Some questions about drum (metal) recording

[Laozen]

Hello,

I´m going to record one song with my band (prog/modern metal) and had a chance to use my school´s pretty good studio.

-I will record china, hihat, and ride with own mics also, never done that before, so which type of mic for those and how to do mic placement? How close and over or under the cymbals?
-Which kind of preamps should I prefer for bd,snare,oh etc.? I have UA 4-710D 4 ch tubepreamp, Metric Halo 8ch and Presonus 8ch Digimax to choose for.
- How about ambience mics? Stereo or mono, which kind of mic? Placement? The recording room is about 30-40m2 and 3m high with few heavy moveable damper walls.


I try to use samples as little as possible, so I want to do recordings well. The sound I´m aiming for is Jens Bogren, Andy Sneap sound a like Albums: Soilwork-The Panic Broadcast, James Labrie-Static Impulse, Symphony X-Paradise Lost, Devin Townsend-Addicted.

Have to mention that I´m the drummer and I know that a lot of thanks to those great drum sounds goes to very good drummers and well tuned drums. I try to do my best

 

[BLUElightCory]

http://www.ultimatemetal.com/forum/f-o-h/770206-best-production-tips-all-stickies-here.html

 

[Manicompression]

oz's metal drum recording sticky is a great read. I would mic the ride from underneath aiming for where the bell meets the body of the cymbal. HiHats are situational in terms of mic position, I would move your mic around a bit untill you can tolerate what your getting. I would recommend using a dynamic mic for them, condensers never work for me. Ive had good results micing chinas from underneath any decent mic should do ok.

I like the seperation you can get from multi micing cymbals but they always end up buried slightly under the main overheads just to give me a better sense of space and detail, I would focus on getting your main OHs as perfect as possible and the rest should fall into place.

Make sure to make samples of the kit if you want a natural sound like Bogren gets. Also most importantly get the sounds as perfect at the source as possible. New heads, a tune bot, moongels, wd40. Good luck

 

[006]

oz's metal drum recording sticky is a great read. I would mic the ride from underneath aiming for where the bell meets the body of the cymbal. HiHats are situational in terms of mic position, I would move your mic around a bit untill you can tolerate what your getting. I would recommend using a dynamic mic for them, condensers never work for me. Ive had good results micing chinas from underneath any decent mic should do ok.

I like the seperation you can get from multi micing cymbals but they always end up buried slightly under the main overheads just to give me a better sense of space and detail, I would focus on getting your main OHs as perfect as possible and the rest should fall into place.

Make sure to make samples of the kit if you want a natural sound like Bogren gets. Also most importantly get the sounds as perfect at the source as possible. New heads, a tune bot, moongels, wd40. Good luck

All good advice.

Lots and lots of "natural" sounding drum productions weren't actually natural.