New Guitar - Happy Independence

bigbubba

New member
So at the guitar center the July 4th sale was going on.

I decided to buy an acoustic that I had wanted for a while. And gave me a chance to test the mic also.

This is my Yamaha acoustic mic'd. Any opinions on the sound and mic'ing technique are welcome. Anything you'd like to share about mic'ing acoustics are cool.

You can hear the click track (a drum track) and the bad playing. Haven't played an acoustic in 6-7 years.

Will also be practicing more. The acoustic hurts my fingers after a while and I couldn't even finish this piece without messing up.

Acoustic Test Drive - http://www.soundclick.com/bands/songInfo.cfm?bandID=419303&songID=5529216
 
Can tell you haven't played in a while; you sound like me! :) You got pretty good tone out of it. Mic placement ia both science and art. So far, the perfect touch has eluded me. But, you can try moving things aruond a little; some schools of thought have the mic pointed right at the sound hole, which can be boomy, some favor pointing at the 12th fret, which gets a lot of articulation but sometimes lacks "bigness", some favor down toward the brigde a bit, which can yield more even tone, but loses some of the fret articulation. Stereo setups combine placements; it's also a matter of taste. I don't think there's one right or wrong way, you have to adjust for the sound of each specific guitar...
 
There seems to be some hiss on the recording. The accoustic sounds good, not boxy at all. You should be able to drop one into a mix no worries
 
Can tell you haven't played in a while; you sound like me! :) You got pretty good tone out of it. Mic placement ia both science and art. So far, the perfect touch has eluded me. But, you can try moving things aruond a little; some schools of thought have the mic pointed right at the sound hole, which can be boomy, some favor pointing at the 12th fret, which gets a lot of articulation but sometimes lacks "bigness", some favor down toward the brigde a bit, which can yield more even tone, but loses some of the fret articulation. Stereo setups combine placements; it's also a matter of taste. I don't think there's one right or wrong way, you have to adjust for the sound of each specific guitar...

You're too kind Llarion. :) After the 20 seconds you can hear a lot of buzz because of half fretted notes. :D.

I'll keep mic'ing in various settings. Currently, it's a sm57. Not a clear recording. Maybe it's the XLR-USB cable that I'm using that adds the noise.

Thanks for listening and commenting.
 
There seems to be some hiss on the recording. The accoustic sounds good, not boxy at all. You should be able to drop one into a mix no worries

Hey thanks for listening and commenting. :)

I noticed the hiss. Don't know how to go about removing it. Or not letting the hiss be on the track. I'm using XLR-USB cable and SM57. It does to my PC via USB.

Don't know what could be causing it. The room and other electronic stuff running?

Any ideas on how to stay away from the hiss?

Thanks.
 
Apart from having the signal as good as can be going in you could use a multiband to lower the highs a touch. That would take away some of the hiss.
 
Is that a kind of all-in-one preamp-A/D convertor? Can you select different sample rate & bit depth?

That's where I'd start looking for the source of the hiss.

It's a USB connector with a XLR connector on one side. The USB side is essentially a sound card on USB. So a XLR-based mic can be used on a computer and one doesn't need a mixer/multi-track.

The sample rate idea is good. Gotta try that. :)
 
Apart from having the signal as good as can be going in you could use a multiband to lower the highs a touch. That would take away some of the hiss.

Monkey Allen - Thanks for listening and commenting. :) Gotta keep a multiband in the process. Currently I'm trying to figure out ACID Pro's out-of-the-box multiband plugin.

Will try to find the hiss area and work on that. :)
 
Nice sounding guitar - no boom!!! Some hiss but I can rely on tinnitus to mask that usually. If thsi is 1st go with that signal path, including the guitar, then it's a very good start.
 
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