Recording mics (newb questions)

K

Kenny202

Member
Pretty new to recording mics. I have a Behringer XM8500 (SM58 knock off but damn good mic) and an XML990 I recently purchased. Both I realize not the top of the tree but both seem to be well respected workhorse budget mics. I am recording into a Zoom R8 recorder.

I have used the Behringer mic before and was pleased with the vocals. Also used it to mic up my amp and was actually amazed at the results. So I thought if that sounded ok could only be better with a Condensor mic, enter the XML....Just not very happy with the results. Kinda sounds a bit thin to me and seem to be getting a bit of distortion even at mid gain. Lower than the volumes of the Behringer. I have it set up around 12" away from my face, face of the mic pointed down slightly towards my neck. Pop filter in front. Phantom power on.

1) Firstly when recording vocals should I be using two tracks? I currently use two, one panned full left, other full right. Gain about midway

2) The gain set to 50% reasonable, 50 - 75%, I am hearing some distortion, but the peak meter not blinking and the input meter levels not even midway compared to other instruments I am
recording. Is that an indication something is wrong or I have set something wrong?

3) As far as I know, and probably wrong....you set the gain on mic or instrument inputs to be just under peaking when pushed. Is that correct?

4) I can select mic/line or guitar inputs. I assume I should be using the MIC / LINE inputs

I have never used a Condenser mic before, maybe I am missing something fundamental? All of my input EQ's are set flat.

Any help appreciated
 
One voice = one mic normally.
Distortion when the peak meters not indicating. Hmm. you'll need to track this down because it will annoy you. If the waveform you see is not reaching the top then the distortion source is not your gain. Are you sure it's the zoom? As you have two mics, plug one into ch 1 and the other to ch 2. Set your gains to give you some headroom and no peaking and see if both mics produce distortion, but do not show any on the screen - this assumes you are viewing the files from the zoom on a computer of some kind? If the distortion is from say the headphones on the zoom, it's possible you have got the input gain too low and the distortion is coming from the headphone out being turned up too high. We don't have the info to answer this one properly yet.

Your gain setting idea is correct - find the peaking level, back the gain of a bit. Experience tells you how much. If you say to the musician you are recording play the loudest they will play, they always lie. You will set the level and then in the playing they go louder. Always happens, so go lower to compensate. Mics go in through XLR connectors into the mic inputs. Line inputs for the output of CD players, videos and other kit like that. Usually .7V or even 1.2V or so maximum level. Guitars are higher than mics and lower than line - a sort of awkward half way. On your Zoom, having the input gain set to 2 or less indicates too much coming in, and above 7 too little. Getting it wrong means usually distortion at one end or hiss at the other.

Condenser mics only have one requirement - 48V power. Apart from that, just treat them as a mic. Like all mics - some are good, others less so. One condenser mic in history gets continually slated for probably making a better hammer than it does a mic. In truth, it's OK, but there are so many better ones. Dynamics are not worse mics than condensers - just different. Like petrol vs diesel vs electric cars.

One thing - your XM8500s are NOT knock offs of SM58s - they just share the ice cream cone shape. Knock offs pretend to be the other - as in counterfeits. Your mic is a perfectly good useable dynamic. I had an open air event pre covid and we knew there would be rain and no chance to keep the mics dry, so we ordered some of those mics and they sounded very respectable. They got drenched and none failed at the event. They went rusty on the grills and are all very, very dull now. I expect they are a real mess inside - but they did not fail on the day and that was what we needed. An SM58 would have done exactly the same thing and tonally been pretty close.

