still hear it clearly without bleed!

let us know how it goes!

[StevenT]

I'm real happy with audio-technica ATH-M40fs headphones. Very true sound made for engineering and mixing as well as recording (they isolate well).

Also Behringer AMP800 headphone amp! Has A/B (two seperate stereo input busses), 4 individual line in level controls, 4 individual volume controls, and LED Meters for levels/clipping.

Both reasonable priced and VERY good quality. I like my audiotech's more than the seins i've used at other studios - comfy and GREAT flat response (good frequency range)!