Live audience recording / shotgun mics

J

johnny5dm

New member
I need to record a live show, with the audience coming through pretty strong. The room kinda sucks, so I need something pretty directional. Was thinking about one stereo shotgun or two spaced shotgun mics, but I don't have much experience with this sort of stuff specifically.

Anyone have suggestions of technique and/or equipment? I'd love to find a pair (or one good stereo) shotgun mics for $200-$500 if that's possible.

Thanks!
 
johnny5dm said:
I need to record a live show, with the audience coming through pretty strong. The room kinda sucks, so I need something pretty directional. Was thinking about one stereo shotgun or two spaced shotgun mics, but I don't have much experience with this sort of stuff specifically.

Anyone have suggestions of technique and/or equipment? I'd love to find a pair (or one good stereo) shotgun mics for $200-$500 if that's possible.

Thanks!
Click to expand...

Are you talking about mics to record just the room/crowd response, or are you planning to actually record the music as well?

If it's the latter, you don't want shotguns!
 
Nono, this is just to augment the rest of the mics, not to capture the music, too. I've got mics on everything else. Just need to get the audience - aimed at them from the stage.
 
not a good idea then, the shotgun will pick up whatever small part of the audience that it is pointed straight at. One jerk heckling there and your recording is a mess. Moreover a shotgun has a zone of sensitivity directly behind it that will pick up the band rather strongly. Depending on accessibility I would either use a cardiod pointed outward from the stage or a omni high up in the ceiling space
 
Shotguns are useful as audience mics in some circumstances, but I agree with Innovations that a pair of more general purpose mics aimed into the audience from the stage can be the right choice in many circumstances. The audience mics will capture not only the audience, but also a great deal of room ambience, so you have to learn to use that to your benefit. Place the microphones so that you avoid capturing the direct sound from the mains or the monitors. Lately I've been using my Studio Projects B3s for this purpose, sometimes in cardioid, sometimes in figure-8, depending on the specifics of the room.
 
Interesting. The issue I have is that the room really does kind of suck, so that's why I was wanting to go with something more directional. I've tried some cardiods borrowed from a friend before - AT4040s - and there was just too much room and not enough audience. Maybe it's my placement, though. Tell me this... have you guys ever tried boundary mics for audience micing, like on a ceiling or something? It sounds weird, but it's a very strange room, and I've thought it might work.
 
johnny5dm said:
Tell me this... have you guys ever tried boundary mics for audience micing, like on a ceiling or something? It sounds weird, but it's a very strange room, and I've thought it might work.
Click to expand...
I've used boundary mics quite often for miking an audience. I have a pair of AT871s that I place at the edge of the stage (typically 30 feet or so apart) on a piece of foam. This works fine if the audience is polite and trustworthy (as they are at most of the shows that I record). I might not want to do it at a show where the audience will be crowding up against the stage spilling beer into them.

They still pick up a lot of the room, and I don't think they'd work from the ceiling. The real virtue is that they are unobtrusive. I don't think they capture anything much different from any other cardioid in that basic position.

If I have enough channels, I'll use both the boundary mics and the B3s. Then I can position the boundary mics to focus purely on the audience and the B3s to capture the room ambience.

The AT871 isn't made anymore, but they have other similar mics in the line.
 
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