Advice for recording live theater

lucasddwrx

New member
Hi,

I'm going to be recording live theater - a musical that includes lots of dialogue in addition to the songs. There's going to be between one person and approximately 40 people onstage during the show.

I'll be recording both video and audio, and I need some recommendations on what type of audio gear I should use.

The theater seats about 500 people and has decent acoustics. My camera + mic will be between 50 and 100 ft from the stage. There's a remote possibility that I can get about 10' away from the stage to place mics, but they'll be at an extreme angle off center.

I plan to grab a feed out of the soundboard into a linux box, but I expect serious drawbacks to this method: sync problems, and non-mic'd actors.

I would like to hear any recommendations for a good low-to-middle end microphone setup to use for recording this type of event.

Do I want to mount a pair of cardoid shotgun type mic on booms and aim them at the stage?

Any recommendations you guys can give will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!
 
Shotguns will work here, but not very well- they usually sound fairly terrible. This might be a good place to try an ORTF pair of cardioids flown in *overhead* (from the ceiling or catwalks) quite close to the center of the stage, just a few feet (5-20, depending on the width of the stage) out from the proscenium. I've done this with Oktava MC012s with the cardioid capsule, spaced 7" apart and splayed at 110deg, and hung from the catwalks so that they were 15 feet or so above the stage, with excellent results. You want to be back just a bit, so that the angle to the wings is 120-130deg, to get the flattest coverage (and minimize the audience noise, which can be a significant hassle with this arrangement). The audience won't see them at all.

I have another show like this one to record, and I'm going to build a Jecklin disc and use a pair of MC012s with the omni capsules. With the disc rig, you want to be *very close* in to the proscenium: you might even be able to fly it just upstage of the main curtain, if little of the action takes place in front of the plane of the curtain. For the show I have to do, there is no action in front of the curtain at all (other than a few exceptions covered by specific spot or body mics), so this'll work well and be completely invisible.

Another possibility might be to rent a Crown SASS-P, which has many of the characteristics of the Jecklin (two hemispheric pickup patterns glued together null-to-null). Or if worse came to worse you could try to do the usual budget-theatre thing of using cardioids (4 or 6 of them) mounted low along the downstage edge of the stage, out of the sightlines. But that almost always ends up with *massive* foot-noise problems swamping the dialogue (hint: don't do it if you have dance numbers!). I'd rather go up high than down low...

I'll almost guarantee that you don't want anything from the FOH board, unless you have body mics on some of the principals. For this work, you have to take the mics to where it sounds good, as much as you can without compromising sightlines. And the type and placement of mics used for feedback resistance for FOH will just not cut it for the best recording quality. Get up on stage as best you can- don't try to go from the back of the hall with shotguns. I don't think you'll like the result...

Hey, Harvey: whaddaya think?
 
I'm going through this very thing right now. I'm doing sound for a production of Hair. Great cast, nice theatre but the theater company had a $500 budget for sound. AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!
Well what I did was run 2 AT ATM87R and 1 AT ATM851R boundary mics in the front of the stage. I hung 2 MXL 603"s over 2 areas where several numbers are performed. I ran that through 4 decent PA cabniets. I hung 2 more 851's from the ceiling and taped the live PA sound from them. No, it's not great but it doesn't suck. Well at least not much. Here is a link to listen to what I got.
www.nowhereradio.com/babyfishmouth/singles

Good Luck
 
On the subject home made Jeklin disc, I cobbled this together for use with an Octava omni pair.
 

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Hey, Zbert: how'd you handle the foot noise issue with those boundary mics? That's what finally killed them for me for live work: I could never get control over that... If you've got a good low-sight-impact solution, I'm all ears!

It's tough recording live theatre, especially when you are called in late in the game (after the show is up, and the house sound is set). You are always the red-headed stepchild, seems like: no budget, no place to put gear, no slack cut, and perfection demanded every time...

Shoot, if it was easy, everybody'd be doing it!

Track rat: Mouse pads _rule_... (;-)
 
zbert: Nice Hair recording...

all:
At present I have 0 mics. But, one thing I failed to mention: they have mics. I believe the leads will be wearing some wireless mics, and there will probably be one or two PZMs for the chorus. (PZM == boundary mic ?)

So, I think:
If the cast is going to be mic'd, then they aren't going to be as loud from very close. (perhaps a half-baked theory. I know that as an actor, when I have a mic, I don't project as loudly with my speaking voice, though I sing the same - and to prove it, I've blown out more than one mic - woops). However, if I am in the house, the speakers will make up for that (maybe). And if I mount some mics (say, the AKG C1000S - any opinions?) upstairs and put them in an X-Y configuration, I should ("should") get what the audience hears, right?

On the other hand, if I mount some omnidirectionals on the stage (any brand recommendations?) in addition to - or instead of? - the mics upstairs, I would probably get a better recording.

My limitations, as you might have guessed are: ignorance of the subject, and money.

fwiw: :)
I'd like to spend less than $1000 on audio equipment (mics, equipment to mount them, cable to connect them)

re: Skip's recommendation to fly in mics ::
Frankly, if I can accomplish a quality recording without having to put mics on the stage (why? because of the configuration of our theater, mics on the stage will noticeably block the view of the first few rows), I'd prefer that situation. Additionally, because of our configuration, hanging mics above the stage is not a very easy task. It's possible, but I'm a relative novice and, while I hate to cut corners and do a half-fast job of things, I want to simplify this as much as possible.

Thanks so much for your comments, guys
 
Hey Skippy
The fact that Hair is a "hippie" musical most of the performers don't wear shoes. The AT mics just are good at aiming up so the foot noise problem is not too bad. Yeah it's always going to get some noise but I'm really surprised at how much they miss floor noise. BTW these boundary mics are great for drum overheads, The AT ATM87R is rated to go in a bass drum (I just got that mic and haven't tried that yet) The mics also do good job for stereo gutiar or acoustic piano and as room mics. I've found the most of these mics retail for around $225 w/ the phantom power pack. You can find them much cheaper used on ebay without the power packs. (the mics works with phantom power from the board) I now have 6 of these and paid about $55 each for them.

BTW this show has only 11 mics total and 4 PA cabniets and it took almost a week (every day) at the theater to get it to sound decent. Doing theater is a work of love. If you don't love doing theater keep far away and stay in your studio. Skippy, I'm sure you know what I mean.
Peace
Tom
 
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