Which drum tuning is best?

[DrumminDisciple]

Hi,
New here. Just wondering, which drum tuning would be best to record digitally onto an O1V using LogicAudio Gold?
For some reason, when I tune them so I have good "spread" between the toms, they seem to lose some of their resonance once recorded.
I compensated by tightening the bottom head to bring the ambience up of the batter head.
On the kick, I de-tuned it just below "wrinkle" mode and killed the front head as well, with a Muff'l on the batter and a small pillow touching both heads inside the drum.
The drums are small-10,12,14,22 kick,3.5x13 piccolo snare, and we are using a kick mic placed inside the drum and a Shure SM57 in front of the kit with it pointing below the resonant tom heads.
Need tips on mic placement (want to do the less is more mic set-up here), and if I'm missing something in the tuning dept. I can tune live great, but they never sound like I tuned them once on disc, except for the kick.
I was thinking of leaving the kick mic, and placing two condenser mics on each side of the kit, for balance and without having to close-mic everything.
Thanks in advance.
Please respond if more info is needed for a more accurate response..............

 

[tubedude]

123

Do you tune according to the "tuning" of the shell? Theres a method that DW uses where they take off both heads, and hit the shell. They get the "key" of the shells resonance, and then tune the top head very slighty above that key, and the bottom head very slightly below that key. Supposedly makes em sound fat.
Just a thought...

 

[S8-N]

Tune your drums to the song... if its in G then tune your drums to G. Retune for each song. It sounds weird but it makes a difference... and it makes sense. Treat your drums just like a guitar.... Actually, I have never done this, but I heard it helps.

 

[DrumminDisciple]

What I decided.........

First off, tuning to the shell's key or to the song's key may sound good on paper, it's not what I'm looking for.
I read a link from a post here about Bonham's recording with minimal micing, and that's what I was looking for.
You raise good points, and their article on his drums being tuned so the whole kit sounded balanced made sense to me.
I decided to just take off the muffling from the toms, leave it in the kick, and mic the kick and put up two condenser's and balance the sound between the three mics by playing the kit and moving the mics around and adjusting my playing for the most balanced sound. I'll get the general levels of all the mics, then re-tune if necessary to get the sound I'm looking for.
This may be a long way of going about doing things, but we don't want to re-mix the entire kit after recording if we can get good sounds right off the bat.
Lots of info to learn here on this board though, and I thank you for your responses.............