Lastly - your EQ was flat by choice? that's fine. If it needed EQ and you didn't do it, that's bad. EQ is like seasoning food. Some people do it just right, others leave it bland. either is a choice.
 
rob aylestone said:
One voice = one mic normally.
Distortion when the peak meters not indicating. Hmm. you'll need to track this down because it will annoy you. If the waveform you see is not reaching the top then the distortion source is not your gain. Are you sure it's the zoom? As you have two mics, plug one into ch 1 and the other to ch 2. Set your gains to give you some headroom and no peaking and see if both mics produce distortion, but do not show any on the screen - this assumes you are viewing the files from the zoom on a computer of some kind? If the distortion is from say the headphones on the zoom, it's possible you have got the input gain too low and the distortion is coming from the headphone out being turned up too high. We don't have the info to answer this one properly yet.

Your gain setting idea is correct - find the peaking level, back the gain of a bit. Experience tells you how much. If you say to the musician you are recording play the loudest they will play, they always lie. You will set the level and then in the playing they go louder. Always happens, so go lower to compensate. Mics go in through XLR connectors into the mic inputs. Line inputs for the output of CD players, videos and other kit like that. Usually .7V or even 1.2V or so maximum level. Guitars are higher than mics and lower than line - a sort of awkward half way. On your Zoom, having the input gain set to 2 or less indicates too much coming in, and above 7 too little. Getting it wrong means usually distortion at one end or hiss at the other.

Condenser mics only have one requirement - 48V power. Apart from that, just treat them as a mic. Like all mics - some are good, others less so. One condenser mic in history gets continually slated for probably making a better hammer than it does a mic. In truth, it's OK, but there are so many better ones. Dynamics are not worse mics than condensers - just different. Like petrol vs diesel vs electric cars.

One thing - your XM8500s are NOT knock offs of SM58s - they just share the ice cream cone shape. Knock offs pretend to be the other - as in counterfeits. Your mic is a perfectly good useable dynamic. I had an open air event pre covid and we knew there would be rain and no chance to keep the mics dry, so we ordered some of those mics and they sounded very respectable. They got drenched and none failed at the event. They went rusty on the grills and are all very, very dull now. I expect they are a real mess inside - but they did not fail on the day and that was what we needed. An SM58 would have done exactly the same thing and tonally been pretty close.

Lastly - your EQ was flat by choice? that's fine. If it needed EQ and you didn't do it, that's bad. EQ is like seasoning food. Some people do it just right, others leave it bland. either is a choice.
Click to expand...
Only using one mic / one input at a time but recording to two tracks through the XLR input with phantom power on. Does that make a difference? And by the by, I forgot and left the phantom power on when I switched to my dynamic mic. Nothing damaged but is this something that may cause a problem in the future. So easy to forget
 
One voice -> one mic -> one track.

I'd leave plenty of headroom when recording. Technically, anything short of 0 dBFS is fine, but a bit more space between the peak signal and 0 dB is preferable. I will generally shoot for an average signal level floating around -18 dBFS. It should spend time above and below that mark.
 
My phantom on one mixer I own was on for 20 years because where it was installed I couldn't reach the button (a global phantom for everything - phantom doesn't annoy other mics. If they don't use it, they ignore it. I have to ask though? Why send one mic to two tracks?
 
phnatom power is okay for the dynamic mic. Not needed, but won't hurt it.

You can double track your vocals, but you've got to be good at singing it twice exactly the same. Otherwise it won't sound good. Personally, I track vocals once and call it good. (even if it isn't - lol)
 
rob aylestone said:
Why send one mic to two tracks?
Click to expand...
I took it to mean he was double-tracking, but now reading this, maybe he isn't.

Kenny, if you're recording the vocal take only once and sending it to two tracks, that isn't going to get you anything. If you're recording your vocal take twice, that is called double-tracking. It can sound great if done properly. It is a common trick used by the pro's all the time.
 
Ribbons and moving coil mics are different types of dynamic. There is a slight chance of damaging a ribbon if the ribbon motor sees phantom power, which is unlikely but possible I guess. Note that active ribbon mics need phantom. Passive types generally use a transformer between the output and the motor which will block the phantom. The problem comes from hot plugging the mic into a preamp that has phantom switched on. If all 3 pins of the XLR make contact at the same time, there likely won't be a problem. If there's a delay between pins 2 and 3 making contact (TRS patch bay?) the ribbon motor might see phantom for a split second which could cause it to pop, and potentially stretch and be damaged. If you make cable connections before turning phantom power on it should be okay.

