Recording Vocals

S

SeekingTheTruth

New member
Hello wiser colleagues, if any of you have the time to answer my questions I'd be greatly obliged.

So I have been recording my band. The instrumental sounds great (to me at least and for the equipment I have) and now I need to add in the vocals.

My mics: Shure SM57 and SM58.

My genres: Old style punk, ska, and light rock

My Room: its probably pretty terrible. A wide horizontal cement room. Lol.
(I would rather any advice be directed towards post production rather than room treatment although that is welcomed too.)

I'm recording into a stand alone device. The Korg D1600. It has most of the effects and tools a computer program has.

My main problem: I do not have a preamp.

My Question: With this minimal equipment what is the best way to record vocals?
Should I get a good level and then just record plain? Or add compression or other effects before?

Also, once a decent vocal volume is achieved what would you do with it? Is there a basic group of effects and things you use initially to tweak vocals? (Reverb, compression, etc.)

I don't know much about the post production but I do know a decent amount on technique. If anyone could help me out with some inital tips on Post-Production that would be great.

Thank You.

-Seeking the Truth
 
Are you doing the mixing on the Korg? Or moving the files into a DAW to mix? If you can get a decent clean recording on the vocals that should be fine - you can always normalize and compress in the mix.
 
Well I will move the files once ready onto a computer to mix. But really my problem is that the volume is okay but it just is so dry and almost obviously over dubbed. I'm trying to give it some space while having it set it to the piece.

Any advice?
 
My Room: its probably pretty terrible. A wide horizontal cement room. Lol.
(I would rather any advice be directed towards post production rather than room treatment although that is welcomed too.)
Click to expand...

I'm always surprised by this kind of thing which is rampant on home recording sites, to me it's akin to asking about good disease cures because you have no intention of doing any kind of prevention but anyway if real room treatment is off the table I'd suggest:

1) get someone to help you sound check the room to see if you can find where the sweet spot is by moving the mic around and singing while you listen on headphones or otherwise isolated to see where the mic seems to sound *Best* in the room

2) while not ideal packing blankets, duvets can be pressed into service to clean up some room reflections, moving furniture around can help too

3) Record at sensible levels with peaks showing at no more than -6 dBFS on your DAW meters or bouncing around 0VU if you have anlog stuff. this should negate any chance of ruining the best vocal you ever sang with a whole bunch of clipping/overs from recording too hot

I'm recording into a stand alone device. The Korg D1600. It has most of the effects and tools a computer program has.

My main problem: I do not have a preamp
Click to expand...

4) according to the manual they are built in to the unit
http://media.musicalplanet.com/pdf/KOR012.PDF
see the features page

5) once you have a vocal recorded at good levels use the gain/volume sliders to get it sit about right in the mix, Reverb, EQ and compression can help it sit more inside the mix and compression can help if you understand how to use it. but basically playaround withit until it sounds right

Just one opinion
YMMV
 
Thanks I'll definitely try all of that. Just mess around.

Do you have any more in-depth room treatment advice because I would in the future like to fix that.
 
keep us(me) posted on how these recordings turn out. I'm using the D3200 and very interested in what others are able to get out of these particular recorders. from what I've read, the Korg "studios in a box" are of fairly high quality.
 
SeekingTheTruth said:
Well I will move the files once ready onto a computer to mix. But really my problem is that the volume is okay but it just is so dry and almost obviously over dubbed. I'm trying to give it some space while having it set it to the piece.

Any advice?
Click to expand...

So the vocals sound too dry compared to the other instruments and drums? If you want to get the vocals to set into the mix better you can try a couple of techniques, there are probably many more - I would post it as a separate question in the mixing techniques section. But here is what I would try:

1) Reverb: Create a reverb effects channel and route all the channels through it. Each channel can be adjusted for the amount sent to the channel - it should not be drastic, it should be very subtle. With the vocals sharing the same reverb space as the other instruments, it will blend in the mix better (it is very easy to add to much reverb, so be careful)
- if you don't know how to create an effects channel, you can just apply the same reverb settings on each channel, but it eats up processor bandwidth

2) stereo separation: splitting the mono tracks into L/R panned tracks does not create separation UNLESS you change one of the channels slightly - the easiest way to create some stereo "width" is to add a very short delay to one channel, like 20 - 40 ms. - tweak the pan positions and the delay time - then you can apply similar effects to some of the other instruments to help them blend.

3) Post your mix in the mixing clinic and ask for some advice there :)

GL - HTH
 
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