Recording Problems, Help Appreciated

[wahwah]

Re: Recording Problems, Help Appreciated

i'm going to buy an sm57 off ebay and see what happens. maybe that will solve the problem.

Keep in mind that you are still going to need a mic preamp to use a 57 with that recorder. You will not get enough level without it.



Cheers............................wahwah

 

[J Moose]

Re: Recording Problems, Help Appreciated

It's all about the fundamental and harmonic frequency range. There is no information below 120 hz that is important to the tone of a electric guitar.

I'd really beg to differ... the real "meat" of any guitar tone is there & lower, in most cases there's usuable stuff down to 50-60Hz. Especially true for rock & "heavy" tones... if there's flub down low I might high pass up to 100Hz to get rid of the junk & add in the same range with some kind of bellshape to put the "chunk" back in.

Solos & ear candy bits might get passed up to 300-400Hz... but not "main" parts. Might low-pass some of those too... "telephone" sounds that slice through a mix...

I really go outta my way to NOT have to EQ guitars & capture "good" sounds. Only so much EQ can be applied before things start to sound phasey & twisted...


Anyway... it sounds like you need to use something besides the microphone thats built into the recorder if any loud sound is the cause of the freak out. An SM57 and some kind of inexpensive preamp would be a good start...

 

[sosomething]

Re: Recording Problems, Help Appreciated

Oh yah, forgot you might tune down. In that case it's more of a bass guitar and 80hz should do it. No matter what 60hz is starting to push the lower range so if your recordings sound muddy and masked that's where you need to start looking.

I tune to Eb, Db at the lowest and find there is a lot of actual guitar "tone" (as in note fundamental AND chunk, weight, etc.) between 120hz and 80hz. Below 80 is usually where I cut it off and let the bass guitar do the work, but in a lot of heavy music the emphasis is on the heavyness inherent in the rhythm guitars and low-passing at 120hz is definitely going to detract from that.

:scared: 2-4khz??? I hope you mean 12-14khz??

I went home and looked at some of my EQ settings... yeah, that's what I meant.:doh:

 

[barbarianbrute]

Re: Recording Problems, Help Appreciated

i hear you guys talk a lot about hz and db, and while i understand basic electronics theory, i'm at a loss to really relate this to playing music or recording in any practical sense.

how do i measure these frequencies? all i have is some amps with control knobs and a mini digital recorder. i do have some recording software, but i wouldn't begin to be able to describe what hz or db i'm recording anything at.

perhaps you could dumb it down a bit for the mere mortals and tell me how the heck i can tell if i'm using the right amounts of what.

 

[daemon barbeque]

Re: Recording Problems, Help Appreciated

i hear you guys talk a lot about hz and db, and while i understand basic electronics theory, i'm at a loss to really relate this to playing music or recording in any practical sense.

how do i measure these frequencies? all i have is some amps with control knobs and a mini digital recorder. i do have some recording software, but i wouldn't begin to be able to describe what hz or db i'm recording anything at.

perhaps you could dumb it down a bit for the mere mortals and tell me how the heck i can tell if i'm using the right amounts of what.

You can purchase plug-ins like parametric equalizers and Mastering tools like izotope ozone...They have those frequencie ranges to controle...Once you hear the differences by tweaking it ,you understand what frequencie does which effect on your tone...

Your ear ,or better said your brain is mostly sensitive to mid-range ,and your hearing range is 25hz to 23000 hz...So 40 hz is mostly the lowest understandable freq.Everything under 40 is just a buzz ,and you can't understand wich note it is.
The low pass and hi pass filters are for frequencies that have a special effect.Like the posts show above ,you can cancel hum ,some telefone like effects ,some buzz or whatever.
Or you can compress some frequencies to stop them to get too dominant or just hearable.

 

[barbarianbrute]

Re: Recording Problems, Help Appreciated

thanks man, that information is very helpful. i understand now what you guys are talking about. i'm going to get right to work tonight when i get home and try a few different recordings too see how it works.

 

[innerdreamrecords.co]

Re: Recording Problems, Help Appreciated

I'd really beg to differ... the real "meat" of any guitar tone is there & lower, in most cases there's usuable stuff down to 50-60Hz. Especially true for rock & "heavy" tones... if there's flub down low I might high pass up to 100Hz to get rid of the junk & add in the same range with some kind of bellshape to put the "chunk" back in.

Do your thing man! I'm sure you're a good engineer. If there was only one way to do things we'd all do it that way. Just don't minimize my experience which is quite extensive.

 

[J Moose]

Re: Recording Problems, Help Appreciated

Your ear ,or better said your brain is mostly sensitive to mid-range ,and your hearing range is 25hz to 23000 hz...So 40 hz is mostly the lowest understandable freq.Everything under 40 is just a buzz ,and you can't understand wich note it is.

Most rooms won't reproduce much of anything under 40Hz anyway... even if a speaker is putting out a 30Hz or lower signal you'll never "hear" it... you'll only hear the octaves of it as it reflects around the room... 30Hz tone = octaves at 60Hz, 120Hz, 240Hz etc.

With sound traveling at 1130 feet per second (roughly) one wavelength of 20Hz needs about 57 feet or so to develop and complete one cycle...compared to about 11 feet for 100 Hz.

The infamous Mixermans 'EQ chart' is quite probably the best description & explanition i've ever seen for the layman.
http://womb.mixerman.net/showpost.php?p=37815&postcount=15

BTW... Hertz when abbreivated should be done with a capital 'H' for Dr. Hertz who charted all this stuff out years ago...