[Jenn]

Hi all,

Continuing my new experience of recording myself.

I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics panned to center
position. I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme L and R
and then play with the balance in the mixdown. Is this the usual way?

Thanks for any help.
(Sorry for such a beginning question! I'm taking a recording class, but
we're not to this point yet!)

[Laurence Payne]

Continuing my new experience of recording myself.

I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics panned to center
position. I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme L and R
and then play with the balance in the mixdown. Is this the usual way?

Thanks for any help.
(Sorry for such a beginning question! I'm taking a recording class, but
we're not to this point yet!)

Pan hard L and R when recording. Otherwise, why record two tracks -
they're both getting the same thing!

If the two mics are pointing at the same thing, leave it that way. If
they're pointing at different things, e.g. one mic on vocals, one on
guitar, you're really recording two mono tracks. Pan them wherever it
sounds good.

[Jenn]

In article ,
Laurence Payne NOSPAMlpayne1ATdsl.pipex.com wrote:

Continuing my new experience of recording myself.

I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics panned to center
position. I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme L and R
and then play with the balance in the mixdown. Is this the usual way?

Thanks for any help.
(Sorry for such a beginning question! I'm taking a recording class, but
we're not to this point yet!)

Pan hard L and R when recording. Otherwise, why record two tracks -
they're both getting the same thing!

If the two mics are pointing at the same thing, leave it that way. If
they're pointing at different things, e.g. one mic on vocals, one on
guitar, you're really recording two mono tracks. Pan them wherever it
sounds good.

Thanks, Laurence

[Mike Rivers]

On Feb 10, 5:30 pm, Jenn wrote:

I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics panned to center
position. I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme L and R
and then play with the balance in the mixdown. Is this the usual way?

"Stereo" doesn't mean "two," it means "solid." If you're recording
with two mics, presumably with each picking up a different area of the
guitar, and then panning both to the center, you're mixing the two
sounds together, and recording in mono, even though you may be
recording a stereo track (or two individual tracks).

There's nothing wrong with that, but it will put your guitar at a
single point in the mix. You would do better recording each mic to its
own channel, blending them together if that's what you want, or
panning them at slightly different positions to add some width to the
guitar instead of making it sound like a point source.

If you're using a true stereo setup - two coincident mics - then you
may want to pan them full left and right to get the full width
perspective of the guitar.

What you do depends on what part the guitar plays in the mix. If it's
just one guitar and one voice, a stereo spread on the guitar is often
nice, but don't let it be so interesting that it detracts from the
vocal.

This probably won't be taught in class. Schools tend to teach
techniques, not taste.

[Jenn]

In article
,
Mike Rivers wrote:

On Feb 10, 5:30 pm, Jenn wrote:

I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics panned to center
position. I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme L and R
and then play with the balance in the mixdown. Is this the usual way?

"Stereo" doesn't mean "two," it means "solid." If you're recording
with two mics, presumably with each picking up a different area of the
guitar, and then panning both to the center, you're mixing the two
sounds together, and recording in mono, even though you may be
recording a stereo track (or two individual tracks).

There's nothing wrong with that, but it will put your guitar at a
single point in the mix. You would do better recording each mic to its
own channel, blending them together if that's what you want, or
panning them at slightly different positions to add some width to the
guitar instead of making it sound like a point source.

If you're using a true stereo setup - two coincident mics - then you
may want to pan them full left and right to get the full width
perspective of the guitar.

Super. Thanks.


What you do depends on what part the guitar plays in the mix. If it's
just one guitar and one voice, a stereo spread on the guitar is often
nice, but don't let it be so interesting that it detracts from the
vocal.

Understood. For me, it's just solo guitar.


This probably won't be taught in class. Schools tend to teach
techniques, not taste.

Yes, I've heard that. I think that ours is pretty heavy on the later,
though. Thankfully.

Thanks again.

[Richard Crowley]

"Jenn" wrote...
I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics
panned to center position.

That is exactly like going to the paint store for a gallon of
red paint and a gallon of blue paint. But then before leaving
the store, you mix them together and walk out with two
cans of purple paint.

You can't ever get the red and blue back once you have
mixed them together. In addition, once they are mixed
together, the second can is redundant.

I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme
L and R and then play with the balance in the mixdown.
Is this the usual way?

If you aren't going to keep the recordings from the mics
separate, there's little point in even putting up the 2nd mic.

Thanks for any help.
(Sorry for such a beginning question! I'm taking a
recording class, but we're not to this point yet!)

Don't be afraid to use common-sense logic. Just because it
is audio doesn't make it magic (or even arcane, mostly :-).

[Julien BH]

On Feb 12, 2:37 pm, "Richard Crowley" wrote:
"Jenn" wrote...
I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics
panned to center position.

That is exactly like going to the paint store for a gallon of
red paint and a gallon of blue paint. But then before leaving
the store, you mix them together and walk out with two
cans of purple paint.

You can't ever get the red and blue back once you have
mixed them together. In addition, once they are mixed
together, the second can is redundant.

I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme
L and R and then play with the balance in the mixdown.
Is this the usual way?

If you aren't going to keep the recordings from the mics
separate, there's little point in even putting up the 2nd mic.

Thanks for any help.
(Sorry for such a beginning question! I'm taking a
recording class, but we're not to this point yet!)

Don't be afraid to use common-sense logic. Just because it
is audio doesn't make it magic (or even arcane, mostly :-).

Sorry for the thread hijack, but which microphones are decent as
coincident pair and low budget. SM58/57 ?

[David Grant]

Sorry for the thread hijack, but which microphones are decent as
coincident pair and low budget. SM58/57 ?

Dynamics, not usually. Condensors, more often. Try a pair of Marshall 603s.