So there is a slight danger with ribbon mics and phantom, but it's overstated sometimes. Most ribbons can be damaged much more quickly from air blasts, like inside a kick drum. It's why people put a bag on ribbon mics when moving them around.
 
That's my experience. If you really want to scare yourself and have a ribbon - take the grills off and expose the ribbon and then plug in the XLR, but insert it 'on the wonk' it's difficult to do, but the idea is to get pins 2 and 3 to make contact one by one, not at the same time. If you can do this you will see the ribbon give a tiny shudder. Like a heart beat? I was trying to fix a commentators mic that sounded to my ears pretty unspectacular, and I'd already fixed a bit of it with epoxy so wasn't really trying to be that delicate - I just thought it was old and tired. I noticed the little shimmer - so did it lots of times to amuse myself - got bored and put it back together. Still had the very unexciting sound.
These have a transformer to convert the virtual short circuit into a usable impedance, but there must be some leakage to get the 'kick'.

Last year I bought another for a job, (sadly wrecked by Covid) and discovered the sound I hate is how they all sound, and I just wasn't talking into it loudly like wrestling/boxing/motor racing commentators do. The silly behaviour didn't wreck it at all. You'll have to search very hard on the internet to read any stories about damage that has happened, but there are thousands of stories about what could (but never actually seems to) happen.
 
I watched a video a while back where the guys that made the Roswellite ribbon mics (before selling the designs to Shure) had one of their ribbon motors on a table hooked up to a DC power source. (Again, not something that really happens in the real world unless the mic is wired incorrectly) When they applied sustained power, (not a momentary blip from a cable connection) the ribbon ballooned out in an arc and stayed there. When they cut the power the ribbon snapped back to its original shape. They did this several times. If that was an aluminum ribbon it would be useless after that.
 
Phantom power will not damage any modern dynamic mic. As far as your noise, my 990's are pretty brittle sounding to my ears and that may be what you are hearing. However, a condenser mic is way more sensitive than a dynamic and many people,(including myself) find out that they have a node or two on their vocal cords that cause a sort of rattling noise that is pretty inaudible to one's ears but not the mic.

If you listen carefully to either Robert Plant or Roger Daltrey when they are pushing you can hear the buzz of damaged vocal cords. Backing off the mic a bit can reduce that sort of problem. You are using a pop filter, yes?
 
rob aylestone said:
One voice = one mic normally.
Distortion when the peak meters not indicating. Hmm. you'll need to track this down because it will annoy you. If the waveform you see is not reaching the top then the distortion source is not your gain. Are you sure it's the zoom? As you have two mics, plug one into ch 1 and the other to ch 2. Set your gains to give you some headroom and no peaking and see if both mics produce distortion, but do not show any on the screen - this assumes you are viewing the files from the zoom on a computer of some kind? If the distortion is from say the headphones on the zoom, it's possible you have got the input gain too low and the distortion is coming from the headphone out being turned up too high. We don't have the info to answer this one properly yet.

Your gain setting idea is correct - find the peaking level, back the gain of a bit. Experience tells you how much. If you say to the musician you are recording play the loudest they will play, they always lie. You will set the level and then in the playing they go louder. Always happens, so go lower to compensate. Mics go in through XLR connectors into the mic inputs. Line inputs for the output of CD players, videos and other kit like that. Usually .7V or even 1.2V or so maximum level. Guitars are higher than mics and lower than line - a sort of awkward half way. On your Zoom, having the input gain set to 2 or less indicates too much coming in, and above 7 too little. Getting it wrong means usually distortion at one end or hiss at the other.

