large diaphragm condensers as cymbal mic's.

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keat_taylor

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how bad of an idea is it to use large diaphragm condensers as cymbal mics as compared to using a 57... those are my options... begin.
 
Not a bad idea at all. People do it all the time. What matters is that you like how it sounds.
 
how will they be used? I would use LDC's over 57's anyday for overheads. On the other hand, I would use a 57 for close micing my hi hats for definition.
 
Ldc for overhead yes!

right on top of the cymbal depends on the cymbal
 
khb

I have four jacks to work with so I'm going as follows
snare - sm57
kick - B52A
overheadL - Nady SCM900
overheadR - Nady SCM900

into a Fostex MR8-HD

thoughts, ?'s concearns
 
keat_taylor said:
I have four jacks to work with so I'm going as follows
snare - sm57
kick - B52A
overheadL - Nady SCM900
overheadR - Nady SCM900

into a Fostex MR8-HD

thoughts, ?'s concearns
Click to expand...

Looks normal to me. Just make sure you treat your overheads as "OVERHEADS"...not "CYMBAL MICS". :eek:
 
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overheads.

you can use ANYTHING you want as overheads....and everyone of them sounds different.

if you want a sound that is professionall....large condensers at a distance work very well....as with any approach, better the cymbals and better the tuning of the set's heads...better the result. the mic's should just be a window to capture what's there.

if you want total control and use software and overdub the cymbals....to most lament's ears they sound more real because they've all grown up listening to band in the box anyway.

if you want "The" drum sound...you're going to have to experiment with everything you can get you hands on for 10 years....and trial and error until you find what works with your particular set.

I prefer AT 4033 or 4040' overhead, MD421 in close between toms, 414 above the drummer's head, and a pair of high end Sanken shotguns on hihat and snare...a little bit of phasing issues so you have to fidget with the directionality of the shotguns...but the punch and isolation is great.
 
an LDC would be 20x better for an overhead than an SM57.

Even though SDC tend to be the standard, I use LDCs because they are what I have, and they capture the depth of the drums more, seeing as I don't use tom mics. I have two Rode NT2-A microphones, work wonderfully. I tend to boost everything above 5k about 2 dB to bring the cymbals out more and make the drums cut through the mix a tiny bit better without getting "louder".
 
LDCs work great as OH mics in Recorderman or Glyn Johns setups. I use LDCs all the time, if it's more of a heavier rock sound I'm looking for I'll copy the OH tracks, strip the cymbals from them, and then EQ the toms to bring them up in the mix.
 
Russtopher said:
if it's more of a heavier rock sound I'm looking for I'll copy the OH tracks, strip the cymbals from them, and then EQ the toms to bring them up in the mix.
Click to expand...

I never thought of that. That's brilliant!!! Sort of gives you separate tom tracks without close micing the toms.:cool:

So, if I understand you correctly, you simply mute or erase everything except when the toms play on the doubled OH track???
 
Russtopher said:
LDCs work great as OH mics in Recorderman or Glyn Johns setups. I use LDCs all the time, if it's more of a heavier rock sound I'm looking for I'll copy the OH tracks, strip the cymbals from them, and then EQ the toms to bring them up in the mix.
Click to expand...

How do you strip the cymbals out?
 
RAMI said:
I never thought of that. That's brilliant!!! Sort of gives you separate tom tracks without close micing the toms.:cool:

So, if I understand you correctly, you simply mute or erase everything except when the toms play on the doubled OH track???
Click to expand...

Erasing everything is best. I've found that if you try and EQ out the high end, it just makes the cymbals sound dull and muddy when the "tom" tracks are combined with the overheads. Sort of like if you submix your drum tracks and then do parallel compression, you can just tell it doesn't sound right past a certain point in the higher frequencies.

It's a bit time consuming, but worth it. I usually will make a stereo .wav of the OH mics with them panned out to about 80 on each side, then strip out everything but the toms, then mix those in with the OH mics on mixdown and EQ/compress to taste. It doesn't sound EXACTLY like close micing, but since I only have the 4 inputs on my Firebox, it helps the toms cut through. Once you get going with the stripping, you can usually eyeball about 75% of the .wav and strip out thing by looking at the peaks and seeing where the toms come in.
 
Yeah, why EQ them out when you can just get rid of them and not affect the toms with the EQ'ing you did trying to get rid of them. Thanx for the help, I'll be trying it out next drum track.
 
Russtopher said:
Erasing everything is best. I've found that if you try and EQ out the high end, it just makes the cymbals sound dull and muddy when the "tom" tracks are combined with the overheads. Sort of like if you submix your drum tracks and then do parallel compression, you can just tell it doesn't sound right past a certain point in the higher frequencies.

It's a bit time consuming, but worth it. I usually will make a stereo .wav of the OH mics with them panned out to about 80 on each side, then strip out everything but the toms, then mix those in with the OH mics on mixdown and EQ/compress to taste. It doesn't sound EXACTLY like close micing, but since I only have the 4 inputs on my Firebox, it helps the toms cut through. Once you get going with the stripping, you can usually eyeball about 75% of the .wav and strip out thing by looking at the peaks and seeing where the toms come in.
Click to expand...

What about the decay tails on the cymbals that are contemporaneous with the toms? It seems you might have to resort to some unnatural cuts and fades. Maybe since it's a doubled track that gets sorta buried enough that it's a not issue?

(I just wanted to use "contemporaneous.")
 
andyhix said:
What about the decay tails on the cymbals that are contemporaneous with the toms? It seems you might have to resort to some unnatural cuts and fades. Maybe since it's a doubled track that gets sorta buried enough that it's a not issue?

(I just wanted to use "contemporaneous.")
Click to expand...

I was thinking that. But then, when you think of it, you usually crash AFTER a tom roll, so I'm hoping it won't be a problem all the time. You might have some left over from a ride cymbal, if that's where the drummer was riding, before the roll. But that shouldn't be too loud, most of the time.
 
RAMI said:
I was thinking that. But then, when you think of it, you usually crash AFTER a tom roll, so I'm hoping it won't be a problem all the time. You might have some left over from a ride cymbal, if that's where the drummer was riding, before the roll. But that shouldn't be too loud, most of the time.
Click to expand...

Very true. You can sometimes get a quick "shht" sound (yes I said "shht" ;)) at the beginning or very end of a tom fill, but eq cuts and/or a low pass up around 10k can take care of a lot of it. I tend to over-emphasize the lower frequencies when doing this to compensate.

If you listen to the first 3 tracks on my myspace page (myspace.com/creeveycrisis) you can hear how it sounds. Like I said, no it doesn't have the in-your-faceness of true close micing, but it does help cut through dirt guitars if that's the style of the songs.
 
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