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#1
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Guitar and panning
Heya,
I've noticed this in a few acoustic guitar tracks before -- some songs will do this thing where the low E string will be panned hard left, the A string will be not quite as hard left, the D maybe 20% left, G center, B 50% right, and the high E hard-right. How would I go about doing this? I would be very suprised if it were to mic each string individually, but that just doesn't seem right. Has anyone done this before? Regards, Matt Carpenter |
#2
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Maybe it's just stereo EQed with highs on one side and lows on the
other, giving you that effect. |
#3
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Producing Acoustic Guitar
The acoustic guitar is very much in style today. Crossing between folk, pop and rock genres. While the acoustic guitar remains one of the most simple instruments, it also remains one of the hardest to get a great sound on in the studio. It's really not that difficult though, if you follow a few basic rules. The sound you get has a great deal to do with the quality of the player. Choose an appropriate type and gauge of string for the instrument and for the kind of sound you're after and make sure that the guitar's action is set up correctly so that it plays without buzzing. There are many different types of steel-cored wound string, all of which have subtly different properties. The most commonly used types on acoustic guitars are bronze, phosphor bronze and nickel wound. An instrument with lighter gauge strings (perhaps an 11 to 50 set) will generally be easier to play, but the sound will be thinner and low in volume. On the other hand, very heavy strings (perhaps a set beginning with a 15-gauge top E) can sometimes sound tubby and lacking in overtones on the wound strings. The best compromise is usually the heaviest set of strings that are still comfortable enough for the guitarist to play. Usually starting with medium gauge strings will give you a decent sound. The size of the acoustic guitar has a lot to do with the frequency range that it projects. The bigger the guitar, the more low end it'll provide. These guitars are most effective with strumming chords in the open position. These "jumbo" guitars are normally strum with medium to heavy gauge strings that are capable of producing more resonance due to the larger amount of wood that will resonate sympathetically. A medium size guitar will sound tighter and project the sound quickly, which makes it great for soloing. There is also the nylon-string guitar or better known as the classical guitar where the top three strings are nylon. This type of guitar produces a mellow and a very harmonically even sound. It obviously does not contain the same amount of mid-range and high frequencies that steel-string guitars have. Nylon guitars are becoming more popular in pop music due to their capability to produce harmonic content in a frequency range that will not affect the lead vocal. A great example of this is in the music of Sting. In a song like Fragile the nylon guitar can be mixed tighter to the lead vocal for it is not encroaching in the presence frequency range of the lead vocal. If Sting were to use a steel-string instead, he would have to lower the overall level of the guitar because of the high frequency encroachment produced by the steel-string guitar in comparison to the lead vocal. That would lower the musical harmonic content of the guitar whereby it would separate the vocal melody from the harmonic accompaniment provided by the guitar. The 12-string guitar is the grand piano of the guitar family. Usually played in a strumming fashion with a pick and chords in open positions. The 12-string guitar works most effectively by itself or with little accompaniment for it takes up a lot of the frequency and musical range. If you already have a basic 6-string performance and you feel you need a brighter guitar in addition try changing the 3 low strings with lighter gauge and tune them up an octave (Nashville tuning). Try to avoid capos', because they tend to choke the sound of the guitar. If the guitarist is using a pick, it is always worth trying one of a different thickness. With strumming you will tend to get a more even sound with a medium to light gauge pick. With soloing a thick or medium gauge pick works best for incorporating dynamics. Another thing to bear in mind is that the sound of acoustic guitar recordings can depend a great deal on the environment in which the instrument is played. Acoustic guitars thrive on live acoustics, and insufficient natural reverb is a common problem when recording them in small home studios. While artificial reverb can be used to liven up the sound of a dead room, getting a sympathetic natural acoustic always produces better results, even if you want to add more artificial reverb later. To get a more live sound out of your room, try to position the guitarist so that the instrument is played close to some reflective surfaces like hard floors, doors and solid furniture. If there is carpeting on the floor of your recording room try placing a sheet of plywood on the floor and get the guitar player the take off his/her shoes. Be prepared to have an additional pair of socks in case of gross air pollution. Most studios will have a broad range of different mics to choose from, there are few dynamic mics capable of doing justice to the acoustic guitar. It is best to use a small-diaphragm condenser mic for its greater high-frequency accuracy, and one with an omni polar pattern for a more transparent sound and removing any proximity effect. If the room has bad acoustics you will need to use a cardioid to minimize the