individual tom mics

fretless

fretless

New member
hi!

to those of you recording real drum kits with individual tom mics: is it a no-no to use different kinds of mics on toms? what do you think? it may take some weeks until i´ll be able to try it myself, for now i´m thinking about this because i don´t know if i can afford more mics in the near future. if some of you tried this succesfully, post your setups please!

thanks!

chriz

p.s. - my mic collection:

1 akg c3000
2 akg c1000s
2 rode nt1
2 behringer ecm8000
1 crown pc1600
1 akg d112
1 akg d224e
1 shure sm58
2 shure sm57
1 behringer xm2000s
1 yamaha b103
1 beyer m81
 
I've used different mics on different toms. I see no real harm. Unfortunatly, I can neither remember what the mics were nor how they were positioned. I usually go with SM57s, but I've put larger diaphram mics on the floor tom before.
 
One thought in addition:
If you have a seperate channel and track for each mic, then it will be just fine to adjust levels,eq, etc using different mics. If you are sending the toms together on one track to record, then the snare, then the kick and overheads (a common practice for recording drums onto four tracks). It might make a very well tuned kit sound uneven. You'll have to spend a lot of time setting up the mix EXACTLY as you want it before you record. Different mics give you different character. That can be good or bad.
 
fretless said:
hi!

to those of you recording real drum kits with individual tom mics: is it a no-no to use different kinds of mics on toms? what do you think? it may take some weeks until i´ll be able to try it myself, for now i´m thinking about this because i don´t know if i can afford more mics in the near future. if some of you tried this succesfully, post your setups please!

thanks!

chriz

p.s. - my mic collection:

1 akg c3000
2 akg c1000s
2 rode nt1
2 behringer ecm8000
1 crown pc1600
1 akg d112
1 akg d224e
1 shure sm58
2 shure sm57
1 behringer xm2000s
1 yamaha b103
1 beyer m81
Click to expand...

Chris,

I'll tell you what.
As a drummer, and remember this is just one man's opinion, I have come to the conclusion that I simply do not like close mic'd toms.

I f I were you, here's what I would use (from your mic selection)

Overheads: C1000's
(use the "diagonal" mic'ing setup John Sayer has a piece about it on his website.)

Snare: SM57
(perhaps aim it at the SHELL and not the head.)

Kick SM57
(Aimed at the mallet's impact spot)

Kick 2D112
(Out in front)


I would suggest that you make a "tunnel" in front of the Kick drum, just use some heavy blankets and a Card table chair.

If you guys really want to do this right, and don't have a card table chair, go to your local DIY Hardware mega-dyna-whopping store and get a pair of Plastic folding Sawhorses - I picked up a pair, with some PVC pipe, for $30.

Stick these in front of the Kick, put one right in front of the Kick, and the other 36" away.
Put the PVC pipe on top (2 pieces about 40" long)
Drape several HEAVY blankets over this. and allow them to lay on top of the kick drum.

Then stick your D112 down in the "tunnel", and simply have someone play the kick drum, and move the mic around untill you get the right amount of "Boom/depth" that you are after....before doing any EQ'ing or anything.

The trick is, the Tent actually "contains" the Kick sound, and you can think of it as the Kick drum having it's own little room by itself, and it will vastly improve your kick sound, because it also cutes ths cymbals out of it!

I kept having problem with cymbals being in my kick, and the problem was this:
I was recording with Compression on the kick-which in turn, raised the volume of the cymbals being picked up in the kick mic.

It was driving me nuts, and I finally built the tunnel, and BINGO!

So, give it a try.



Tim
 
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