First home studio - am I on the right track?

[RandomHero]

I sat down recently with my bandmates and told them of the $2500+ tax return that will be mine in just a month or so. We seriously discussed renting a home together in half a year or so for the sake of making music, and possibly moving to a nearby city where our particular brand of music is more enjoyed.

With that couple grand, I'll be assembling a home studio focused on catching mostly acoustic guitars, vocals, and hand percussion. We have a trap kit that I may also mic up eventually.

On the bill right now, are:

Mics for all our noisemakers: I love my Sennheiser vocal mic and can get most of their products at half street price. I'm planning on expanding the arsenal.

An 8-channel mixer: I'm stuck on this one. For one, I don't know what brands to look for, for good quality. For two, I don't know what direction we're going to take with our recording. As I understand it, we can either all plug into a mixer and record an entire performance, or we can layer tracks two at a time into one of those umpteen-track recording monsters on the market nowadays. Which is better? Am I even right?

An 8 or 16 track digital recorder: I have a bit better of an idea what names to go for in this department, and I'm in the market for something that can do the master mixdown, and burn us a demo CD. The question here again is whether or not this recorder will be operating alone, or behind a carefully adjusted mixer.

Studio Monitors: Duh.

Headphones: For isolating a single musician with already-recorded music for the purpose of laying down vocal harmonies, doubling tracks, or throwing in last-minute ideas.

Aside from the 50 pounds of patch cables for all that, am I missing anything?

Also on the bill are a few instruments to fill in the gaps; between us we have one very nice acoustic, one very not-so-nice acoustic, a middle-of-the-road 12-string, and a tambourine. I might throw in many random pieces of hand percussion, and an acoustic bass.

Between the three of us, we have about 60 songs to record. All GN2 members will, of course, be entitled to free listening. ;D

[gfxbss]

a couple of comments.

mixers: Mackie is a great brand. do not get a behringer. they can do the job, but i havent had them last too long.

in response to the digital recorder. if you want to go that route, then i would put a mixer in front of it just for added control. also, you could think about putting a nice sound card into your PC(or mac if thats your style). if you do that, get a program like Sonar. it is made by cakewalk, and the last i heard is used by a recording studio in my town that is rather well known. just for your info there website is www.sweetwater.com/.

studio monitors: get the best you can find!!! may i suggest some JBL? in my mind, your monitors are the most important part of your studio.

also, dont skimp on your headphones. you need the sound perfect to get perfect harmonies.

also, may i suggest to do some soundproofing. this really is rather important. if you dont want to put the pad soundproofing on your walls and have exposed ceiling/ walls, i would suggest sound proofing R-19 insulation. then putting paneling or whatever covering you desire over it. i have the R-19 in the ceiling of my bedroom and it works great.

hope this helps,

Tyler

[RandomHero]

Thanks for the reccomendations on the mixer, monitors and headphones. Soundproofing may be a little difficult to do; I live in a studio apartment. We may be battling ambient noise by what time of day it is.

I'd really rather get a digital recorder for the same reason I'd rather buy a Playstation version of a game than a computer one. Computer software, no matter how well designed, just -hopes- your computer is configured as such to run it flawlessly. A digital recorder will always do its' job without worry about things like "not enough ram" or "hardware/software conflicts."

[gfxbss]

not a problem. for soundproofing i would suggest as many blankets on any outer surface that you can. they dont seem like much, but they do help quite a bit.

i totally understand the recorder thing. i have a $3000 PC and a dual processor G4 in my bedroom. so i can run nearly anything on either platform.

i have never used digital recorders because of my before mentioned computers, so i cant suggest what to go w/ on them. maybe DigiTech?

also, since youre doing acoustics. mic them, dont plug them in(if you have acoustic electrics). then get two condenser mics. one of the large ones and put it near th body of the guitar for that nice natural sound. then get what i like to call a "stick" condensor(as soon as you look into them you will know what i am talking about as far as a stick condensor.) thake that and put it near your fretboard. you will get a nice sound from it. it just catches any sound comming off of that thing.

[johan]

" a home studio focused on catching mostly acoustic guitars, vocals, and hand percussion."

dude really, that a great way to start, but with one condenser mike, a decent basic mixer with phantom and a somewhat decent soundcard and you can do everything you want without any extra gear.

If you have a computer, you can at least start with what you've got. Recently recording our band with two condenser mikes back to back and this as stereo track, sounds amazing and you can completely alter sound by mike placement. Al lot of blues soul and country music prior to the sixties was recorded like that remember.

Don't jump in with 2500 bucks when you can tip your toe in for free... Once you do that, you will better know exactly what equipment you need to achieve what you want.

have fun anyways, and let us know how much

[JohnH]

While talking minimal, I've just taken some small steps in that direction.

I wanted to record and multitrack my electric sound from my DSL401 amp. I have a Shure PG57 mic and the smallest Behringer mixer, which has a mic input and two stereo line-ins. I'm finding I like the sound of a mix between the mic input, and that from the cab-simulated line-out of the amp. The mixer then goes to my 5year-old computer with Soundblaster live card. I record with Audacity, which is a free downloadable multitacking program.

