40 Second Spot For Input

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nwduffer

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I'm about to do some recording of mostly fingerpicking type acoustic stuff and vocal tracking on my home system for the first time.

After reading here for a while, and messing with settings on my pc, gear, and acoustic, I finally tracked just 40 seconds or so of noodling. I'm wondering if I could get some general overall input. I'd like to get my guitar sound nailed down first before I jump into laying down any vocals. Here's the little guitar part:

(775 kb mp3 file)

This is three tracks, two of nearly the same thing doubled and panned out a bit, and one track with some single note stuff. I hit a few bonkers in here , came in a touch late on one side, and didn't really check the tuning before laying it down. I'm really after input on the sound anyway, not really the playing...it's basically one take stuff for testing.

Am I in the ball park of a decent acoustic sound? Any pointers are appreciated.

Thanks for the help.

Paul
 
I think it sounds great!

What kind of equipment you using?
 
Thanks

I'm running my Taylor acoustic directly through an old ART FXR Elite processor for some delay, and then into an SB Live card. I'm using Cool Edit Pro for tracking.

I don't have a decent mic right now, just a 58 knockoff, and when I record stuff through the little mixer I have with it, I get a hum...not from the mic, but from the mixer. Even when I unplug the mic, I still get that noise, and it intensifies when I normalize my tracks. I've moved my mic across the hall to a noise free room, moved the mixer across the room...nothing seems to get rid of it, so I bagged it for now.

I'd really like to get a decent condenser mic, and pre-amp, like the ART MP unit, to try recording with, but even just the $300 I'd spend to get going with those would be a little out of line during tax season for me.

Since I have this Thinline pickup in my guitar I figured I'd give it a whirl direct....just trying to get other ears to give some input.

Thanks again,

Paul
 
Wow........man I have a pretty "budget" setup as well and I cant get it to sound anywhere near what you have.
 
> I'm running my Taylor acoustic directly through an old ART FXR Elite processor for some delay, and then into an SB Live card

That's a pretty "open" sound for a pickup. I've found that a combination of a mic and and a pickup can produce a nice sound. And having both sources you can "tailor" (pun intended) it to your tastes by mixing it in software instead of using a crappy mixer. But you're gonna need a pre-amp eventually.
If you're not mixing bands a nice pre will be cheaper than buying a bunch of nice pres in a decent mixer.

The sound overall was pretty nice. I did hear three farts that weren't performance-related. It sounded like you overloaded the ART a little. I do mean a very little. But I don't think this had to do with the input level on the Soundblaster because the wave shape wasn't clipped at all. Maybe this was an artifact from your Cool Edit normalization- I don't know. But overall, you're way ahead of the newbie pack when it comes to capturing acoustic guitar with a Soundblaster.

You might want to pan the doubled pair of guitars away from the other track, unless you're leaving a "hole" in one channel for a vocal or something. I just noticed that one side was noticeably hotter than the other.
 
Thanks for the replies

Nutdotnet-
I have been pretty unhappy with all the sounds I've had up till this round. I didn't try the ART unit till just this time, and for whatever reason, it seemed to be a decent go-between for the pickup and sound card, but wasn't super hot, which is why I normalized the tracks at around 85 in cool edit.

drstawl-
Thanks for the notes. I was for the most part pretty happy with the sound, but wanted other ears that could point out some of the things that you did from a different perspective.

I originally thought about laying down a vocal track down the middle, and maybe some harmonies way out wide, which is why the two acoustics are panned out only so far, and the lead line thingy just a little off to the side. But then once I had the guitar tracks down I figured I'd get a little input and just left it at that. Better for me to bite of little chunks at a time then to try to nail everything right of the bat.

I didn't watch the load led on the ART the whole time to see if I got any peak while playing, but it's entirely possible. I set my normalization to 85 in CE, and to be honest, I don't know all the ins and outs of normalizing, just started doing it after someone mentioned it in a thread before, and it's always helped get good levels. I usually normalize at 90, but this had a little more level going, and I just figured I'd try 85 instead, and it seemed to work. Again, don't ask me why I'd pick one number over the other...I wouldn't have an intelligent answer.

I'm seeing ART MP pre's on Ebay for around $70 and new around $100. Think this is a decent way to go? I'll always record one track at a time here in my room, and at the most will record an acoustic, and electric (probably going through my POD) and a bass. No drums, I'll have to use loops, or send it to my buddy to record the drums in his studio and them send them back.

So even though most people would say "use it to buy yourself a good dinner," I'm kind of wondering what the best use of $100 might be. Can I help things out by picking up an ART unit, or not so much?

Again, thanks for the info, I really appreciate the feedback.

Paul
 
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