influencing characteristics of the room. Capturing a natural sonic balance from the guitar is very important. There are different sounds coming from different places on the guitar that are important in contributing to an overall natural sound. If a mic is used too close to the guitar, the direct sound from that part of the guitar the mic is nearest to will dominate the sound from other parts of the instrument and from the room. You risk miking up only a part of the instrument when what you're really after is the bigger picture. Opposite if your mic is too far away from the guitar. You can end up with a lot of room ambience, leaving the original sound distant and unfocused. As for the specifics of mic placement, position your ear as if it were the microphone while somebody else is playing the guitar. Move your ear around to find the "sweet spot". A common approach is to set up the mic around 6-8" from the guitar, with the capsule aimed between the sound hole and where the neck joins the body. This will usually produce a well-integrated sound. The levels of direct and reflected sound will be about right and the sound hole's contribution will be controlled because the mic doesn't point directly at it. If you need more low-frequency content move the mic position closer to the sound hole. If you need a brighter sound move the mic closer to the 12th fret. This is where the first series of harmonic overtones originate that contribute more high-frequency content to he overall guitar sound. If you have a pair of enclosed headphones that are very accurate to a reference point that you have established, you can easily experiment with tweaking this mic placement while listening for the best sound. If you find a promising sound in this way, remember to check it out on your monitors before committing yourself. Headphones can sometimes be rather misleading. If you find a good position but feel the sound is too dead try switching the pattern to omni and if the opposite occurs switch the omni pattern to cardioid. Be careful to not get too close for this will create an unnatural balance from the guitar. If you are working with a studio musician they will most likely have a custom-made guitar. Ask them where the "sweet-spot" is on their guitar for the performance they are playing. If the guitar player is soloing and moving up the neck try placing the mic closer to the sound hole to give you a fuller sound of the guitar. This will obviously compensate for the lack of low-end that the guitar can produce when used in a soloing fashion. Selecting a microphone depends on the size of the guitar, if the player is playing open chords or soloing. If the player is strumming with open chords use a pencil condenser. If they are soloing, move to a large diaphragm condenser. Dynamic mics simply don't cut it. A guitar with a built-in pick up and a microphone will undoubtedly create some phase problems. Experiment with moving the mic closer and further away from the guitar. That will affect the phase relationship of the two sound sources. Phase, he can be a tricky bugger. This will work effectively if the guitar player is also singing whereby minimizing the vocal leakage into the guitar microphone. If you are cutting a track in a studio with drums try using the direct pickup only and replacing it with an acoustic pickup in an overdubbing stage. Even though direct pickups on acoustic guitars have come a long way I have yet to discover one that sounds as good as a microphone pickup. Stereo miking works well for solo applications. The XY technique is good but still falls short due to its lack of direct sound access. It will give you more of a big cardioid pickup but with less high-end than a single mic. Placing a mic over the 14th fret and another just slightly off-center from the sound hole provides a good starting point for stereo pickup. Make sure both mics are pencil condensers, the same model and miked with the same distance from the guitar. Also incorporate a slight off-axis pickup. The main challenge when using a stereo technique is to make sure that all the different signals are in time with each other when mixed; if there are delays between signals this could cause phasing problems. Some prod/eng's get around this problem by placing all the different mics at exactly the same distance from the guitar's sound hole and this can be successful. As with any studio recording, the composition of the cue mix you feed to the guitarist will be extremely important, so be prepared to take a little time in preparing it given the sensitivity of the mics traditionally used in acoustic guitar recording, it's easy to pick up unwanted leakage from the headphones. Solo the recorded track to check for this and if there's a lot of leakage coming through (from a click track, in particular) then consider turning down the overall headphone mix level or using a different pair of headphones. Closed-back models are obviously best in this application and reduce the possibility of feedback. Recorded acoustic guitar sounds will usually benefit from a little processing. This should be kept to a minimum while recording, so that you leave your options open for the mix. In recording roll-off any problems in the low-end such as rumble by inserting a high-pass filter. As always stated, it's always safer to leave EQ and dynamic processing until the mixing stage. Equalization of the acoustic guitar is very common but used very subtly. The first thing to try is just rolling off some boominess bass, if there is some, using a high-pass or shelving equalizer at 60-80Hz. This can prevent the compressor from working too hard and maintaining an even harmonic balance. It can make a big difference, for example, if other sounds in the mix have strong low mid-range components and if you