Putting a blanket over your amp/mic

B

BigMuffinMan

New member
I want to be able to play my amp louder when I record it with a mic, without disturbing my roomates upstairs too much.

If I put a blanket over the amp while Im recording it (or put it in the closet/bathroom whatever with a blanket) to make it quieter to the rest of the house will the tone I record out of it suffer? i.e. will it be muffled, dead sounding etc?

The only mic I have is an sm57 and I always have the mic right up against the grill cloth anyway so I guess my question is will I be missing the 'room sound' by doing this, and would just adding some reverb in my DAW make up for that?
 
BigMuffinMan said:
... will it be muffled, dead sounding etc?
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This is from another thread I posted in with similar topic:

miroslav said:
No...not at all...you just add the ambience during mixdown....and besides, when close-miking (like most guys tend to do), the room doesn't figure in all that much anyway.

I don't need to use a closet since I have my studio space...but I'll often build a tent over the amp/mic because I WANT to remove the room from the equation and add the ambience later....and, I don't like to close-mic all the time, so with the mic away from the cab, it WOULD pick up the room, especially when using something like a ribbon-mic with figure-8 pattern.

Actually...the tent approach also does a great job of cutting down some of the amp's volume so it's not bleeding out into the studio (or annoying people outside).

This is my typical tent setup:

AmpTent01.jpg

AmpTent02.jpg

AmpTent03.jpg
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I use this setup often.
 
moresound said:
No they will still hear it.:mad:
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Yeah...true...blankets won't soundproof it, but they help cut down the volume some....and using a closet will do that even more.
I guess it really depends how loud you wanna play and how easily your roomates are annoyed by it. :D

I don't use the blanket "tent" for volume control...I use it mainly to remove the room ambience from the equation so I can choose the room sound later, and more to keep outside sounds from getting INTO the mics, rather than to keep the guitar sound from getting out. :)
 
BigMuffinMan said:
I always have the mic right up against the grill cloth anyway so I guess my question is will I be missing the 'room sound' by doing this, and would just adding some reverb in my DAW make up for that?
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A 57 up against the grill cloth = no room sound anyway.

My guess is that your room probably doesn't sound too great, so reverb would be the better option, even though you're not going to pick up room sound with that setup.

Just tell any complainers to STFU and rock out with their cock out :D
 
philbagg said:
A 57 up against the grill cloth = no room sound anyway.

My guess is that your room probably doesn't sound too great, so reverb would be the better option, even though you're not going to pick up room sound with that setup.

Just tell any complainers to STFU and rock out with their cock out :D
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:laughings::laughings::laughings:Yeah word to your mother:laughings::laughings::laughings:






::cool:
 
What you need is a Speaker isolation box, you have a small speaker box, 10" or 12" speaker, this speaker box is in turn mounted inside a bigger box that is lined with acoustic material and has a microphone mounted in it. The box has a lid which seals in the sound and mic cable connectors and speaker connectors to get the signal from the amp to the speaker in and the mic to the recorder out. You then can crank the amp and only hear the recorded sound.

These are used nowadays for a lot of tours where they don't want a loud stage sound but want a cranked guitar sound.

Cheers
Alan.
 
Just be careful when your done playing and open the box all of that captured sound will come rushing out and knock you on your ass.:rolleyes::laughings:






:cool:
 
moresound said:
Just be careful when your done playing and open the box all of that captured sound will come rushing out and knock you on your ass.:rolleyes::laughings:


:cool:
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And make sure the cats no asleep in there when you close the lid.
 

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That looks like my cat! My cats waste no time leaving the room whenever i pick up my axe.It doesn't even need to be plugged into the amp,i pick it up & they run.
 
philbagg said:
A 57 up against the grill cloth = no room sound anyway.
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Eh, a bit more of it comes in than you'd expect, especially if this is a small room we're talking about. Think about it - the volume doesn't exactly drop off magically by 30 or 40 decibels once the sound waves move a foot away from the amp, so if it's being reflected back towards the amp by a wall 10 feet away, the sound is only traveling maybe 20 feet at most before it intersects with the mic again - it's still pretty loud. This is especially true with reflections off the floor or off any nearby wall.

Miro - how much of a difference does that make? I've been meaning to experiment with something similar to that, but I haven't really gotten a chance yet.
 
moresound said:
It may help then to treat the adjacent wall to help on the reflections.;)






:cool:
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I record in my bedroom. The "adjacent wall" is the side of my dresser. :laughings:


EDIT - and kidding aside, I think this raises a pretty valid point - while it's far more technically "correct" and better to treat your walls to take care of room reflections on a guitar amp, this IS "homerecording.com" and my situation is hardly unique. Using something to shield the amp from the room is totally a guerrilla approach to getting a good recorded tone, but that's the sort of approach many of us are forced to take. It won't do much on the low end I'm sure, but if it'll help somewhat with room reflections in the middle and upper frequencies, then it's a pretty simple way to improve your recorded electric guitar sound, and worth trying.
 
miroslav said:
This is from another thread I posted in with similar topic:



I use this setup often.
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That looks very innovative but I'm curious... Why not plug your guitar straight into a mixer? Or, if the amp sound is particularly special to you, why not run a line direct from your amp, to the recorder?

Dr. V
 
philbagg said:
Just tell any complainers to STFU and rock out with their cock out :D
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What if it's your frail Aunt Matilda ? Or someone trying to sleep that does the nightshift ? Or a grumpy irritable cop that hates rock but loves C&W ? Or a neighbour with a two month old baby ? Or someone trying to watch telly ? Or the Pope ? :D
 
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