One man and his guitar, how do record?

professorlamp

professorlamp

I are Joe
Nov 2, 2009
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0
36
Wales, United Kingdom
I've never done an acoustic recording before (apart from me dabbling myself) but this guys coming to me soon for a recording of a couple of songs.

I'm thinking , should i do it stereo with my nt'5s and pan them hard l/r
or should i just do it with a single microphone two takes? since a geetar doesn't have loads of stereo information im finding it hard to choose which one.

Any advice from some experienced guys would be sweeet

edit: also , im not sure if this guy has a pickup on his guitar but im probably gonna blend that in a bit for some attack
 
Normally with an acoustic you mic near the sound hole - generally the advice is start about a foot away from where the neck meets the body, pointed halfway between there and the sound hole (so you avoid getting really a boomy low-end), and adjust to suit the guitar.

If you want a second mic, I normally go for one over the player's strumming shoulder (normally the right), pointed towards the top of the guitar. It gives you some attack, but it's warm and avoids too much string noise. YOu need to be careful if they're using headphones for a click though, as it's easy to pick that up. You can use that and the main mic panned slightly for a sort-of stereo sound (more like a short 'verb than anything).

I bought an electro-acoustic solely for recording purposes, and I've literally never used the electro bit - piezo just sound terrible recorded. The attack is all scratchy and plinky, I've never got a sound from it I'd want in the final mix.

Generally I use two/three mics, and for the mix I use all of them for the best take, panned slightly off-centre. Then I take the next best take and pick one mic (normally the straight-on, though it might be the over-the-shoulder or a close room mic) and hard pan that the other side with quite a lot of reverb or a good room impulse. Then send them both to a bus with a gentle reverb to help glue them. If I'm layering strumming parts, I like to have some with a plectrum, some with the thumb.

Steve
 
I just did an acoustic recording on Monday. I used 2 Heil PR30s in an XY pattern, one mic pointed at the soundhole and the other pointed at the 12th fret. We double tracked but it wasn't tight enough, so I hard panned both mics, duplicated the track, and put a 30ms delay on the other tracks, and EQed them both slightly different.
 
Right so if im going stereo , I dont really want to double things up?
to ParsonsMAtt he's not too sure on what he wants, Im just gonna give him demos of different mixes and see which one he likes the best and go from there, Its a friend of a friend so its quite a relaxed affair anyway

how'd that turn out arv?
im worrying about this guys tightness, he's good singing wise but I'm not sure how his guitar work is
 
professorlamp said:
Right so if im going stereo , I dont really want to double things up?
to ParsonsMAtt he's not too sure on what he wants, Im just gonna give him demos of different mixes and see which one he likes the best and go from there, Its a friend of a friend so its quite a relaxed affair anyway
Click to expand...

You can try double tracking, this dude just didn't know his own song well enough to do it consistently twice, lots of little inconsistencies that annoyed the shit out of me.
 
With my Taylor 414ce i've recorded it with a couple of mic's as well as a DI from the guitar itself. This particular taylor has magnets inside the body strategically placed (i guess strategically?) so that it picks up a broader spectrum such as acoustic taps, slaps on the body itself. It actually turned out quite well to record it with just two room mic's and the DI straight from the guitar and panning it. Kind of made the guitar sound double tracked, even though it obviously wasn't. Could always give that a go? You can always delete the extra tracks you don't need.
 
totally depends..... sometimes just a stereo pair, either xy, blumlein or spaced pair, depending on what mics you've got, and maybe another on at the 12th fret, or just one mic around the 12th fret and double track if the music calls for it.
If its more damien ricey sort of stuff definatly wouldnt double track, but if the arrangements start to stack up, i may do bits here and there... kinda hard to say without knowing what sort of vibe it is...
 
I'd say have one mic pointed at the fretting hand, the other pointed about halfway between the sound hole and the 12th fret area

wouldnt hard pan them, maybe 50%L 50%R

I take it your tracking vox seperate??
 
When I've tested recording my acoustic, I really like my pair of SM81s in XY configuration, pointing at the sound hole and the 12th fret. That's given me both the most natural and the most "rich" sound.

I would probably double track acoustics and pan leads down the middle... but I'm sure that's my metal nature coming in. :D
 
Yer im gonna be tracking the vocals separately , it's not going to be really layered acoustic songs with strings and drums etc...
Sparse really, like the title says just him and his guitar.
I was thinking of this as my strategy...
Nt5's XY around where the neck meets the body maybe a bit closder to the sound hole and one of my condensers at the 12th fret. The condenser is just an experiment though and I'll ditch it if its not adding anything to the song

and at parsons theres not gonna be any shredz of leadz :D


edit:superlameeee , hes just informed me now that he wants drums an bass and will now be using an electric so looks like its a band now :lol: jesus unprepared or what.
 
professorlamp said:
edit:superlameeee , hes just informed me now that he wants drums an bass and will now be using an electric so looks like its a band now :lol: jesus unprepared or what.
Click to expand...

Just like the session I was supposed to do this saturday. He canceled last sunday because the band hadn't rehearsed at all.

I would've used a pair of KM184's as a CAP for the acoustic stuff (with maybe a LDC pointed at the 12th fret to see if it does anything good), if that would have been what he would have wanted to record that is.
 
Can anyone post samples of their acoustic work?

I have not succeeded to get the right acoustic sound so far. Cud the problems b my mic placement or the room itself. :(
 
Hi,

this is my first post and i hope i can help you out on this one.

I did a production two weeks ago and i had to mic an acoustic guitar. So here is a picture of what i have done.

I used a Neumann TLM103 30cm away from the soundhole and a AKG C414 30cm away pointing on the 12th fret.

I didnt pan this hard l/r, i only mixed and routed the signals. TLM103 at 0db and the C414 at -10db. Got a beautiful sound out of it.

 
lucaskills said:
Hi,

this is my first post and i hope i can help you out on this one.

I did a production two weeks ago and i had to mic an acoustic guitar. So here is a picture of what i have done.

I used a Neumann TLM103 30cm away from the soundhole and a AKG C414 30cm away pointing on the 12th fret.

I didnt pan this hard l/r, i only mixed and routed the signals. TLM103 at 0db and the C414 at -10db. Got a beautiful sound out of it.

Click to expand...

can u share the sample dude? :blush:
 
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