Two Mics on One Amp Cab

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nsureit

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Those of you who record guitar with two mics, are you using two of the same, or would you mix a condenser with a dynamic for a contrast? Do you record in stereo. Thank you from a newbie.
 
2 seperate tracks then pan according to your tastes.

i heard a 58 and 57 work well together.
 
Thank you. I was recording in stereo onto one track. I will use separate tracks and play with the pan. Great idea!
 
What are you trying to use the two mics for?
Just so you know, if you are panning for stereo, you're not going to get the "wall of guitars" sound that you hear on a lot of records these days. Using two mics, you definitely want mics that contrast with one another, but the sound you get will mostly be useful for fattening a mono sound. If you pan them, I'm sure it will help make them a little less mono, but if you really want the wall of guitars, you need to offset (delay) one of the tracks, though the better solution is just to record another take, preferably with a slightly different sound (switch mics, amps, etc).
If that doesn't make sense, try it out. Use two mics on the same cab and pan them hard left and right, then do two takes of the same section and pan those hard left and right. Compare those. You'll see what I'm talking about. Honestly, your best bet here is to experiment a bit and find a solution that you think sounds good. There's no magic formula for every song or even every sound.
 
I understand what you're suggesting. I'm not looking for the "wall", just for some sonic variety. Like you said, try it several different ways and play with the mix. Recording is all new to me, so that's why I'm here at this forum. As far as recording several takes, don't know if I'm a good enough guitar player to play it the same way twice! Perhaps I can clone a track, and apply delay/echo/reverb, etc. Guess one is limited only by his imagination.

Great answer, thanks.
 
Ah, well, if you're more interested in just variety without necessarily increasing the width of the sound (making it "more stereo"), then you've got the right idea! A lot of people do that with acoustic guitar, too. Usually, they point one mic more toward the body and the other more toward the headstock. I don't know about panning, b/c I usually don't do it that way, but I'm sure it would help give some space to each sound.
 
It depends on what we're after.

What are you referring too, Acoustic, Electric...
 
I personally place a sm57 and a condenser mic at3035 in front of the cab.
 
I use two mics, and double-track.

I'll usually use a Sennheiser e906 close on the cab, and then either a ribbon or a LDC about 4 feet in front. The 906 gives you the punch of the close cab sound, while the mic a few feet out captures the reverb and more open room sound.

I record each mic onto a separate track, and then pan those together, either hard right or hard left. I mix the two tracks according to the degree of close vs room sound I want on the guitar

I then double-track it by playing and recording the part a second time, giving me two new tracks which I then pan to the other side of the previous tracks.

So, it's a total of 4 tracks, 2 on each guitar part.
 
rio452001 said:
I use two mics, and double-track.
I'll usually use a Sennheiser e906 close on the cab, and then either a ribbon or a LDC about 4 feet in front. The 906 gives you the punch of the close cab sound, while the mic a few feet out captures the reverb and more open room sound.
I record each mic onto a separate track, and then pan those together, either hard right or hard left. I mix the two tracks according to the degree of close vs room sound I want on the guitar.
I then double-track it by playing and recording the part a second time, giving me two new tracks which I then pan to the other side of the previous tracks.
So, it's a total of 4 tracks, 2 on each guitar part.
Click to expand...

Rio, bet it sounds great!
 
Last time I was tracking guitars we put a 57 and a ribbon mic (acm-3) on the cab each on a different speaker.
The song had a rhythm and a lead guitar part. So I hard panned each mic to opposite sides for each part. SO i ended up with........ Right channel rhythm-SM57 Lead-ACM-3 Left Channel Rhythm-Acm-3 Lead-Sm57.

We were really pleased with the results. If it was a heavier song we would have double tracked as well but for what we were doing it wasn't necessary.
 
Y'all have given me some great ideas. Like you said earlier, just experiment...there's no real right or wrong way. And with DAWs, if you don't like it, delete it and do it again.
 
I also have done the close-up 57 and condenser a couple of feet away bit, usually with the two tracks panned together or close together, and most often, the dynamic with a higher mix level. Something similar I've enjoyed success with is mic'ing a 2x12 cab with a mic on each speaker. So far I've only used a 57 on one speaker and an e609 on the other. The speakers in the cab aren't the same either. Panned relatively hard left and right, it basically creates a pretty huge guitar up the middle. But the subtle differences in speakers and mics help to make it full and rich. Have yet to encounter any phasing issues either. For what that's worth.
 
Shure SM57 and sE Electronics Ribbon.......

CrateV33-SM57_sE-R.jpg.w560h420.jpg
 
i use a 57 with a tlm 103 about 4 feet back.. nice and roomy. waiting to get royer r121 tho...
 
I use a Sennheiser e609 and an MXL V69...if the cab has multiple speaker types in it, I'll put the mics on separate speakers, but otherwise I don't bother. I angle each mic so it's pointing at the wall of the speaker cone just off center. The mic element is sitting parallel to the speaker cone rather than parallel to the cab's grille. Then I pan left and right and get a very large sound.

It is possible to run into phase issues when taking this approach. If you take care to get the two mic elements the same distance from the speaker cone(s), you should be OK. I was getting huge phase problems when trying an SM7 as my dynamic, and I couldn't figure out why until I realized that mic has the element set a couple inches back from the end of the windscreen.
 
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