recording drums - bad room

[bryan_kilco]

We are going to start recording in a few days in our practice space. This room is nothing to brag about.

We have some of these thick sound blankets, think it's best of we try to wall off sort of close to the drums and get the most out of close mics? Or better to get a little room sound in there, even if it is shit?

 

[JeffTD]

Build a cloud above the kit and treat close reflections. Thick blankets on the walls will help, bass traps in the corners would be amazing, but the cloud above will help you with your cymbals the most and that's the most important part. Low end buildup can be filtered out of OH mics easily and the shells can be replaced, but bad cymbals will ruin a production.

A cloud and surgical EQ will do wonders for your drum sounds.

 

[DavePiatek]

I'd make the room as dead as possible and then use ambience samples. Make sure you check the phase on the close mics against the overheads in mono.

 

[RedDog]

Cloud and treat direct reflections. They are your worst nightmare.

 

[bryan_kilco]

I must have been half dead when I made the OP

Thanks guys. Will report back.

 

[bryan_kilco]

Never did the cloud before. What would you all recommend? Something like a heavy blanket? We can easily staple/nail into wood.

I'd love to do proper treatment but it won't happen with our budget and time. We at least have some padding covering concrete and bare walls. Floor is carpeted.

 

[JeffTD]

A suspended 2" or 4" panel like you'd place on the walls, just a lot wider, is generally ideal if you don't have the space/resources/ceiling support to do the full 1" staggered wooden block style diffuser.

 

[meanmrmustad]

Underheads! And a room mic in another room

 

[bryan_kilco]

I never tried underheads before, and was actually debating on it this round. I only have 8 inputs and that normally gets filled by close mics and OH's alone. I'd like to get a room mic going but I'n not so certain I want to sacrifice snare bottom mic.....

 

[bryan_kilco]

Well, spent a few hours yesterday getting drums tuned (or, trying to.... =\) and hanging as much sound dampening as we could.

I absolutely HATE trying to get good raw drum sounds. I don't have any personal hands-on experience with tuning drums, so I let our drummer take care of that, but then he thinks they sound good but I think otherwise. He does have a drum dial that he uses but its still rough.

He likes his snare real high and ping-y where I almost hate that sound and like a deeper, more body-driven snare. We clash heads a bit here which kind of sucks.

We did hang a bit of a cloud but it's pretty ghetto and we couldn't make one bug chunk as there are florescent lights recessed in the ceiling and we didn't want to cover them. Monday we get mics set up and do some tests.

 

[meanmrmustad]

Let him tune it tight and dampen it, it will have nice attack and take advantage of the proximity effect for the body, you can always send the snare to a pitched down reverb

 

[meanmrmustad]

Use the bottom snare mic for hihats instead, you can always reamp the bottom snare mic later!

 

[Studdy]

Quote
"Well, spent a few hours yesterday getting drums tuned (or, trying to.... =\) and hanging as much sound dampening as we could."

If you are hanging treatment all over that is not dense/thick enough (minimum 6inch 703 or alike in corners) you are more than likely making things worse for a truly natural drum tone. I went down the moving blankets everywhere road, at first listen wow its so controlled sounding, but i ended up with dull, muddy ass mixes. In a smaller/mid size room I would put bass traps in every corner. (superchuck or straddled 6 inch panels). And put a cloud above the kit. That should give you a very balanced sound. Once you have that experiment with reflection points.

my 2 cents.

 

[meanmrmustad]

Record outside!!!!!

 

[Uros]

the full 1" staggered wooden block style diffuser.

Some more info on this?

 

[cfh11]

i think he is talking about something similar to this:

 

[Uros]

I know what diffuser is, was just confused and thought that "staggered" meant something else other than, well...staggered. So one (virtual) trip to English dictionary cleared it all up for me haha
All's good. I must say this though, that in a few studios I've been I've never seen huge diffusers on ceiling, it was always panels with absorptive properties.

 

[bryan_kilco]

Something I've wondered for a long time and never knew the answer to: Those staggered diffusors - are the blocks just random height/pitched? Or is there some sort of formula and special way they are laid out?

 

[~BURNY~]

Formula