Condenser mics only have one requirement - 48V power. Apart from that, just treat them as a mic. Like all mics - some are good, others less so. One condenser mic in history gets continually slated for probably making a better hammer than it does a mic. In truth, it's OK, but there are so many better ones. Dynamics are not worse mics than condensers - just different. Like petrol vs diesel vs electric cars.

One thing - your XM8500s are NOT knock offs of SM58s - they just share the ice cream cone shape. Knock offs pretend to be the other - as in counterfeits. Your mic is a perfectly good useable dynamic. I had an open air event pre covid and we knew there would be rain and no chance to keep the mics dry, so we ordered some of those mics and they sounded very respectable. They got drenched and none failed at the event. They went rusty on the grills and are all very, very dull now. I expect they are a real mess inside - but they did not fail on the day and that was what we needed. An SM58 would have done exactly the same thing and tonally been pretty close.

Lastly - your EQ was flat by choice? that's fine. If it needed EQ and you didn't do it, that's bad. EQ is like seasoning food. Some people do it just right, others leave it bland. either is a choice.
Click to expand...
Rob, It's always lovely to read when someone knows their stuff and advise others in a nice, non-condescending manner. Creates a very positive atmo on the site! 🎖️
 
I try, but after all these years still learn new stuff, but then spread the word. What really worries me is the newish trend to teach at school the need for rules and framework. Until last year, I still did the occasional bit of supply teaching in schools when I was bored. I’ve stopped now because frankly, how it’s taught to under 16s now removes experimentation and requires rule learning. No context, no deviation. I’ve had to actually teach wrong practices. In the specs it was required. I can’t do that. Imagine something you know for certain works, but is now deemed wrong? I was a college teacher where industry experience was crucial, but kids get given these crazy rules to save teaching time.

when they leave education, they try to do recording the same way. You always use an AKG C1000 for drum overheads. It’s a rule. BECAUSE that’s what the school had so it was taught as a rule. Record levels must never peak. Normalisation to 0.1dB is essential. Condensers are never for loud instruments, SM58s are the only vocal mic, Guitars always need two mics, drum overheads MUST be in stereo, dynamics are no good for acoustic guitars, LDC are only for vocals, the list goes on.

nobody seems to try things and make their own decisions, so I really like to encourage rule breaking and experimenting. So many faults on the forums are just silly choices? Sometimes I am deliberately controversial and when discussions then suggest alternative ways that’s brilliant. I learn too. I just want to get rid of stupid and often very wrong rules.
 
rob aylestone said:
I try, but after all these years still learn new stuff, but then spread the word. What really worries me is the newish trend to teach at school the need for rules and framework. Until last year, I still did the occasional bit of supply teaching in schools when I was bored. I’ve stopped now because frankly, how it’s taught to under 16s now removes experimentation and requires rule learning. No context, no deviation. I’ve had to actually teach wrong practices. In the specs it was required. I can’t do that. Imagine something you know for certain works, but is now deemed wrong? I was a college teacher where industry experience was crucial, but kids get given these crazy rules to save teaching time.

when they leave education, they try to do recording the same way. You always use an AKG C1000 for drum overheads. It’s a rule. BECAUSE that’s what the school had so it was taught as a rule. Record levels must never peak. Normalisation to 0.1dB is essential. Condensers are never for loud instruments, SM58s are the only vocal mic, Guitars always need two mics, drum overheads MUST be in stereo, dynamics are no good for acoustic guitars, LDC are only for vocals, the list goes on.

nobody seems to try things and make their own decisions, so I really like to encourage rule breaking and experimenting. So many faults on the forums are just silly choices? Sometimes I am deliberately controversial and when discussions then suggest alternative ways that’s brilliant. I learn too. I just want to get rid of stupid and often very wrong rules.
Click to expand...
When I was taking graphic design in college, the first thing the professor told me in the introductory course was that ”we’re going to learn the rules. In the advanced class, we’re going to break them.”

I think rules aren’t a bad thing to start out with, but they shouldn’t be taught with such rigidity.
 