I'm getting good results, limited entirely by my own lack of ability. Ive been impressed by the quality of the mic and the mixer

cheers

John

[gfxbss]

i will go w/ you johan. ive done w/ nothing but a guitar. i took an adapter and plugged my guitar directly into the soundcard. then i used the default windows recordings 30 seconds at a time then pieced them together. i think my problem is that i am a major in sound engineering and am in the process of starting my own pro studio.

[dd842]

Hi all, and Happy New Year!

gfxbss said:

then i used the default windows recordings 30 seconds at a time then pieced them together.

I was doing the same thing until I found a free MP3 recorder at MP3myMP3.com . I don't know if the site is still functional, etc. but the software records with no time limit - well, maybe it was an hour or something, but effectively no limit.

So far I have written only about a dozen songs. Half are so-so, half are okay, and half are not bad . Of course I've always got my math skills to fall back on ;D

Until I am in a position material wise to look into it further, that's all I plan to do.

Dan

[lunaalta]

There are a couple of open source recorders around. Great for getting to know how things work and easy to get working.

[sumgai]

Dan,

....
So far I have written only about a dozen songs. Half are so-so, half are okay, and half are not bad . Of course I've always got my math skills to fall back on ;D

I was gonna say, with that kind of ability to juggle numbers, I see the House of Representatives in your future! ;D


sumgai

[sumgai]

luna,

There are a couple of open source recorders around. Great for getting to know how things work and easy to get working.

Links, please.

[RandomHero]

Search for these two:

Audacity
Kristal

Both completely free and quite functional.

[dd842]

This thread got me thinking about something I had heard about but never tried: Recording while using a loudspeaker as a microphone.

So, last night I connected a speaker to the microphone input jack on my computer to hear what would happen.

I would love to tell you the sound was great ... it was not.

BUT at least it "was". The recording was clearly audible, but quite weak and muddy.

I wonder, if the speaker had been wired differently, if the result could be better.

Has anyone ever tried this and achieved good results?

Dan

[UnklMickey]

dd842 said:

...Has anyone ever tried this and achieved good results?

not-so-much.

smaller speakers work better.

also, using a (step-up) transformer helps a bit too.

if you look at the element of a dynamic microphone, it vaguely resembles a VERY small speaker with an extremely loose suspension.

cheers,

unk

[ux4484]

couple of items on using a speaker as a mic.....

Use a good speaker, the larger the voice coil the better (paper cone, not poly).
The speaker should be wired with as short a cable as possible or be wired with a shielded cable.
If possible; use a preamp with a low impedance input, a small amp with a line/speaker out will do nicely.
The room should be as soundproofed as possible, blankets over hard surfaces and such.
Try multiple placements for the sound, depending on the acoustics of the room you may need all the equipment pointed toward the speaker or away/angled from it. If done right, it will give you a mono version of the sound of being in the room when played back (wall of sound), a weird sound by today's digital standards, but quite common in some of the up and coming garage style bands.

We used a speaker as a mic in High School in stage crew. We used an old theater speaker (massive) on it's side just at the edge of the stage (in one of the footlight wells) to pick up audio during dialog scenes, it worked quite well. We switched it off during musical numbers, as once the band came up, they would take over that input. We had a couple wireless mic's (a very costly item at that time), but not enough for everyone doing a dialog scene. The speaker fit the bill quite nicely.

Back on topic: Right now for monitors, I use a set of shielded computer speakers as monitors on the computer I use to record (which also has a Sound Blaster Live card) via my Digitech Rpx400. If it were more than me (and my kids occasionaly), I might want more. But with multi-tracking, some very passable recordings can be made with it.
If you are looking for a good value in a condenser mic for your home studio, you can't do much better than a MXL 990. I've used and recommended this mic to others, for $60 it can't be beat. Every one who's picked one up, has come back and thanked me for the heads up. MF also sells it with an instrument mic for $99, but I'd rather get it with the shock mount.

*edit* as you'll notice, I didn't see unk's post before I finished writing.....and apparently we are at odds on speaker size.

[UnklMickey]

ux4484 said:

....*edit* as you'll notice, I didn't see unk's post before I finished writing.....and apparently we are at odds on speaker size.

maybe not as much as it would seem.

did these "massive" speakers have tweeters in them?

[ux4484]

They were theater speakers from the 50's, they did not have tweeters, just one very large (14-16 inches width) elliptical shaped speaker in a cabinet that we had shielded on the inside with sheet metal (we had to cut the cabinet down to fit in the hinged footlight well). Our sponser/electric shop teacher had built a tube preamp for it, as when we originally connected it to the preamp for sound board, it was very muddled. It was fairly good for voice, it gave a reverb effect (which most school auditoriums have going anyways). We used another one in the lighting booth for the spot operators (carbon arc lights) as they needed to talk to the sound booth without moving from the spots. The sound booth called on it and they replied on it via a footswitch, we did use a step-up transformer on that one as I recall.

