Recording in an untreated room

DarrenVocal

DarrenVocal

New member
Hello there people of HR, I am currently recording in a room that is untreated and whenever I turn up my condenser mics' gain up, they tend to pick up car noises. I am living on the 7th floor ( Its an apartment ) and it seems that I am unable to get rid of the noise, although I have already closed the windows and doors etc. Any advices?
 
It would take a hell of a lot of mass to block out the noise.
To be honest, it would probably take more than the space allows.

Jim's advice is the best.
I record in an old garage with airgaps around the doors and all sorts.
Get a dynamic mic and get really really close to it.

You could try a reflection filter or diy panels, but in my experience they'll help with room reflections more than they will outside noise.
 
@ Darren; Not really. You can reduce it a little with rockwool/blankets over windows, but soundproofing is an expensive process. Forget foam doing anything at all. Sound is transmitted through structure as well as air, so you need to decouple the room from the structure, in order to get really good results.
 
How high are you turning the gain up and do you need to turn it up that much?

I record in an untreated room with a very busy road outside the front of my house. I don't pick up road noise at all.
 
Mr Clean said:
How high are you turning the gain up and do you need to turn it up that much?

I record in an untreated room with a very busy road outside the front of my house. I don't pick up road noise at all.
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With a condenser?!?!?


Listen to this, its me playing on my violin and its recorded a few minutes ago. I turned the gain lower and tried to minimize sound. Any comments? ( My violin spicatto is bad, I know, :\ )
 
Yes, with several condensers. If I turn up my pre-amps I'll get noise but with a good gain stage and good positioning of the mic I don't get background noise, just good clean recordings of whatever instrument or voice I have in front of the mic.
 
I just listened to the recording, and I couldn't hear any street noise even with my headphones pressed against my head. It did seem as though there was a good deal of room in the recording. How close are you getting to the mic?
 
I record vocals with a condensor (AKG Perception 220) in a room that's 25 feet from a well-traveled road. I use the bass-cut filter which certainly helps eliminate the road noise, but I wonder if that's why my vocals tend to sound weak at times. the -12dB starts at 300Hz according to the specs.
I use dynamics on my acoustic and road noise is seldom picked up (Unless a loud motorcyle or ricer goes by).
 
Many of the artists we consider great today had background sounds on their first album(s). Smashing Pumpkins, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, etc.

If it is not too obvious, let it be.
 
dmuchow said:
Many of the artists we consider great today had background sounds on their first album(s). Smashing Pumpkins, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, etc.

If it is not too obvious, let it be.
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That's actually a really interesting point and throws up a couple of things. Firstly, are we too obsessive in shooting for perfection ? I'm not in any way saying that we should be sloppy recorders or that we should seek to make noisy or noise laden recordings. But background sounds were on tons of records in 'the old days' and frankly, you don't really hear them unless you're being really finnicky or it's pointed out. Furthermore, such sounds were relatively {to the entire number of recorded songs} few and far between because the recording environment has always needed to be a relatively silent one. It's a different kind of red light district.
Darren, If you're finding that car noises are on your recordings, perhaps you need to work out different times to record. Or turn your preamps down. Or get in a little closer. Or set the mic up in a room that has no trafic noise able to penetrate. The other thing I wanted to ask is what else are you recording besides violin ? Part of the reason most background sounds {think "signal to noise ratio"} are masked is because there's other instrument/vocal sounds in the mix.
By the way, I couldn't hear any extraneous sounds in the clip you posted.
 
grimtraveller said:
Could you hear any car noise ? How does the clip differ from what it's usually like ?
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Well, I turned down the gain a little bit, so that it wouldn't pick up the car noise. HOWEVER, I just can't seem to be content with the volume of the violin. As in, its just not "focusing" on the violin, if you get what I mean. Maybe it could be a whole different issue?
 
DarrenVocal said:
HOWEVER, I just can't seem to be content with the volume of the violin. As in, its just not "focusing" on the violin, if you get what I mean.
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I don't.
Perhaps you need to experiment with mic positioning.
Is violin the only instrument you record ?
 
I think your clip sounds very clean and noise-free. It seemed quite useable to me anyway. Not sure though if you typically record just the violin solo or add it to a larger mix...

Like others who've posted here, I record with an LDC in a room that is not at all airtight about 30' from a fairly busy road. During quieter bits I can occasionally hear a vehicle in the background, but never loud enough to make me feel like I had to do it over or anything. I'm not much of a perfectionist though, and my recordings tend to be pretty full of sounds, so it isn't as noticeable as it might be for someone else doing more delicate work.
 
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