Getting that DI to sound reasonable...?

T

Theros

New member
So... I dont have the best of setups, recording guitar from a Line6 Spider II 2x12 direct, into protools MP, and although I can get a reasonable clean sound, and distortion is so-so, I really would like some tips on getting the sound to be a bit more... Well, up-front...

Has anyone got any tips on how to achieve this? Im recording it at the best volume I can find, without clipping, but always seem to envision it as a sound that has about 2 feet or air between it and your ears...

Does anyone else have this problem with DI? or am I imagining it because im comparing against mixed guitar? Anyhows, Ill hopefully post a clip a little laters of some clean/Distorted, to present the problem... :o

Cheers for your time in reading...

Theros
 
I had the same problem (still do, kind of) for a long time. Try adding post-recording compression (slight!).
 
The problem is that you're trying to record the sound you hear with your ears using a DI which doesn't allow you to record what your ears hear. You want that 'air' sound, but you're not recording the air sound...get a mic and do it, or be satisfied with what you can do DI'ing

Jacob
 
Chessrock, ill take that suggestion with a pinch of salt... Contructive, if at all please ;)

Mic'ing a real amp presents a problem as I live in a bunch of flats, I occationally have the chance to turn up the volume, but not nearly enough... besides the point, my MXLV67G/dynamic mic seems to take forever to get sounding reasonable, by which point Ive run out of time to have it cranked... :(

This recording is only for demo/for my reference, so it hardly needs to be the best, but saying that, if there is a way of achieving what I want, why pass it up? Hence the question mark behind the title ;)
 
Theros said:
Chessrock, ill take that suggestion with a pinch of salt... Contructive, if at all please
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Why would you take it with a grain of salt? That's the best advice in answer to your question. That IS the most constructive suggestion.

An amp doesn't have to rattle the windows in order to get a great recording. Get a big cardboard box (like a 30 inch color tv box or a refrigerator box cut to size) turn it upside down over the amp (with the mic in front of the amp) and toss a sleeping bag over it. Or get a couple of movers blankets and use office binder clips to sandwich the sleeping bag in between the movers balnkets. Put the whole thing in a closet full of clothes and coats if necessary. If you cant get a decent sound mic'ing your amp that way, without having the cops come to the door, then you may be doing something else incorrectly.

But jkokura is right, you cannot get that "in the air" sound unless you record that "in the air" sound. DI wont do that.
 
It is possible to get very good DI sounds and in fact I was chatting to the head engineer with a small but very successful record label only today and talking about his gear that I am going to do some work with. I asked him what amps and things he had, and he reeled of a list of all the standard amps and mics a project studio should have, before saying "but we normally just use the POD, it's so much easier to get a good sound and we can experiment all day without going deaf". I thought he was full of shit until I listened to some of the singles they have out at the moment and all the guitars are farking great!!
 
Amazingly, pods are very popular these days. Project studios, even high end studios use the Big Bad Red Bean (or the rack unit).
 
soundchaser59 said:
Why would you take it with a grain of salt? That's the best advice in answer to your question. That IS the most constructive suggestion.
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Soundchaser, to me that isnt constructive, and I certainly aint gonna argue here, but I asked for help with "a situation", replying with a "Why not change the situation" comment isnt exactly helping... its just changing it completly...

If I asked for help making my bycycle be able to go faster, the answer aint gonna be helpful when someone says... sure, go buy a motorbike... That certainly aint helping me with my bycycle... :confused:

I will concede that mic'ing would be a better option, but it isnt always available to me...
 
It's sad that the stock answer on Homerecording.com nowadays is "you need to spend more money". There's no reason at all he can't get acceptably good sound with what he has. Yeah, maybe it's not the ideal amp or room, but then this is a hobby, right?

Dude, what preamps and things do you have? You might find that if you work a bit harder with your EQ that you can get things to start happening a bit for you. You want more mids than you normally think you want .... don't go scooping the hell out of it and then wondering why it sounds hollow! :)

I would run the DI out through a channel strip and add a little EQ and comp on the way in, though you can obviously always do this afterwards, playing back through one channel and recording your re-amped signal back in through another.