We got the idea from the school PA system which also used the speaker as a mic when using the "call" office button, those were usually 8 to 10 inch speakers. We were putting on a pretty big show with a full band for our School's community theater group, and we needed stage amplification on a low budget.
We went back there for career night last October, the speaker cab is still in the footlight well after 27 years!.

[ux4484]

On another speaker as mic note, back in the band days, we had a reel to reel 8 track available to us for recording, we tried an 8 in speaker as an input on a couple of tracks with a preamp, it was very weird sounding by comparison, but when listened to alone it make the recording sound like it was decades older, not bad, just very different.

[gfxbss]

im with ux. those are the mics that i use as well. i just picked up the shockmount on ebay for like $10.

[UnklMickey]

okay Tyler, i'll take the bait.

what does that shock-mount look like? (he said, with a frightened look upon his face.)

[ux4484]

unklmickey said:

okay Tyler, i'll take the bait.

what does that shock-mount look like? (he said, with a frightened look upon his face.)

Is there a joke in there?.....

.....I'm not gettin' it....

Looks like this:

[UnklMickey]

ux4484 said:

...Is there a joke in there?.....

yeah, but it is kinda suBtle.

we just got finished talking about speakers as mics.

in fact, "massive" speakers.

and speakers as mics, are the only microphone references, (unless you return to page-1.)

hence, shock mounts for those would be equally massive......


sorta loses somethin' in the translation.

[sumgai]

RH,

Search for these two:

Audacity
Kristal

Both completely free and quite functional.

Thanky! Already have Audacity, didn't know about Kristal, will search for it now.......


sumgai

[sumgai]

The size of the speaker is not as important as quality, which is no where near as important as impedance matching.

Both unk and Chris arrived at that conclusion, albeit in different ways.

Rule of Thumb: A gross impedance mismatch obliterates a quality signal transfer. (There are exceptions, but they're very rarely seen in the wild.)

Try a 70.7 line speaker. ;D


sumgai

[dd842]

sumgai said:

Rule of Thumb: A gross impedance mismatch obliterates a quality signal transfer.

Funny you say that, as it occurred to me last night that I had used an old car stereo speaker the night before ... 4 ohms.

Last night I tried again with a little paper cone speaker from a TV ... 8 ohms.

The difference was night and day ... huge improvement.

I haven't had time to set up my stereo speakers yet (larger but better quality) to see what happens, but in the meantime it's fun.

Dan

P.S. Randomhero, I don't mean to get this off your original thread of what to do with your tax refund, it's just that I can't relate because I haven't earned enough yet in my 15+ working years to pay taxes (insert fozzy bear punchline drumroll here - wucka wucka wucka)

[ux4484]

sumgai said:

Both unk and Chris arrived at that conclusion, albeit in different ways.

hmmmm.....haven't seen Chris anywhere in this here thread.....



sorry unk,
It never occurred to me as I (thought) I knew what gfxbss meant.

RH,

Do we want to split this speaker as mic stuff into another thread?

[UnklMickey]

ux4484 said:

....sorry unk, ....

i make a lame joke, but you're the one apologizing.......... you ARE easy to get along with!

[gfxbss]

sorry about that, it was my bad. i when i posted that, i thought i was looking at page 2(as i clicked on the 2 link on the main page.) turns out i was on page one.

Tyler

[gfxbss]

also, the shock mount i was speaking of was exactly like the one ux menioned.

[dd842]

ux4484 said:

couple of items on using a speaker as a mic.....

Use a good speaker, the larger the voice coil the better (paper cone, not poly).

..... and .....

If you are looking for a good value in a condenser mic for your home studio, you can't do much better than a MXL 990.

Hi all,

For the sake of completion, I thought I'd share this with you.

I finally got around to hooking up the stereo speakers, and I found that
1) they were no better than the small (albeit paper cone) TV speaker I tried before,
2) when I spoke directly into the woofer, midrange and tweeters, the woofer was most effective at capturing sound accurately (I do not have any sophisticated equipment to measure this, but my 7 year old daughter says so ... so there ya go),
3) I also used a set of headphones, with about the same result ... which gives me an inky stinkling that maybe tweeter in my stereo speaker isn't up to snuff anymore?

So, I cannot say that the size of the speaker really made any difference in my own little experiments. However, it should be noted that I really never achieved any results that are worth pursuing no matter what type of speaker I used.

I didn't have a good microphone, and since ux had mentioned the MXL 990 microphone, I thought I would buy one and hear for myself.

Unfortunately, they were somewhat difficult to find in Canada, but in the meantime I did come across a mic by Samson called the CO1U.

The "U" denotes USB, and since the only recording equipment I have at this point is my computer, USB connectivity was an excellent feature for me so I bought one to try. The price was good and the reviews on Harmony Central were similar to the MXL 990.

Unfortunately I can't compare it to the MXL 990, as I don't have one, but the ease of use is fantastic, and the recording quality seems very good for the money ...

... now, if only I can improve what is being recorded!

Dan