KEL HM-1.... A cheap "Darker" Mic???

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On their way!

I just got notice mine ( a matched pair) are on their way.

11 days huh? I have a tracking number,but web site url for Canada post was missing from the email. I guess I'll just wait!

I am glad to hear they are smaller. I want to mount them side by side for stereo overheads for my drum kit. I hope the don't weigh 2 lbs each like my Cad E100s. My mic stand does not like them.

Tom
 
Mine are on their way.
I hope to hear reviews from folks as they are receiving them. I know I have some recording I am holding off doing till they come in.

Mine are still tied up in Canada right now.
I hope to get them by Christmas, but I am not holding my breath.

Tom
 
According to Canada Post mine are about an hour and a half from my house, So it shouldn't take more than a week!!!
 
tmix said:
Mine are on their way.
I hope to hear reviews from folks as they are receiving them. I know I have some recording I am holding off doing till they come in.

Mine are still tied up in Canada right now.
I hope to get them by Christmas, but I am not holding my breath.

Tom
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You posted on 12/14 they were on their way, and now 6 days later they're still in Canada? I guess they didn't tell you the trip to the border was via dog sled. :)
 
crazydoc said:
You posted on 12/14 they were on their way, and now 6 days later they're still in Canada? I guess they didn't tell you the trip to the border was via dog sled. :)
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Hey Crazydoc, I take offense to the dog sled thing..........we are not in the dark ages in Canada..............we have skidoo's now!!! :rolleyes: :D :D
 
dudge said:
Hey Crazydoc, I take offense to the dog sled thing..........we are not in the dark ages in Canada..............we have skidoo's now!!! :rolleyes: :D :D
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Dudge, How cold is it now? Are you near Winnipeg? I'm a Canadian transplant living in balmy Atlanta (from Nova Scotia). It is cold here. It was down to -8C this morning! But warmed up to around 6C.

My father who is back in Canada had a bad run of it lately when his igloo burnt down. He lost everything in a matter of minutes. You know once that ice catches fire you have to run like hell to escape the intense heat.
 
JohnnyMan said:
Dudge, How cold is it now? Are you near Winnipeg? I'm a Canadian transplant living in balmy Atlanta (from Nova Scotia). It is cold here. It was down to -8C this morning! But warmed up to around 6C.

My father who is back in Canada had a bad run of it lately when his igloo burnt down. He lost everything in a matter of minutes. You know once that ice catches fire you have to run like hell to escape the intense heat.
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Hey JohnnyMan! I live about 75 miles Southwest from Winnipeg.
It was +5C here on Friday........now it's -20C .....tomorrow is supposed to be above 0 again. Ya know, if you don't like the weather here just wait a day.
I have a sister who lives out on "The Rock". It's raining there with 120km winds.

Hope your father got a new igloo built before the polar bears got him.
They are hungry this time of year :D
 
dudge said:
Hey JohnnyMan! I live about 75 miles Southwest from Winnipeg.
It was +5C here on Friday........now it's -20C .....tomorrow is supposed to be above 0 again. Ya know, if you don't like the weather here just wait a day.
I have a sister who lives out on "The Rock". It's raining there with 120km winds.

Hope your father got a new igloo built before the polar bears got him.
They are hungry this time of year :D
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Although they will deny it, the Newfies get some of the most miserable weather in Canada.

Thanks for the words of hope for my father but you shouldn’t have to worry, Dad was raised by polar bears. In fact he visits the clan every now and then. He’s very popular there because he always brings baby seal meat.
 
Well I got my mics today! The mics themselves seem to be made quite well, one of my mounts had a little issue with the thread, but I got it to work with a little effort.

The first thing I looked at was the frequencey responce charts. They were pretty closely matched until you get to 5khz. From there one is a little brighter than the other, and has a slight bump from 17-20khz that the other doesn't have. This isn't a real complaint, as kelly told me they wouldn't be exactly matched, but that he would get them as close as he could.

As to the sound of the mic, it is deffinetly different as advertised, but I must say so far I like it better than I was expecting to. I compared it to an NTK ADk a51 type V and an old shure 330 ribbon mic going into a demeter tube preamp. Om my voice (a little on the edgie side) It did quite well. The song I am working on is more of a ballad, and the ntk sounded awful, the a51 sounded good with the mids 1-3 khz pulled down a little, the shure just is never a great match for my voice (I use it more on female vocals). The hm1 actually sounded the best of them all (It akes any "honkiness" right out).

What supprised me the most was how simular the sound of the hm1 and the adk mics were. If you take the 1-3 khz dohn on the a51 and then a little off the high end from 8khz on and the two sound very simmilar.


On a more upbeat song it would never cut it (the high end is closer to a ribbon mic than any of my other condensers). I could see it working well on some background vocals.

I am in the middle of recording a cd for a bluegrass group, so in the new year I will be abble to see how they handle, fiddles, banjos, etc. (fun stuff).

I don't have time right now to test it on instruments, but when I get a chance I will let you guys know what I find.
 
Just got my mics today. WOW!
I played around with them and like them so far.
I plan to use them as drum overheads along with a snare and kick mic over the weekend.
I will try to post some clips.
 
It's been a while now. Have you guys been able to do further testing? I have ordered one but am still interested in what you think of them.

Thanks, Terry
 
So far, The only thing I recorded that was a winner was Drums.

They worked very well as OH mics, taking the sharp edge off the cymbals and being fairly directional, had a good reach for bringing out the tom sounds.

I did not like it on voice (mine) or acoustic guitar. But I have an upcoming session with violin and mando, and I anticipate it working very well on those items.

I have not been able to try it on guitar cabs yet, but that may sound good as well on those cabs where folks run those ridiculous shredder pedals that sound like a bunch of white noise.

Tom
www.tmixstudio.com
 
I've used mine a little bit.

I didn't like it at all on my martin dx1 in x/y but over the shoulder with strumming it was alright, but I still prefer pretty well every other condenser I have for this aplication.

For electric they are not bad, but I still prefer my 421 and ev 636a.

I tried them on mandolin the other night. The group I was recording really liked the the sound. This is my favorite application for them so far. It "darkened" down the mandolin a bit and let it sit in the mix really well with no eq.

For voice it is usable for some stuff (like a ballad) for mail vocals, and I used it on one female vocalist, that had a "piercing voice and it sounded quite good, but I ended up going with an adk a51.

What I really bought them for was drum overheads, but the next two groups I am recording are bluegrass groups, so it will be a little while before I really can see how they perform.

Oh, yea One other thing I used them for was to get a rough track for a new song the blue grass group is going to be working on next session. I put them up in x/y and just let them go. I was really shocked at how well the track came out. If I had a mic on the vocalist and mayby the bass (And if they had played flawlessly!), it would have been quite usable. When ever I have done this in the past with other mics, the results have not been impressive.
 
The only thing I have used mine for have been for room mics so far.
I have been very happy with the results. I am still planning on using them as drum overheads.
The specks on the site do seem a little off. It looks more like a 3/5 element.
And the Freq. graph is a lot different
 
Sorry for digging up this old thread, but I found a reffernce to these mics in another thread and was wondering how everyone is "feeling" about this mic now that some time has passed...??

Thanks,
Rick
 
Rick,
I am still loving mine.
They have become my "go to " mics for drum overheads. I have gotten to where I just use them with a kick and snare mic and great really good results.

They also are good for mando and violin.

That is about all I have ever used them for. But just those have kept them very busy!

Tom
 
as advertised it does cut down on some of the harshness of certain instruments. For the money you cant beat having a pair in your arsenal of mics.

sLY
 
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