Do you have any multi-FX etc that have cabinet emulation? Like any of the Digitech RP stuff or whatever? Don't forget also that you need less gain than you think too. :)
 
Ah, but nobody said spend more money. He has a mic and sometimes mics it, he just usually can't because of noise. Soundchaser gave him good advice on keeping levels down and still being able to mic it.

The term constructive certainly applies to that advice. It is the best advice to improve the sound, and it may be possible more often than you think. You may not like the advice because it takes too long for you, or because sometimes it isn't possible. Well in that case the second best advice will apply to what to do with the DI, and noisedude already gave any advice I can think of. But don't criticize somebody for giving the best advice possible for your sound. Nobody knows what limitations you have until you tell us.
 
Noisedude, I appriciate the comments, and im glad you see my point of view...

To be blunt, I am, at the moment doing nothing to the signal, its going Amp->soundcard (audiophile 24/96), I do have a preamp(though not super quality)... would it be better to chuck the signal through this? At the moment im basically just using a compressor to keep it from clipping for if I for some reason happen to really whack the strings... :o

The amp is set with a lot of low, not that much mid (though I am gonna try with more mid as you advised in an hour or so, and see if it improves).

Apart from that, I will have a play around and post a sample this evening...
 
I've heard a few very good sounds out of PODs and similar devices, but you can't rely on the presets to get you there. You'll have to do some EQ tweaking and such to get a sound closer to miking an amp. Mess around with input/output gain, distortion level, EQ (boost the mids a bit more than you think), etc. Get rid of all the delays, reverbs, chorus, & crap (add them in your software later). If you approach an amp simulator as a device to create unique sounds, you can get usable stuff out of it. If you expect it to sound exactly like/as good as a nice amp with a mic in front of it, you'll be disappointed.
 
noisedude said:
Don't forget also that you need less gain than you think too. :)
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dude is right on this one, Theros. I used to DI all my guitars, and in looking back I think my biggest flaw was trying to run it in too hot. If I would have used less gain and then tweaked it later on playback, I would have achieved much better results. And it may help to think about that "air" sound as being just a different kind of reverb. Even in the best of rooms, the "room sound" is basically just a controlled type of room reverb. So maybe you can gain some "air feeling" by using a certain type of reverb setting???

"You need less gain than you think" is easily the best tip for DI on guitar......a LOT less gain than you think. And note that - in my always so humble opinion - running directly into a soundcard, even a good one, is the most difficult way to get clean dirty guitar tracks without overdriving your audiophile input.

Maybe look at it the other way around. Dont try to get it as hot as you can without distorting, instead try to run it as "cooL" as you can without hearing any noise floor. Then you can tweak it and boost things on playback without gaining a ton of noise. You also need less distortion or less "break up" than you think on a recording, much less than you would want to use playing live.
 
soundchaser59 said:
You also need less distortion or less "break up" than you think on a recording, much less than you would want to use playing live.
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That's what Noisedude meant by gain. He was talking tonal issues rather than level. The same with his midrange advice, many people scoop too much midrange out when recording distorted guitars.


:)
 
Some good advice guys, im certainly gonna try these all out... I think I get you on the gain stuff, I'll certainly bear that in mind... Soundchaser, I will also try out the less distortion :) - this is the first time I've bothered with recording distortion, I mainly play Piano so it aint really applicable, but it certainly aint easy to get the noise you want :eek:

Some horrific samples of what I recorded without any tweaking:

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pagemusic.cfm?bandID=354527

recorded and listened to only on headphones :(
 
I think unconstructive advice would be telling someone to get a more expensive amp and run it at higher volume levels. The advice given on isolation boxes was good, of course.

I'll try to have a listen when I get back to my desk and off this silly laptop ... the Wigan vs Arsenal game has been rubbish ...
 
technically,


if you got pyscho enough (like yours truly), you can "simulate" mic recorded tracks. But you need a mildly inventive mind, some basic tools, some basic reasoning and maybe a carton of ciggeretes.


However, that conversation is reserved for a rainy day. Heads would explode if I talked about it. Besides, I have to perfect the technique and document it before I start blabbing about it (as always) :D

cheers.
 
noisedude said:
Ooooooookay. I totally understand what you're on about. :confused:
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I was just trying to generate some thought provoking insight :D It's not even some big deal. I seriously doubt heads would explode. But it's a nifty trick for Theos, so that can't hurt.


Man, I seriously need to start finding a better outlet for my days off!
 
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