Room importance when recording guitars???

[GuitarHack]

How much/little does the room influence when close-micing guitar cab's? I have my amp set up in my study with my computer, etc...

I am thinking about putting my amp and cab in a walk-in closet that shares a wall with my study but am wondering what it will do to the sound. I can easily get the required guitar, mic cables, etc... in there. When the house was being built I put some insulating batts in all the walls to help keep ambient noise from each room down (not thinking that I would be using it to try and stop the sound level of a kranked amp, I understand that I will not achieve this with such basic means).

Since it will be only close-micing and no room/ambient micing, how much does it really matter. I can see the difference for recording drums, but just curious about close-micing a cab.

Thanks for any info

 

[smy1]

I have never noticed any considerable difference if your amplifier level is high enough. If it is really low, then you might pick up other sounds, but at even modest settings the amp should just overpower everything else.

Of course that is totally untrue if you have a multi-directional mic ...

 

[cobrahead1030]

i did an experiment a while back, with a guitar cab at a wall slightly angled (cab was about 3' from the wall) the wall is covered with egg crates for a pretty dead sound

i recorded a few short clips that way, and then i stuck a piece of plywood over the wall right where the cab was facing, and recorded a few more clips...in comparison i found that when the plywood was in place the tone was just a hair brighter, the low end seemed a bit stronger, and overall it just had more life to it

i now have a sheet of plywood on that wall anytime i record something

i've also found that sitting the cab on a wood floor opposed to a carpet one gives a nice natural sounding low end

 

[chadsxe]

Not to burst your bubble or anything but egg cartons are a myth. It has been proven over and over again on countless forums.

 

[Soundlurker]

I'm fairly sure the room has a considerable impact on the sound you get even when close micking. You can get good results from your closet, though. You should simply cover the walls with rockwool or fiberglass and some fabric. If it sounds too dry you could always use some impulses. If it's the other way around you've got a problem as you can't remove the bad-sounding reverb.

 

[cobrahead1030]

Not to burst your bubble or anything but egg cartons are a myth. It has been proven over and over again on countless forums.

what's mythical about them? we're set up in a room with concrete walls, and they sound better than the bare concrete

i know there are a lot of better solutions, but we can get a lot of those for free

 

[chadsxe]

I am not debating they don't change the sound just a little, more so that they you said it made dead sound. In fact it is almost the opposite. When we are talking about dead sound we are talking about absorbtion (if you consider dead sound something else then you lost me), correct? We also have to take into consideration that high freq's are easy to absorb and that low freq's are usually the ones we have trouble with, correct? Absorbtion is measured by NRC values. A value of 1 means that a frequency is absorbed by 100%. Egg cartons are typically made out of fiberglass which have an NRC value of 0.01 at 125Hz. Not so good.... There is a website that tested this all out, I just have to find it.

EDIT: http://www.acousticsfirst.com/eggc.htm

 

[Loren Littlejohn]

What on earth kind of egg cartons are you refering to? I am pretty sure that he is talking about the foam mattress crap you sleep on. Another thing I read in his report... that stuff isn't that flamable.

 

[~BURNY~]

Of course it's important. Especially with the low frequencies.

 

[cobrahead1030]

i said that the eggcrate covered wall was pretty dead, not completely

it's dead sounding moreso than plywood, and much more than concrete

btw...this is what we're using

 

[Ermz]

:zombie:

 

[Loren Littlejohn]

lol ok so you are quite literally using egg crates. My bad I thought it was that foam shit you sleep on.

 

[chadsxe]

ehhh....who am I to debate science

 

[cobrahead1030]

i get where you're coming from, all i can say is that i spend a lot of time playing and recording in this room...the bare walls, egg crates, and plywood all have a different sound to my ears; the bare walls being the most unpleasant of the 3

 

[chadsxe]

Yeah for sure.....On that scale I would imagine it makes a diffrence. In the end if it sounds good then it sounds good and thats all that matters.

 

[Loren Littlejohn]

Recording mag had a fucking sweet article on recording guitars in the home studio enviroment. Alot of ideas that I (personally) wouldn't be inclined to try, but alot of good ones. Like using your couch to float your amp (although with a half stack that sounds like a rather bad idea to me).

 

[sparkyness]

dude....that's a lot of fucking eggs.....

 

[dreamcatcher]

dude....that's a lot of fucking eggs.....

Everyone drinks a dozen raw before each take





uke:

 

[flhctroll]

Who would sleep on egg cartons?

 

[sparkyness]

a lazy chicken?