[Jenn]

In article ,
"Richard Crowley" wrote:

"Jenn" wrote...
I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics
panned to center position.

That is exactly like going to the paint store for a gallon of
red paint and a gallon of blue paint. But then before leaving
the store, you mix them together and walk out with two
cans of purple paint.

You can't ever get the red and blue back once you have
mixed them together. In addition, once they are mixed
together, the second can is redundant.

I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme
L and R and then play with the balance in the mixdown.
Is this the usual way?

If you aren't going to keep the recordings from the mics
separate, there's little point in even putting up the 2nd mic.

Is that really true? The two mics pick up different timbre aspects of
the instrument, so even if recorded in a way that I lose the opportunity
to mix them to my liking, don't I at least gain the mixture of the
timbre (albeit an inflexible one after recording) by using the two mics?


Thanks for any help.
(Sorry for such a beginning question! I'm taking a
recording class, but we're not to this point yet!)

Don't be afraid to use common-sense logic. Just because it
is audio doesn't make it magic (or even arcane, mostly :-).

[Scott Dorsey]

Jenn wrote:

Is that really true? The two mics pick up different timbre aspects of
the instrument, so even if recorded in a way that I lose the opportunity
to mix them to my liking, don't I at least gain the mixture of the
timbre (albeit an inflexible one after recording) by using the two mics?

Sure, but you also get comb filtering issues and all sorts of other
trouble from using the two mikes. Try it with one mike and see.... move
it up and down and forward and back and see how the tone and ambience
change.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Jenn]

In article ,
(Scott Dorsey) wrote:

Jenn wrote:

Is that really true? The two mics pick up different timbre aspects of
the instrument, so even if recorded in a way that I lose the opportunity
to mix them to my liking, don't I at least gain the mixture of the
timbre (albeit an inflexible one after recording) by using the two mics?

Sure, but you also get comb filtering issues and all sorts of other
trouble from using the two mikes. Try it with one mike and see.... move
it up and down and forward and back and see how the tone and ambience
change.
--scott

Understood, thanks

[Julien BH]

On Feb 13, 9:48 am, "David Grant" wrote:
Sorry for the thread hijack, but which microphones are decent as
coincident pair and low budget. SM58/57 ?

Dynamics, not usually. Condensors, more often. Try a pair of Marshall 603s.

Thanks Dave

[Misifus]

Richard Crowley wrote:
"Jenn" wrote...
I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics
panned to center position.

That is exactly like going to the paint store for a gallon of
red paint and a gallon of blue paint. But then before leaving
the store, you mix them together and walk out with two
cans of purple paint.

You can't ever get the red and blue back once you have
mixed them together. In addition, once they are mixed
together, the second can is redundant.

I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme
L and R and then play with the balance in the mixdown.
Is this the usual way?

If you aren't going to keep the recordings from the mics
separate, there's little point in even putting up the 2nd mic.

Thanks for any help.
(Sorry for such a beginning question! I'm taking a
recording class, but we're not to this point yet!)

Don't be afraid to use common-sense logic. Just because it
is audio doesn't make it magic (or even arcane, mostly :-).




Surely, you could record two mics, each panned to center, perhaps, on
two separate tracks and still have the input from each mic separate.
Granted, at some point one or both of the tracks would need to be panned
one way or the other to be able to distinguish the two.

-Raf

--
Misifus-
Rafael Seibert

blog: http://rafsrincon.blogspot.com/
Photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rafiii
home: http://www.rafandsioux.com

[WillStG]

On Feb 10, 5:30 pm, Jenn wrote:
Hi all,

Continuing my new experience of recording myself.

I've been recording with two mics, stereo, both mics panned to center
position. I understand that some folks pan the mics to extreme L and R
and then play with the balance in the mixdown. Is this the usual way?

Thanks for any help.
(Sorry for such a beginning question! I'm taking a recording class, but
we're not to this point yet!)

Typically for very close micing, you use the two mics so the
combination of the two covers the overall sound of the guitar better
(like in an XY pattern one facing the body of the guitar and the other
around the 12th fret.) How you pan or not is an artistic choice, but
the idea is better coverage of the overall guitar, rather than stereo
imaging. I like to work such close mics with headphones on, where I
can hear the effect in the cans of how close I place my guitar to the
mics (especially for single note stuff.) Where stereo panning is more
of an issue is medium distance micing, which requires a room that
actually sounds generally good, where you try to get a bit of the room
ambience too by placing the mics in XY (or spaced omnis) a few feet
out.

Either way you can pan them closer together if you want, like 9
o'clock and 3 o'clock. You can even pan them both center to mono and
add an ambience program for stereo, or aux the mono mix into a very
short stereo delay, the delay outs into a stereo reverb, and bring
that delayed stereo reverb back hard panned L/R. Or I like to send
both tracks to an aux buss with a compressor on in, and bring the
compressed track back into the mix in the middle, with a bit of
different center eq, that way I have a solid center to the stereo
image.

WIll Miho
NY TV/Audio Post/Music/Live Sound Guy
"The large print giveth and the small print taketh away..." Tom Waits

[Laurence Payne]

On Sun, 17 Feb 2008 13:42:03 -0800 (PST), WillStG
wrote:

Typically for very close micing, you use the two mics so the
combination of the two covers the overall sound of the guitar better
(like in an XY pattern one facing the body of the guitar and the other
around the 12th fret.) How you pan or not is an artistic choice, but
the idea is better coverage of the overall guitar, rather than stereo
imaging.

All very true. But let me emphasise once again that WHEN RECORDING to
a stereo track, you pan the mics hard L and R. The decision whether
to go for a wide or narrow spacing comes when mixing. If you know
you're going to pan both centre, record to a single mono track in the
first place!