How does diaphragm size/polar pattern relate to mic applications?

[Harvey Gerst]

Recording drums - Things to think about

I have some time so here goes the start of this section:

Drums: One instrument?

There are two schools of thought on this. Since each drum and cymbal basically produces just one note each, it may be thought of as simply one large instrument.

You can mic a drum set with just one mic, but it's tricky. You pretty much move the mic around till you find the right balance between the snare, toms, kick, cymbals, and high hats. That's usually about 6 to 8 feet away, and about 6 to 8 feet up in the air.

BUT that means you're also picking up a lot of the room, and if you have a shitty room, the drums won't sound all that great. So how do you get around that? It's actually the same problem as miking an acoustic guitar or a grand piano. Move into the instrument's near field (get closer), but when you do that, all bets are off.

In the near field, you have to use more mics, watch for phase problems, and realize you're gonna hear resonances a lot louder than normal. To keep phasing problems down, try just two mics (above the drummer's head, aimed at each end of the drum kit), then see what needs more oomph. You may need to add a snare mic, or a mic on the kick drum, but at least you won't be fighting the room.

If you have a lot of available tracks, you don't even need to commit to a particular drum balance right now - just put a close mic on every tom, the snare, kick, even the high hats, and worry about balancing everything out at the mixdown. (We'll talk about phasing problems that can occur in a little while.)

The snare and kick - the heart of the drum set. Ok, so it has two hearts. In actual fact, the snare is the heart of the set with the kick a close second. Everything revolves around the snare. When you set your overhead mics to pick up the cymbals, use a tape measure so that each mic is exactly the same distance from the center of the snare head.

Miking the snare up close - decisions, decisions.
I use a hypercardioid mic (the Beyer M201) to mic snares, since it has some nulls at 130° off axis, so I can angle it to reduce hihat bleed into the snare mic channel, but even the Shure SM57 kills for snare if placed right.

One of the first places I try is the spot between the high tom and the hihat, aimed at the center of the snare, about 1" above and 1" inside the snare rim. If that doesn't sound good, I then check the actual sound of the snare to make sure it's tuned right and not creating a lot of problems. Sometimes, a little butterfly of duct tape on the snare head, right in front of the mic, will reduce ringing and spurious resonances enough to get a usable sound.

If that doesn't work, I'll check different mic placements, even to the point of pulling the mic back a few inches and moving it up and down the height of the shell, looking for a good balance (yes, actually pointing the mic at the shell, not the snare head).

Finding the right place for the snare mic can actually take upwards of an hour, but it's well worth the time spent. Once I have the snare sound about 80% nailed, I'll go to the eq and do any trimming that's needed, roll off some bottom, add a little mid crack, or some high end.

I usually add some short plate reverb to the sound of the snare, even if it's just in the headphones for now. I don't get "super anal" about the final sound, since I know it'll hafta change a little bit when I have all the other instruments mixed in.

Then I move on to the kick, which I'll cover in the next post on drums.

 

[Harvey Gerst]

Some of you may not be familiar with the duct tape "Butterfly" used on drums. I've (hopefully) attached a picture that explains it a little better. It use a piece of duct tape shaped a little like an upside down butterfy to use for damping out any nasty head resonances.

It works better than a flat piece of duct tape, since the footprint can be smaller and it adds more mass in a given space, so that it damps just the problem spot without affecting the surrounding area. It can be as little as 1" wide and 3/4" high.

Any questions?

 

[tubedude]

I'm still following you, but I can't beleive the lack of response lately. I think everyone is arguing in the cave about how to kill each other instead. Keep it coming!

 

[Tekker]

I'm still here too, but unfortunately I just started college today so my internet time is going to be cut significantly.......but I'm here now.

Great stuff Harvey, can't wait to hear more.

-tkr

 

[mixsit]

Harvey, when you refered to the two overhead mics being 'aimed at each end of the kit', did you mean front and rear?
In other references to a 'three mic tecnique', the primary mics seem to be directed as much front/back as left/right. If that's the case, would this call for more of a mono/center blend mix on the drums, rather than paned? It could be I missunderstood altogether!

Hey, by the way, I joined in late. Great stuff here. Thanks to all!

 

[Harvey Gerst]

Harvey, when you refered to the two overhead mics being 'aimed at each end of the kit', did you mean front and rear?
In other references to a 'three mic tecnique', the primary mics seem to be directed as much front/back as left/right. If that's the case, would this call for more of a mono/center blend mix on the drums, rather than paned? It could be I missunderstood altogether!

Hey, by the way, I joined in late. Great stuff here. Thanks to all!

Actually, I meant left to right. Think of a plastic dome over the snare, with the center of the dome being the center of the snare head. (Or think of it as a force field around the drum kit, with the center of the snare head being Voyager, or the Enterprise).

