Comments on: Recording didgeridoo for Kosmopterix – part 5

By: Du

Du — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 13:53:33 +0000

Hey Bern!
Phases are connections between time and space of sound.
I adjusted phases by microphone placement.
The process is like this;
Place microphones. Record. Listen. Move one microphone. Record again. Listen again and compare. Do until satisfied.
The other option is to move a wave a little bit in the DAW. You can see where do the beginnings of certain sound start, so you adjust that. It sometimes works, and sometimes it completely ruins the whole story.
So do first, microphone placement well.

What you will notice later is that compression again messes up the phases, and it is really quite tricky to stay sane during the process if you are stubborn to get the best possible sound

I compensate for different distances and sound level on mic pre. But we also do some tricks here because we know that for certain sound there is an optimal gain of the preamp. It is usually quite high so that it is crisp in transients, but not to high, because it then becomes too
saturated.
You also need to know how your converter likes it. Mine likes it hot! =)
But again, not too hot.
Later, in the mix everything is adjusted anew. For didgeridoo solo we only use one summing mixer, with outboard connected serially to some channels.

Hope this helps!

By: Bernard Schlageck

Bernard Schlageck — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 00:03:55 +0000

Du,

I am re reading some of your texts in order to perhaps understand things in a new/better light. I have a couple of questions on this one… How did you adjust for the phase problems? Did you do so at the mixer board? In the DAW? Or did you do so in some other soundninja way that I am yet to discover? Also, same question for the level of each mic? How did you compensate for the different line levels that the different distances must certainly create? DAW, Pre, mixer?

Thanks for this text. There is alot here for the soundslave to discover, and your roadmap helps make this more easy!

Bernard

By: AJ Block

AJ Block — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 16:48:01 +0000

Thank you so much for the detailed research and report. I will certainly be using your article as a guide for my upcoming recordings.

By: Pamela Mortensen

Pamela Mortensen — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 20:05:16 +0000

Ok, I’ve said thank you so many times for these articles that these words are sounding funny in my ears.

Du, I can’t begin to say how much I appreciate you sharing this information. A person could drive themselves insane with mic placement to get the “right” sound but it’s homework that pays off as so evidenced by Kosmopterix. You’ve answered (and created) many questions I’ve had about individual didges and what they would need to sound their best. Many, many, many thanks.

Pam

By: Ben

Ben — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 20:41:13 +0000

You are crazy, Du!
What a perfectionist!
I will probably never come to this stage of didgeridoo recording myself,
but enjoyed reading it, and Id love to hear this setup live.

Cheers from Sydney