listen carefully to rock or pop mixes that include acoustic guitar, you'll notice that the low end is quite even. Most acoustic guitars performing in a strumming or fingerpicking style have a mid-range and/or high frequency boost. With the mid-range use a wide Q centered anywhere between 3-7K. If high-end is needed, try a shelving EQ from 8-12K which will produce a silky top-end sound. Be aware of making the acoustic guitar brighter than the lead vocal, if it is mixed at a loud level. If you need musical body, boost in the 600Hz-1.5K range with a medium Q. With acoustic solos you might need to enhance the low end between 100-200Hz to add more body to the performance especially if the guitarist is soloing high up on the neck. With compression for strumming a ratio of 2:1 - 4:1 with a medium attack and medium release should be used, if required. Remember that the transient sound of using a pick identifies the rhythmic component of the performance. If the attack time was too quick it would create the illusion that the guitar player is playing behind the beat. For soloing you might need to limit the transients slightly, then EQ and then compress. With processing on an acoustic guitar it should be done with transparency in mind. If the guitar performance is continuous strumming, there will most likely be no need for reverb. Reverb may be needed if the recording was made in a small room or studio. Mono recording can also be given a sense of space and width by adding a little stereo reverb. Ambience settings with pronounced early reflections are particularly effective in adding life and realism to the acoustic guitar. With strumming use a short pre-delay of 30-50ms and a bright reverb with a 1-2 sec decay time. With a guitar solo use a pre-delay of 100-150ms with a warm reverb with a decay time of 2-4 seconds. De-ess the send to the reverb if there is a lot of high frequency finger noise. Extra Attack To Rhythm Guitars |
#4
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"Matrixmusic" wrote in message oups.com... Producing Acoustic Guitar major sniappge Is this an auto-post of some kind? I noticed yet another post under the drum thread once the subject line was changed slightly, and it looked to be the identical post as before. Quick, someone put up a thread entitled "recording violin" to see if he has one for that, too. Neil Henderson |
#5
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Jeez, more stuff I don't do... Should I feel like a failure?
-- Dave Martin Java Jive Studio Nashville, TN www.javajivestudio.com "Matrixmusic" wrote in message oups.com... Producing Acoustic Guitar Snip |
#6
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#7
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For a 'real' guitar, I would try a close XY with the flat plane of the
mic bodies perpendicular to the direction of the neck. Put another way: stand the guitar straight up, and XY fairly close in (6"?), probably where the neck meets body. Plane of mic bodies parallel to ground. Now rotate everything to accomodate the non-horizontal guitarist. Mikey Wozniak Nova Music Productions This sig is haiku |
#8
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Matrixmusic wrote:
Producing Acoustic Guitar You're way past just starting to lose it. -- ha |
#9
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Dave Martin wrote:
Jeez, more stuff I don't do... Should I feel like a failure? Look at the room and the kit around you, then decide. -- ha ha ha |
#10
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Matt, I've heard guitar samples that are panned exactly like that. I
bet that's what you're hearing. Neat effect if it's just an arpeggiated chord. But if you need a real guitar performance it doesn't work very well. Cheers, Rick. P.S. Tons of good info in Matrix's post, although it doesn't even try to answer Matt's question. Obviously a cut and paste, but from where, and why? Wassup Kevin? R.N. |
#11
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#12
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On 12 Feb 2005 05:08:21 -0800, "Matrixmusic"
wrote: The sound you get has a great deal to do with the quality of the player. Doh! |
#13
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Some acoustic guitars with built in pickups can do this.I had a yamaha 12
string that was able to do this years ago.It was a stereo guitar.....very cool sounding. wrote in message oups.com... Heya, I've noticed this in a few acoustic guitar tracks before -- some songs will do this thing where the low E string will be panned hard left, the A string will be not quite as hard left, the D maybe 20% left, G center, B 50% right, and the high E hard-right. How would I go about doing this? I would be very suprised if it were to mic each string individually, but that just doesn't seem right. Has anyone done this before? Regards, Matt Carpenter |
#14
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I suspect that the Roland MIDI guitar setup could do this -- it has
separate pickups and feeds for each string. wrote in message I've noticed this in a few acoustic guitar tracks before -- some songs will do this thing where the low E string will be panned hard left, the A string will be not quite as hard left, the D maybe 20% left, G center, B 50% right, and the high E hard-right. How would I go about doing this? I would be very suprised if it were to mic each string individually, but that just doesn't seem right. Has anyone done this before? Regards, Matt Carpenter Willie K. Yee, M.D. http://users.bestweb.net/~wkyee Developer of Problem Knowledge Couplers for Psychiatry http://www.pkc.com Webmaster and Guitarist for the Big Blue Big Band http://www.bigbluebigband.org |
#15
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