Recording punchy snare

ecktronic

ecktronic

Mixing and Mastering.
Does anyone know about mic placement for a snare drum?
The way i am doing it justnow is having a 57 on the top of the drum pointing straight down at the skin near the outside edge of the skin (about 1 to 2cm away). The snare sound when recorded seems to ring quite a bit and for too long. I dont want to use a gate as i dont think i can as the snare hitting is pretty fast. Could i use sticky tape on the bottom of the snare to calm down the ringing?
The sound i am looking for is a really in your face punchy sound with not much of the actual snare rattle, but i still want some snare rattle!
Could i use a 57 and a 58 both facing the top skin using the X/Y method?
How should i tune it for less ring? Could i put a soft weight of some sort on the top of the snare?
 
ecktronic said:
Does anyone know about mic placement for a snare drum?
The way i am doing it justnow is having a 57 on the top of the drum pointing straight down at the skin near the outside edge of the skin (about 1 to 2cm away). The snare sound when recorded seems to ring quite a bit and for too long. I dont want to use a gate as i dont think i can as the snare hitting is pretty fast. Could i use sticky tape on the bottom of the snare to calm down the ringing?
The sound i am looking for is a really in your face punchy sound with not much of the actual snare rattle, but i still want some snare rattle!
Could i use a 57 and a 58 both facing the top skin using the X/Y method?
How should i tune it for less ring? Could i put a soft weight of some sort on the top of the snare?
Click to expand...

Ring, what ring :confused:
Duct tape fixes everything! :D

Never tried XY on a snare, I don't really see the point but that’s just me. Minus the ring, does the drum produce the sound you are looking for? If not, that's the place to start. Retune, change heads, change drum if you have to. If the drum doesn't produce the sound (unless you mean "punchy" is a compressed & processed sound) it will be difficult to produce at mix time.
 
To Echo Simman, it has to sound like what you want before you record it.

You also might want to use another mic below for the snap (not necessary but can add a different color when you mix it) I never do that but some guys swear buy it. :) Make sure that snap mike is reverse phased to your top mic.

And echo on the compressed thing too. an 1176 is a great compressor when tweaked right to get that punch out of a snare.

And dont forget about ye olde Dead ringers.
 
Sounds like a tunning and overtones issue...


What kind of room do you have?

What kind of snare?

What kind of snare heads do you have on the snare?
 
The quality, tuning, age of the heads and skill of the drummer (as well as overall kit balance) are factors influencing your snare sound. Getting a great snare sound is not easy, it's something you have to work at.
 
Try backing up the mics a little more. Trying positioning them in different spots of the head. Try different angles. Or simply another room with a better color will help.
 
I can never get a good snare sound with the mic any closer than 4". Also, putting the mic to the side of the snare, pointed at the shell, actually seems to give the best sound (best combination of top head and bottom snares).
 
I've been working with an LD condensor (yes an LD condensor) back 6-8" from the snare and just peeking over the top edge of the drum. I'm still experimenting with it, but I like it so far.
 
ecktronic said:
Does anyone know about mic placement for a snare drum?
The way i am doing it justnow is having a 57 on the top of the drum pointing straight down at the skin near the outside edge of the skin (about 1 to 2cm away). The snare sound when recorded seems to ring quite a bit and for too long. I dont want to use a gate as i dont think i can as the snare hitting is pretty fast. Could i use sticky tape on the bottom of the snare to calm down the ringing?
The sound i am looking for is a really in your face punchy sound with not much of the actual snare rattle, but i still want some snare rattle!
Could i use a 57 and a 58 both facing the top skin using the X/Y method?
How should i tune it for less ring? Could i put a soft weight of some sort on the top of the snare?
Click to expand...

"Punchy" and "ringing" snare drums are different problems. The ringing can be tamed with a pad of cotton taped to the head at the edge (top) or bottom of the snare (whichever needs the damping). The punch comes from both the pre-amp and a compressor. A really good pre-amp has the headroom to get the huge sound without clipping and great pre-amps sound punchy on their own because the dynamics are there and intact. Pre-amps like behringer and mackie don't have either the headroom or the fast transient response to get that punchy sound. Second, a good compressor will enhace the punch by setting the attack to about 5-10ms and the ratio to about 7-10:1. Hit the drum and set the attack less until you get the punch you want. What is happening is that the compressor allows all the initial snap of the drum through for 10ms (or less) and then the compressor clamps down the gain *very quickly*. That is where the severe punch comes from. The decay should be set fairly fast as well. Much better compressors have more controls to really zero in on the sound shaping. The whole key to this is to get the drum to sound right *on its own* with no compressor. You will have to tune the drum and tame the ringing. If you cannot get the drum to sound right, look to another drum as the one you have will not be fixed with any amount of equipment. The hardest thing for new recording people to understand is equipment solves nothing if the sound is bad to begin with. The secret to recording great sounds is to find the place where you get the best sound and place the mic there. That is it. Everything else is just icing on the cake.
 
ah, great thread !
i always loved the TOINGGGG that a snare can make, the long decay sound;.. something like on "saint anger" of metallica,
but when i started to record my own drumkit with more than TWO mics i noticed that its hard to get such a rock solid sound.

now i always record my snare with lots of DUCKTAPE on it, and this does help against the ringing noize and a decay that is too long

but like someone else already said: putting a little piece of cotton under your ducktape, somewhere on the side of your upper snare-head helps ALOT


ftp://fast6:LSh8RNkg@ftp18.smutserver.com/_data/digi/tape.jpg


feels like the shorter the decay of my snare, the punchier i can make it sound :)
 
Cheers everyone. Great help. I am going to use the cotton bud technique and really fiddle about with the compressor. Im using a 24 track digital yamaha 02R and just using the compressors in the mixer. They are pretty good and the outboard one there is too noisy and kills the sound. A little tip on cancelling tom ringing is to put cotton buds inside the toms.
 
Get an Evans Genera HD Dry head. Orient the holes to match up with the lugs. Tune it well and you won't have excessive ring.
 
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