Mono Or Stereo?

[lurgan liar]

Okay guys, this is my first ever post on this forum, so i'll keep it brief and just give you an insight into my situation

We are a 5 piece band with drums, bass, semi acoustic guitar, electric guitar and vocals / backing vocals...

I am using my computer to record our demo...I have a Pentium 2 Processor, Cakewalk sonar 2 for multi tracking, Sonic Foundry Sound Forge 6 for manipulating the sounds...

The drums were recorded on a cassette tape using a 4 track recorder , which i transferred onto the computer - the sound quality is pretty good...

I have a Boss GT6 mult FX pedal which i connect directly to the sound card to record the guitars and bass onto the computer...

Can anyone offer me any advice at all? Record in Mono first ??? Record through my Marshall Amp onto the 4 Track then transfer to the computer...??? Is Using my multi FX pedal a good idea...or are there better ways of getting closer to a real recording studio quality???

Any advice at all would be much appreciated..I've already recorded a rough version of our demo which sounds Alrite...but not the 100% quality that i am striving for...

 

[Elmo89m]

the hundred percent studio quality sound cannnot be had unless you have some equipment....dont record to the four track....that is just adding another link in your chain to degrade you sound and add noise to it.....if i were you i would go into the marshall amp....which i would mic twice...on right on the cone and the other say like 6 feet back..but the placement i all up to you and what you like...then i would g.....(i dont know what kind of equipment you have mic and preamp wise) but you would go through a preamp and then into you computer....pan the two guitar parts hard left and right (note: this is just how i do...there are a million opinions on this kind of thing and you should do what sounds right to you.) i wouldnt record thru the fx pedal though

 

[AlChuck]

A few comments:

Does Sonar 2 even run on a P-II? I'm amazed. A machine of that vintage probably doesn't have a fast enough front-side bus or hard drive controller to perform very well as a recorder. I suspect you will bring it to its knees very quickly if you try to multitrack with it. If you start running into limitations, you can always submix tracks to a stereo pair to keep going, but this is rather limiting. (Keep your original tracks and archive them; then you can always return to these later to make a more professional mix if you move to a more modern and powerful computer.)

You should record everything in mono, and use the recorder to create a stereo image by panning the mono tracks to different parts of the stereo image. Recording things in stereo is rather advanced and only really useful for capturing the real sound of instruments in a good-sounding room, but otherwise it brings all kinds of complex phase problems to the table that will make it very difficult to get good results. Track in mono; mix to stereo.

The best way to get a good guitar sound is to stick a mic in a sweet spot front of a roaring, wonderful-sounding amp. But it's difficullt to do. You can achieve a pretty darn good approximation with far less effort if you use one of the amp modelers on the market. The POD is sort of the prototypical modeler but there are many of them on the market. If your foot pedal has amp modeling built into it (many do these days), it might be adequate -- give it a try.

 

[lurgan liar]

thanks

Ok so correct me if i'm wrong...

I am going to plug my guitar into my marshall amp, place a mic directly into the cone...and another about 6 feet away(what kind of volumes do i adjust them to?)...these mics will be connected into my mixer, which will be connected directly into my sound card...I don't have a preamp(will a mixer work?)

Now what comes next...I record this into a mono track...? Make sure it doesn't clip 0 Db...

Ok what comes next....I have to lay down tracks for drums, bass, 3 guitar parts, an organ, vocals and backing vocals...

Should i record all of these as mono tracks...and make sure that i get them each as close to 0 Db as possible? Then i pan them????

 

[Farview]

Ok so correct me if i'm wrong...

I am going to plug my guitar into my marshall amp, place a mic directly into the cone...and another about 6 feet away(what kind of volumes do i adjust them to?)...these mics will be connected into my mixer, which will be connected directly into my sound card...I don't have a preamp(will a mixer work?)

Now what comes next...I record this into a mono track...? Make sure it doesn't clip 0 Db...

Ok what comes next....I have to lay down tracks for drums, bass, 3 guitar parts, an organ, vocals and backing vocals...

Should i record all of these as mono tracks...and make sure that i get them each as close to 0 Db as possible? Then i pan them????

Just use one mic on the cabinet for right now. Plug it into your mixer, then the mixer into the soundcard. Record this as a mono track.

If you are recording at 24 bit, don't worry about getting as close to 0 as you can. That is old advise left over from the 16 bit days, just let the meter hover around -12.

Record the rest of the instruments the same way, pan them the way you like when you mix.

 

[lurgan liar]

16 bit

i'm recording at 16 bit...can u give me any advice on the mixing process

some people said to do 2 tracks for guitars one panned to the left and one to the right...

is this the same for the bass, drums, and vocals?

and only at the very end should i convert the entire project to stereo? and master it in Sonic Foundry Soundforge?

lol bear with me if i seem dumb, its 5:41 am my time and i want to learn as much as possible before the weekend

 

[Farview]

Play the guitar parts twice, pan one to the left and the other to the right. Bass and vocals should just be one track. Drums, if you are doing real drums, should be mono except the overheads.

 

[lurgan liar]

Excellent Advice for a newbie

Thanks a lot...so let me see if i understand

the acoustic part which runs throughout the song should have two tracks
the bass one mono track
the vocals one mono track (panned which ever way i prefer)
the drums mono with the over heads stereo
the distorted electric guitar will have 2 tracks (two mono tracks, one panned left and one right)
the guitar solo (two mono tracks, one panned left and one right)

So the mixing process is actually where i adjust the volumes of these tracks and adjust the panning to my preference?

Then i will transfer this to sound forge where i will convert it to stereo...? and adjust the volume (mastering?)

Wow its 6:05 am i need to sleep lol...been up all night reading this forum...

 

[Elmo89m]

when you record the solo guitar you only need to have one track and you only pann it slightly in most cases