Think of the overhead mics as "photon torpedos". You want to place the two overhead mics so that they are at the same distance from the snare (like touching the surface of the dome). Now without moving the front of the two overhead mics. you angle the mics outward, so that they are aimed more toward the outside edges of the kit.

I usually aim one of the overheads at a spot between the high tom, snare, crash, and high hat, and the other mic is aimed at a spot that sees the floor tom and the front edge of the ride cymbal.

But the business end of each overhead mic is equidistant from the snare.

Does that make it clearer?

 

[Harvey Gerst]

A few more thoughts to wrap up drum miking

Before we move on the last section (understanding mic specs), I want to finish up this section with some tips, tricks, and general thoughts about drum miking:

You don't always need "stereo drums". Unless there are a lot of tom rolls (or the drums play a huge part in the song), sometimes mono drums will work better to preserve the mood of the song.

If you DO mix the drums in stereo, you don't always need to pan everything wide. Closing up the stereo width will help bring the set together. Most drum sets aren't as wide as the distance between your home stereo speakers.

GENERALLY SPEAKING, you use large diaphragm dynamic mics on the drums, and you use small diaphragm condenser mics to bring out the detail of the cymbals.

A large condenser room mic can sometimes help bring the whole drum set into focus - if you have a decent room. Works best at 6 to 20 feet away.

The better the room, the less mics you need.

You "close mic" drums for two reasons - either the room sucks, or you want more options later, during mixdown.

Avoid gating and compression during tracking. Use it during mixdown if you need to.

Avoid recording the drums with reverb or effects. Add those later if possible. If not, add a little plate reverb to the snare during recording and just a touch to the rest of the drums. Record the kick dry.

If you have enough tracks AND you're close miking, record each drum to a separate track. If you're track limited, record the kick to it's own track, the snare to it's own track, and the rest of the set to a stereo track.

Use eq to get into the ballpark of what you envision as the final drum sound, but don't add big amounts of bass boost at this point - you can add that later, during mixdown. The snare will be the hardest to get right, but getting all the toms to sound even will also be a big challenge.

You can get a bigger deeper kick sound by building a tunnel and adding a second mic about 4' to 6' out from the kick, in the tunnel.

You can also put a second kick drum in front of the first kick drum, and mic that - with or without heads.

You can run the whole drum mix thru a pair of speakers and mic the speakers and mix that in with the original mix to fatten the drums.

You can lay a speaker on top of the snare, mic the underside, and feed the snare track to that speaker to add body, more snare rattle, or change the sound of the snare.

You can run the drum mix thru two compressors to really fatten the drum mix - here's how:

Set the first compressor for maximum compression (20:1 or greater), set the threshold for about -8 dB, and set the attack and release pretty slow (a little past halfway - you'll need to experiment to find the right settings). That knocks down the really loud parts without touching the faster initial peaks.

Take the output of the first compressor and feed it into a second compressor. Set the second compressor for maximum compression (20:1 or greater), set the threshold for about -3 dB, and set the attack and release to their fastest settings. That trims the fast stuff and what you get back is a huge sounding drum kit. The output of the second compressor is your final drum sound.

Hopefully, this covers all the drum stuff, so the next section (the last section ?) will cover understanding mic specs, seperating the truth from the hype and BS, and how to really read a mic frequency response curve (how they're created, and what they REALLY mean).

Did I miss anything?

 

[zoetrope]

Great great great

Many thanks, this is all great stuff. Much appreciated

 

[Henrik]

Ditto that! Harvey, it's really very generous of you to take your time writing all this. I can't wait to try out the double compressor-trick on drums!

However, I have two questions:
1. When you emphasize the importance of placing each overhead mic at exactly the same distance from the snare drum, is this to avoid phase anomalies, or is it because you think it's important to have the snare in the center of the stereo image?

2. If you mic a drum (or anything) with two mics at different distances, as you suggested for the kick drum in your previous post - what steps do you take to avoid phase cancellation (if any)?

Thanks!

/Henrik

 

[Harvey Gerst]

Ditto that! Harvey, it's really very generous of you to take your time writing all this. I can't wait to try out the double compressor-trick on drums!

However, I have two questions:
1. When you emphasize the importance of placing each overhead mic at exactly the same distance from the snare drum, is this to avoid phase anomalies, or is it because you think it's important to have the snare in the center of the stereo image?

It's primarily to avoid phase anomalies.

2. If you mic a drum (or anything) with two mics at different distances, as you suggested for the kick drum in your previous post - what steps do you take to avoid phase cancellation (if any)?

I try to make sure that each mic follows the 3:1 rule, mentioned earlier in this thread. (I've been bitten on the ass many times for this in the past.)

Thanks
/Henrik

You're welcome. Glad you're finding some of this helpful.

 

[Henrik]

Ah, how could I forget the 3:1 rule. I've gathered all of your posts here in one single Word file so I can easily go back and read it again whenever I need it. So yes, this is no doubt very useful!

