anyone using condensers on snares

i57dwun4yb1pt8

im trying the oktava mk12 on snare - seems nice so far.

trackmixstudio

A condenser would generally not be directional enough and you you will end up with a lot of hats in the snare track.
If you want condenser style performance with lots of highs and attack try an audix i5. Much better than a 57 in my experience and has better rear rejection.
The i5 is great on everything i throw at it, even vocals.

i57dwun4yb1pt8

yeah , i have an i5 and have used it on snare .

i5 seems to prefer the hi tom though on the kit .

i find the transient snap in the 57 is better than the i5 , and the transient on the oktava is better than the 57 ( its aalso cardioid) - but as you say the spills are higher in the oktava

i also dont bash the hats to dust like some drummers do .

doesnt seem to bad though as the spills are more musical than the 57 .

studiorat

I took a bit of a flyer on a session last week and decided to try a really different setup. I based most of the drum sound around an ambient mic and added spots in to add detail and width. It took a bit of time but it was worth it and we got Drums and Piano/Keys for 3 songs done in a day. So that worked out at about €200 a song for good solid backing tracks...

I used an AKG 414 on snare. It doesn't sound as pinched or nasal as the sm-57. I never really worry about spill from the hi-hat, it's a given that the hat will be on everything. As sure as death and taxes. It's really down to the drummer and the hi-hat and how they play as to how loud the hat is going to seem in the balance, nothing I ever do seems to change this...

I'm also using 57's for spot micing the cymbals instead of traditional overheads which I can never get right;). You can get a really close cymbal sound and it not be harsh or distorted sounding. It takes a bit of hitting a cymbal and then moving the mic and trying again but it works really well. I suppose the ribbon thing would be kind of similar. Not having lots of top end.

The main kit sound is a C-12 through an Amek 9098 and U-87 Urei-1178 ambient sound (mono) and the 414 on the snare lets you get snare top-end into the drum sound without the actual snare hit getting too loud. The transient of the snare hit isn't as hard as it is with the 57 which I thought it would be. A tiny bit of the 57 gives the snare just a little thump.

Kik is a Beyer M-88 and the cone from an NS-10. I'm really happy with the detail I'm able to add into the ambient sound from the spot mics. I love when you can make out the click of the kick drum ion the ambience and add body with the NS-10.
We recorded with live piano in the room and I spent yesterday editing from different takes and spinning in the odd bar here and there in the verses.

And of course all recorded in glorious 96Khz.

If I get the chance I'll post the tracks of the 414 and the 57 so you can hear the difference. It's really quite nice.

I think a lot of the old regulars for mic choices are a bit out dated, because the recording medium has changed but a lot of the techniques haven't. You use condensors on cymbals because their their excellent top end helps capture the highs of the cymbals. That's grand if you are going to analog tape and expect the high end to soften. But with digital the high end stays pretty much like you recorded it so I don't think you need to use that extra anymore. Using KM-84's on guitars is similar. Now they are just too toppy for digital use. Same goes for the sm-57 on the snare, which now needs too much compression because that hard hit isn't getting softened on tape anymore.

i57dwun4yb1pt8

ive found that the ortf method on overheads , either 6 feet in the air over the kixk pedal plate pointing down and forward or same hieght over the drummers back bone poiniting forward and down a bit - gives a nice overhead
with less toms and more cymbals

but the setup you describe sounds good - im just realiisng the digital factor
and its influence on top end - maybe a valve overhead pre would smooth it a bit /

teamdresch

How's the drum bleed on the piano mics?
That's always a bit of a 'mare.

studiorat

teamdresch wrote: »

How's the drum bleed on the piano mics?
That's always a bit of a 'mare.

Really nice, it really adds depth to the sound of the kit. It's a 9ft grand with the lid wide on the big stick. We worked for about half an hour on getting three mics to cover the piano evenly all over with a huge full sound full of harmonics.

