i know you people are probably way past this stage by the sounds of it, but..... i'm losing an awful lot in my drum mix due to poor separation, so bascially everything ends up sounding like its in the centre of the mix. unlike the guy in the "favourite drum mics" post just below this one, i really like a very dry drum mix and mixed in hard stereo.

i'm assuming its my mic placement thats poor and i've got this far on common sense and little else, so does anyone have any helpful tips to take me from a training bra to a 32A?

Hey,

I'm not sure what type of mics your using, but you should check out their polar response pattern first. For good separation, use mics with highly directional response patterns, Hyper or Super Cardioids. Cardioids will even do the trick. This will avoid unwanted spill from neighbouring drums.

One of the hard ones to contend with is hi hat spill in the snare mic. I usually avoid using a hi hat mic all together and just let the overheads do the work. Another way to deal with this problem is to use a compressor in ducking mode, feed the hi hat through a hi pass filter and then into the side chain of the compressor with the snare going through the main compressor path. This will cause the snare to drop in volume when ever the hat is hit. Personally I hate this method because it causes the snare to modulate in sympathy with the hats, causing a loss in "whack" to use the not so technical term.

Another option would be to use a spaced or even co-incident stereo pair in front of, and slightly elevated over the kit, to get good stereo imaging and then use spot mics sparingly to accentuate the drums you want to dominate in the mix.

Hope this helps.
Best of luck.

Dan

Try leaning on your overhead mics a bit more. You will probably wind up with a little more ambient drum sound depending on your room, but it may help you out.

Assuming you're using a atereo pair of cardioid mics (if you're not, THERE'S you problem) Try putting your overheads just above and behind the drummers ears. Give him a bit of space to move around if he needs to, though. When you do this, your mics will need to be pointed slightly forward. I try to aim for the space between the toms and cymbals. Then, make sure that as much as possible, the drummers head is between the overhead mics and the snare drum. It's amazing how much of a difference this will make in "unlocalizing" the snare drum in the overheads. You can then add a close mic on the snare to sneak into the mix just enough to give you some definition.

Depending on your close mic situation, how "dry" you want your drums to sound, and how mono-compatible you want your drum sound to be, try a pair of ambient mics (the spaced pair on the floor technique used frequently at Electrical works well) with the polarity reversed (so that the mics are farther out of phase). This will give you a very wide image, even though it will largely disappear in mono.

Good luck!

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

wow, thanks so much. i understood a fair bit of that, more than i expected in fact, but some of it lost me.

the stuff on careful mic placement of overheads, i'm going to try that out, sounds great.

the stuff on what kind of mics i'm using kind of passed me by. i'm using akg condenser mics for overheads. these are cardiod mics as i understand it (as opposed to hyper cardiod right!!) and if using a "stereo pair" means using two of them panned left and right, then yes i am.

in case you hadnt figured, i've set up a room in my house for recording, and my kit is placed on top of some heavy felt underlay and thick nylon carpeting. i also have close mics on the three toms, snare, and the bass drum.

i get as youve suggested alot of hihat in the toms and snare mics, and i read that by taking the skin off the bottom of the toms and putting the close mics inside them, it can really improve the separation that way.

i'm figuring once i get decent separation i can start eq'ing it properly.

you fellas are obviously experts. thanks. if anyone needs to know anything about thier cars, maybe i can help you sometime.

cgarges wrote: with the polarity reversed (so that the mics are farther out of phase).

can i ask what does out of phase mean?

and how i reverse polarity? - if this has anything to do with wearing your wife's clothes i'm telling mother straight away.

Wow. Anyone else want to field this one? I don't have a few days.

I guess since I opened that can of worms, I'll try to give an EXTEREMELY BRIEF overview.