Thanks again.

/Henrik

 

[ausrock]

I have this all printed out and in a folder for future reference..........just got to get my son to sit and read it now..lol.

Harvey, are you intending to start a thread on drum tuning in the future, as threatened? I think it would be valuable in it's own right as even a lot of drummers don't really know how to tune their kits correctly.

Peace...........ChrisO

 

[Kelly Holdridge]

*raises hand*

Ok, I've been going off of John Sayers' approach to drum micing, which includes putting the snare in the middle of the stereo overheads by offsetting the axis of the stereo spread. Here's a picture of what I understand John to be talking about:

(told you I'd post it, lol)

Ok. What I'm wondering is why worry about phase cancellation with precise measurements if you can get the diaphragms close enough together in an X-Y config? Is it because of the middle tom (or whatever sits below this offcentered axis) being louder than anything else? Is there a distinct problem with this setup? (the snare and hi-hat both have the same off-axis position to the 57's)

Oh, and that's an RE-235 hanging from the ceiling, our only omni. Since omni's are... omnidirectional, is it okay to just hang them like that? I mean, without any axis to worry about, (and outside of tugging, etc.), this is acceptable, yes? (prolly should be further away; we use it as our harmonica mic, too, and that's where it stays inbetween uses)

And if anybody wants to answer the bonus question, here it is (live sound question, but for recording purposes): That vocal mic picks up more snare than the overheads do, a result of Brian (my drumming brother) harmonizing using falsetto, which isn't too loud. Any thoughts on a way to get more of him and less of the drums on his vocal track? (it's a "Sound Addict" mic. i dunno, don't ask) I've considered using a "foamed dog collar" approach to his mic, but that just reeks of disaster. How do drummers who sing while playing get mic'ed in the studio (he HAS to drum, btw).

 

[Harvey Gerst]

I have this all printed out and in a folder for future reference..........just got to get my son to sit and read it now..lol.

Geez, what did he do to piss you off that much? Some states have laws about "cruel and unusual punishment".

Harvey, are you intending to start a thread on drum tuning in the future, as threatened? I think it would be valuable in it's own right as even a lot of drummers don't really know how to tune their kits correctly.

You're right about some drummers not understanding how to tune their drums. I was going to get into a whole section of how to tune drums, but then, I found this web site that covers it pretty well:
Drum Tuning

Peace...........ChrisO

 

[OPunWide]

I hope nobody minds, but I've taken most of the knowledge that Harvey provided on this thread and put it all on one page at The Microphone Primer . It includes diagrams embedded in the text to make the reading easier. I'll try to keep it updated as new messages are posted here. There's also a link back to this thread so anybody can easily check back here to make sure my page is current.

I found the information presented here very useful but difficult to navigate through. I did this page for myself but then realized others might benefit from the consolidation.

If anyone has a problem with this, please let me know.
pblakelock@yahoo.com

 

[Henrik]

Harvey,
You mentioned some time ago that you would explain why many studios use small drum booths instead of nice sounding rooms. So why is that? They trust their digital reverbs and want the drums as dry as possible when tracking?

 

[Harvey Gerst]

I hope nobody minds, but I've taken most of the knowledge that Harvey provided on this thread and put it all on one page at The Microphone Primer . It includes diagrams embedded in the text to make the reading easier. I'll try to keep it updated as new messages are posted here. There's also a link back to this thread so anybody can easily check back here to make sure my page is current.

I found the information presented here very useful but difficult to navigate through. I did this page for myself but then realized others might benefit from the consolidation.

Great idea, thanks.

 

[Harvey Gerst]

Harvey,
You mentioned some time ago that you would explain why many studios use small drum booths instead of nice sounding rooms. So why is that? They trust their digital reverbs and want the drums as dry as possible when tracking?

That's part of it, but mostly, it's to keep the drums from bleeding into all the other open mics.

 

[vox]

Re: *raises hand*

And if anybody wants to answer the bonus question, here it is (live sound question, but for recording purposes): That vocal mic picks up more snare than the overheads do, a result of Brian (my drumming brother) harmonizing using falsetto, which isn't too loud. Any thoughts on a way to get more of him and less of the drums on his vocal track? (it's a "Sound Addict" mic. i dunno, don't ask) I've considered using a "foamed dog collar" approach to his mic, but that just reeks of disaster. How do drummers who sing while playing get mic'ed in the studio (he HAS to drum, btw).

A couple things that might help, use a boom stand instead of a gooseneck so that you can point the mic directly at his mouth and point the back (or null point) of the mic at the snare, use a mic with a tight cardiod pattern.

Good Luck.

 

[Harvey Gerst]

Sorry, Kelly, I missed the bonus question first time around. Usually, we'll use a headset mic to record a scratch vocal, and then replace it with a final vocal after everything else is done.