Not much spill of the piano on the kit, but we certainly won't be using the piano take without the kit at any time! We did multiple takes and edited instead of dropping in fixes we just cut the whole band to fix any mistakes. The trick is to look at the whole recording as one thing and not just the elements.

I think overheads can be pretty hard on mic pres. I prefer a good solid state amp instead. But anything as long as it can handle a good cymbal crash.

studiorat

DaDumTish wrote: »

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doesnt seem to bad though as the spills are more musical than the 57 .

This is a very good point. Very often people grab a cardioid thinking it will reject sounds off axis. The problem is it doesn't do it very well. So what you end up with is the instrument that's spilling onto that mic sounding bad because it's off axis. If you used an omni the spill won't have as much frequency information missing and it can actually add to the sound rather that detract from it.

jtsuited

my old kick drum used to sound amazing with a 414 inside it set to omni (and with the pad on).

personally i hate hearing d112's on kicks. the last bit of mixing i did for a band they had used one and i could not for the life of me get enough slap into sound to get it to poke through.

the 'common practice' on drum mic technique tend to lead to very common and quite unnatural sounding drums IMO.

that's a nice idea there studiorat with your mic setup. must try something like it the next time i'm tracking drums (which is something I'm still fond of doing, nothing quite like having a real rewarding drum sound on a mix).

PaulBrewer

DaDumTish wrote: »

ive found that the ortf method on overheads ,

I find the RTFM method works well too ...

PaulBrewer

studiorat wrote: »

Very often people grab a cardioid thinking it will reject sounds off axis.

Omni is nice on the ole acoustics too as the proximity effect (affect ) doesn't come into play if you're in close.

Similarly the Fig of 8 on a ribbon is a winner on brass.

There's more to life that Cardioid.

i57dwun4yb1pt8

as a drummer as ell, i actually like the d112 sound - and it gives a whole range of sounds if you exreiment with position ,

sound on sound did a whole mag on it recently and the suble position changes revelaed an amzing range of tones from a d112 .

fitz

Have heard good things about the KMS105 on snare....

PaulBrewer

DaDumTish wrote: »

as a drummer as ell, i actually like the d112 sound - and it gives a whole range of sounds if you exreiment with position ,

sound on sound did a whole mag on it recently and the suble position changes revelaed an amzing range of tones from a d112 .

The D112 was a replacement for the D12.

In the 80s a kick sound became sucked out mids and low mids and boosted top end.
(The most excessive example I remember was 'True' by Spandau Ballet)

The D112's remit was that top end thing so if it's not there it's down to how the track is recorded.

i57dwun4yb1pt8

ahhh screw it . ive gone back to the 57 , and put the oktava on the hats

the beyer m201 that was on hats is now under snare.

i tried a 57, m201 ev 408 and oktava mk12 , and audix i5

the 57 is best followed by the audix , but the audix sits lovely on the top tom

i still like my d112 though


if any one has an audix d6 - try it on a snare sometime and report how you get on - its interesting .

teamdresch

fitz wrote: »

Have heard good things about the KMS105 on snare....

Beat me to it.
Use one just yesterday.

Seziertisch

Have also heard good things about the Blue Baby Bottle for this job. It seems that it finds favour with a lot of guys who have access to fairly well stocked mic lockers and could use other stuff but don't.

eoin5

DaDumTish wrote: »

ahhh screw it . ive gone back to the 57 , and put the oktava on the hats

the beyer m201 that was on hats is now under snare.

i tried a 57, m201 ev 408 and oktava mk12 , and audix i5

the 57 is best followed by the audix , but the audix sits lovely on the top tom

i still like my d112 though


if any one has an audix d6 - try it on a snare sometime and report how you get on - its interesting .

Might be getting my hands on a dp7 kit over the christmas so I may get that chance.

I tried a beyerdynamic opus 53s on the snare once. The attack was way too sharp and the sound was very jarring, a failed experiment that one.