Ha! I love that. So true. The state of music and recording education in schools nowadays is truly dire. I used to be the Principal Examiner for A Level music technology in the 90s/2000's and am still a member of some forums and the teacher's questions are simply amazing. Some know bugger all about the subject - and they're teaching it. They ask questions that if asked on the forum would be laughed at - and these are the people the kids go to for information. Some of them also cheat. They don't understand the spec and are doing things plainly against the rules in total ignorance. I can't imagine a teacher with no history of the subject. Even the 1980s are totally lost on them - but then they have a Beatles question and start talking about how they were recording on 16 or 24 track equipment (as in end of Beatles era) when the music is from the 60s. Some have never even touched a reel to reel and just make it up - or worse, assume what they teach the kids is real.
 
rob aylestone said:
You always use an AKG C1000 for drum overheads. It’s a rule. Record levels must never peak. Normalisation to 0.1dB is essential. Condensers are never for loud instruments, SM58s are the only vocal mic, Guitars always need two mics, drum overheads MUST be in stereo, dynamics are no good for acoustic guitars, LDC are only for vocals
Click to expand...
Dang and durn, Billybob ! No wonder my stuff sounds so bad ! >:(

It took a while but I came round to the realization that for every one of the "rules", even from the experts, there's someone who got great results to my ears from doing things that were considered against the rules. And in doing so, I found that the "rules" really do net good results and so does going against the rules. So both are an intrinsic part of my practice.
I just see the rules and the breaking of the rules as part of the methodology. It depends on what I want at that specific moment. I'm just as likely to record an acoustic guitar with 2 mics as I am one mic or right in front of the sound hole {at different distances} as I am 2 mics and 2 pick ups.
I'm so evil ! 👹
 
Evil? Probably just a bit - but you're dead right. If you can think of the reason the rule was developed, you know when it's safe to break it. Rules are for averaging performance, not getting the best. I like your mention of the two mics thing - If we accept that the notion that a mic on the neck side sounds brights and fingery, and the one near the sound hole can be a bit boomy and lacking in the fingery department - then using both and blending them can produce the best overall sound. The trouble is that you then see the word 'stereo' start to creep in and understandably, the new rule forms that all guitar recording should be in stereo. Anyone questioned shows images - probably of dual miking, not stereo miking. Weird how these things happen. In my exam days we often encouraged the people to include photos, and often you saw these misunderstandings in the picture and knew what it would sound like before you pressed play. One of the tasks was an 'ambient' recording - direct to stereo and my pet hate was a pair of mics for capturing the room sound. The room often being a classroom with awful acoustics for music. In the picture would be a pair of cheap dynamics simply stuck on a couple of stands and blended in - wrecking the recording with all the reflections and distance. I think the rule was "a maximum of 4 mics' taken to mean you MUST use 4 mics.
 
rob aylestone said:
If you can think of the reason the rule was developed, you know when it's safe to break it.
Click to expand...
Well....that quote absolutely belongs in the "Say Something Prolific" thread.

I love reading what pretty much everyone here has to say.........but for sure......rob aylestone is always a must read.

2 cents worth of.....I wish I knew half of what he does about specs and technical info.

Mick
 
No, I talk rubbish as much as the rest. I’m just very good at remembering my mistakes and not repeating them. But I’m constantly surprised that people don’t try them out? In the pre-internet age we’d get books from the library and assume they must be totally correct. Most were but I had this sort of distrust and I alway tried the bad ideas out to see for myself. Most times they were right but the results were always interesting. Now though, people read stuff put on the net by a 15 yr old with too much money and everyone just accepts advice without question.

rules are guidelines, guidelines are suggestions. Never trust anyone’s suggestions without explanation.

I’m really into omni mics close in recording at the moment. Everybody says cardioid for live sound and especially singers. I want to try some handheld omnis on stage as soon as I can. I bet I find they’re not as bad as everyone says.
 
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