R
RAMI
Guest
timboZ said:
I prefer boxers myself.
I prefer boxers myself.
Scooter B
Member
Guilty as charged!
Actually it is the very reason I got into home recording.
All the best preamps went to the drums. I always worked very hard on getting the right tone and dynamics through my amps and have always been complented on my live tone.
Every time we went to the studio my bass tone went flat and there were no more dynamics. Sounded decent in the headphones but not as good as the amped tone. Then we go to mix and the bass suddenly becomes lifeless, flat and uninspiring.
I have heard plenty of mixes where I love the bass tone, dynamics and place in the mix (mosty on contemporary jazz recordings) so I know it is possible to achieve a good bass sound and placement in the mix without being over powering.
Whoops I went and did a rant instead of contributing a trick or tip.
Sorry carry on with the good stuff.
Scooter B
Member
Okay I only have one so far for those of us unfortunate enough to be stuck using drum machines.
I call this a "pseudo overhead" for electronic drums.
Back in my 4 track casette days I/we obviously had some limiting choices and I had a Roland DR-5 for my drum machine. Great practicing and writing tool but a little dated and not "life like".
Since I recorded the drums first in stereo I had two additional input channels that I could also send to the first two drum tracks. I sent the L&R DI channels to tracks 1 and 2 and multed these two on the way to the recorder into a summed mono out that I fed to an SWR bass amp and a 2-10 cabinet in the tiled bathroom and close mic'd the speaker with a 57 but backed of enough to pick up some early reflections.
This mono signal was blended approximately 5%-10% pseudo overhead with the stereo DI "close mic'd" sound and the difference was incredible!
The little bit of natural delay between the DI and mic'd signal with some early reflections in mono produced a very 3 dimensional sound very close to having overheads combined with the close mic'd kit.
The tracks not only had a left to right stereo image but a top to bottom and a front to back presence that was completely missing before.
It really blew me away how adding just a touch of this made the drums sound more "live" and present.
The SWR's all have the adjustable Aurial Exciter which helped and I spent a little time tweaking the Eq to cut bass a little and let the "overhead" pick up mostly the mid and high frequencies.
I call this a "pseudo overhead" for electronic drums.
Back in my 4 track casette days I/we obviously had some limiting choices and I had a Roland DR-5 for my drum machine. Great practicing and writing tool but a little dated and not "life like".
Since I recorded the drums first in stereo I had two additional input channels that I could also send to the first two drum tracks. I sent the L&R DI channels to tracks 1 and 2 and multed these two on the way to the recorder into a summed mono out that I fed to an SWR bass amp and a 2-10 cabinet in the tiled bathroom and close mic'd the speaker with a 57 but backed of enough to pick up some early reflections.
This mono signal was blended approximately 5%-10% pseudo overhead with the stereo DI "close mic'd" sound and the difference was incredible!
The little bit of natural delay between the DI and mic'd signal with some early reflections in mono produced a very 3 dimensional sound very close to having overheads combined with the close mic'd kit.
The tracks not only had a left to right stereo image but a top to bottom and a front to back presence that was completely missing before.
It really blew me away how adding just a touch of this made the drums sound more "live" and present.
The SWR's all have the adjustable Aurial Exciter which helped and I spent a little time tweaking the Eq to cut bass a little and let the "overhead" pick up mostly the mid and high frequencies.
kidvybes
New member
...got tricks?...
alien
New member
Just did this on one of our recordings:
Korg Triton LE
Recording a pianao part, but none of the piano's seemed to fit the part. Either they were too bright and ringy or they were to flat with no life.
So we recorded a lively piano in stereo and a flat piano in stereo. I reverse phased one side of each one. I then did a high cut, mid boost, and bass cut on the two inverted tracks. I played with the levels, meshed the four tracks, and wound up with a piano sound that almost hits a steinway in front of a orchestral shell.
Korg Triton LE
Recording a pianao part, but none of the piano's seemed to fit the part. Either they were too bright and ringy or they were to flat with no life.
So we recorded a lively piano in stereo and a flat piano in stereo. I reverse phased one side of each one. I then did a high cut, mid boost, and bass cut on the two inverted tracks. I played with the levels, meshed the four tracks, and wound up with a piano sound that almost hits a steinway in front of a orchestral shell.
guitar junkie
Guitar User.
a tin can over my AT4040 gave me a chance to track dobro parts without really owning a dobro....
one note though is that the lower notes sounded the best but then again i was looking for dark and mellow anyway
tuning down a full step and then using a capo can give you a darker acoustic guitar tone due to the low tension of the strings.
one note though is that the lower notes sounded the best but then again i was looking for dark and mellow anyway
tuning down a full step and then using a capo can give you a darker acoustic guitar tone due to the low tension of the strings.
S
sirslurpee
What does THIS button do?
Wow great post guys!
I have a little trick of my own that hasn't been mentioned here yet..........
Don't spend all of your college money on recording equipment! Yeah I figured this out the hard way... Oh well, at least I have some decent gear
I have a little trick of my own that hasn't been mentioned here yet..........
Don't spend all of your college money on recording equipment! Yeah I figured this out the hard way... Oh well, at least I have some decent gear
B
banjoboy
New member
Not a trick!
I only have one trick - when I'm mixing, I turn the volume way way down, so that I can barely hear the track. That way I put the things up in the mix which really matter to the track, instead of doing the usual amateurs' mistake of wanting to hear everything you've recorded just because you recorded it! It also gives a better balance of bass and percussion, I find - although all of this of course might mean (a) I need better monitors, or (b) I need better ears!
I only have one trick - when I'm mixing, I turn the volume way way down, so that I can barely hear the track. That way I put the things up in the mix which really matter to the track, instead of doing the usual amateurs' mistake of wanting to hear everything you've recorded just because you recorded it! It also gives a better balance of bass and percussion, I find - although all of this of course might mean (a) I need better monitors, or (b) I need better ears!
kidvybes
New member
banjoboy said:
...actually, what you're doing is somewhat related to a practice common to many of the great mix engineers...after doing a preliminary mix, they run a cassette or CD copy of the mix and play it back on a very inexpensive boombox...if the mix holds up (sounds good) when played through the cheap boombox (which is how much of the public will actually hear the finished product) they know they've acheived a viable mix...more recently (due to the popularity of the Ipod) I've noticed that many of my associates send their preliminary mixes to MP3 format and listen to them on an Ipod for the same reason...it's a more accurate representation of how much of the public will listen to the finished product...
B
banjoboy
New member
I do that too! Thought everybody did...........
junplugged
Taking the slow road
or play in car driving w/ widow orpen or w/ a vacuum on or something that has a high noise level that competes w/ it and see what's left audible