Recording two people in the same room?

[PTravel]

I need to record vocals and dialogue for two or more performers simultaneously (it's for one of my musicals). I'll be recording at the performers' homes -- studio recording is not an option. I have two GXL2400 condensers and an MXL 990 condenser, stands with shock mounts, pop filters and a single ambient filter (I usually record at home, and just one voice at a time). The music is already recorded and mixed and the performers will be singing to that. Everyone will have closed-back headphones for monitoring. I'll be recording with an m-Audio Fast Track Pro onto my very capable laptop running Audition CS6, with a Korg nanoKontrol2 to make level setting easier (this is my standard "location" recording setup).

Here's the challenge: for the final mix, exact placement in the stereo field is rather critical. Though I can handle a little "cross talk" (wrong term for this, but you get the idea), I'd rather introduce it myself in post through judicious use of reverb. Accordingly, I need to get as much aural isolation as possible between the performers.

I am absolutely dead broke and cannot afford to spend as much as a penny on portable sound walls or the like. In fact, the reason I'm recording at the performers' homes is because they're actor friends of mine who are doing this for me for free, so I need to make it as convenient and easy as possible for them. That means taking their living rooms as I find them -- I can't rearrange furniture.

To complicate things further, for this particular section, I need to minimize proximity effect, which means putting them a little further back from the mikes than I would normally like. To make things even worse, I expect I'll have to autotune the sung portions (I use Melodyne).

I'm thinking of recording as hot as possible, using 24-bits to get the maximum dynamic range, and then using VST noise gates in the mix to cut cross-talk. If worse comes to worse, I can record the dialogue portions separately from the song portions -- this would, at least, keep the spontaneity and exchange of the dialogue, whereas recording the different vocal parts individually is less of an issue.

I am not trying for studio quality, professional quality, or as a now-departed poster once said, "industry quality." I do, however, want the final product to sound as good as my limited gear and skill set allow.

Any suggestions on microphone placement and/or any other tricks that will increase sound isolation between performers in the same room?

 

[Armistice]

Depending upon how loud they're singing, and the nature of the room, position your mics with an understanding of how the cardioid pattern actually works - ie. there's a null (well almost) at the back of the mic, so if those are pointing at the other singer, you should get reasonable isolation - or as good as possible. That said, you also need to understand the room you're in and the reflection possibilities before you set everything up.