Phase relationships deal with how two or more sounds arriving at one point affect each other. This can mean two mics on a guitar amp, a mic and direct bass signal summed together, or the sound of a voice directly reaching a mic diapragm while the same voice bouces off a nearby music stand and arrives at the diapragm a few milliseconds (or sometimes microseconds) later. Sometimes, when two or more signals combine in certain ways (or arrive at a point at different times), there are cancellations that occur at certain frequencies, making these frequencies sound quieter or disappear altogether. In short, this can make your signal sound funny.

Phase relationships are everything in how sound works. Especially when using multiple microphones on a drum kit. Have you ever gotten the bass drum to sound great by itself, then when you listen back to the whole kit, it's not the same? That's probably because of phase issues.

An easy fix (sometimes) is to reverse the polarity (positive and negative) of one (or more) of the mic signals, so that the sounds are more in phase with each other. This can be done if your mic preamp has a polarity reverse or "phase" button. But that's not to say that a signal can be either in phase or out. A polarity-reversed signal is considered 180 degrees out of phase. There are many degrees of phase relationships (360 actually, like a circle) and so there isn't really an easy cure-all.

More than half the times I have been asked to mix a project that someone else has tracked, I have sat down at the console to find a really wimpy bass drum sound. That's usually a pretty good indication that there wasn't any phase checking at the tracking session.

This is a super-huge topic and one that I am finding to be greatly overlooked by people getting paid money to record other people. And it upsets me. Hope this helps a bit.

Chris Garges

PS-As a quick fix for bigger drum sounds, I bet that if you make a polarity-reversed mic cable (reverse pins 2 and 3 on ONE end) and use it on your bass drum mic, it'll help.

And by the way, taking the bottom heads off your toms may give you more isolation, but in my opinion will probably make your drums sound terrible.

Keep 'em on!!!!


Chris

thanks man. and dont be upset.

i'm a bit concerned i could fuck it up even worse now. is there someway of conveniently flipping the polarity on the mic like some sort of adaptor and then if its having the wrong effect flip it back again?

youre scared of my dumb questions arent you?

Not at all, education is the key.

It is a big can of worms, and a neat one to be sure. Once you can develop an understanding of how phase manipulation works, there's alot that can be done with it. But it takes a good while of experimenting and developing your ears to hear exactly what's going on. You must understand, too, that I'm a big believer in learning your craft and a bit of the history involved (whether it's engineering, drumming, or cooking) before you automatically start "taking it out."

Shure makes a polarity-reverse adapter. The old version (that's probably the same one made today) is called the A15PRS, and actually had a switch on the connector. It's a barrel-type adapter, like their pads or in-line transformers. You can put it anywhere in line and it will work. This is assuming that you have balanced inputs on your... (wherever your mic is going). It only works with a balanced signal. They can get a bit expensive, but are a semi-convenient solution if you don't have a polarity reverse on your mic preamps. I just read a posting at Tape Op from Fletcher (of Mercenary Audio) where he noted that he always uses polarity reversed cables in lieu of switches at the preamp because the preamp reacts to how it sees the polarity of the mic signal. He's absolutely right, but that's a pretty subtle thing. These adapters would work in the same regard.

If you're handy with a soldering iron and know how to make your own mic cables, it's really easy (and probably cheaper than buying a bunch of Shure adapters) to make your own polarity reversed mic cables.

Steve Albini once said that he was working on an article on phase relationships for EQ magazine (if I remeber correctly), but I never saw it. I'd love to know if it was ever published and if it was, I'm sure it would be of great help. He just has a way with words.

Hope this helps shed some light. And don't worry, I'm mad about alot of things.

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

www.studiospares.com has some adapters for £5 each so i've picked up a few of them for a play around. i'll noodle about and see if i can make some improvements.

i dont have mic preamps, and i darent say what i'm using to record on because alot of people on here will think i'm the antichrist.

i can tell you i've been relying on some heavy eq'ing to make my drums sound like i want, so now i have some decent kit and a bit more understanding, i'm ready to see what new stuff i can discover.

thanks chris garges.