How much time do you spend finding the "sweet spot"?

Question

I spend quite a long time finding the perfect spot for my microphone while recording voices - both narration and vocals.

Do any of you who also record narration/vocals do the same? Or do you sort of "set it and forget it"?

Do any of you give extra special care to where you place your mic when you are recording sound effects in the field?

Also, I never really understood the principle of "letting the sound wave develop" like the lower frequencies. Someone told me I have to place the mic a little further away to "let the low frequencies develop". Is this true and do you guys do this? Can someone explain that to me if you don't mind?

Thanks!

• Ryan

Answer 1

To touch on your question about "letting the sound wave develop"...

Sound travels through the air (and other materials) via waves. Higher frequencies have shorter cycles than lower frequencies; the practical implication of this is that you need to be further away from a sound source to experience the lowest frequencies, while higher frequencies can be heard rather close to the source. Let me demonstrate…

Think of a home fire alarm. Put your ear up to it, it's really really bright. Walk 50ft from it, it's still really really bright.

Now think about a bass drum. Put your ear up to it, it's kind of clicky and snappy. Walk 50ft from it, it's more bassy, thuddy and resonant in the low end.

The lower frequencies require more distance from the source to be heard in their fullest form.

OK all you learned acoustics folks, chime in and drop some data!

Answer 2

I spend a lot of time with my mic placement. I just heard a story today from a veteran mix engineer who, on one of his first sessions where they spent two weeks recording an album, but then it took them 6 months and tons of dubs to get it to sound right, and it still didn't sound as good as it could've if he had recorded it properly in the first place. The next session he had, he dedicated 2 months to recording it correctly, and it only took 2 months to mix.

Spending the time to properly mic your subject is so huge. Change mics, change positions, etc... There's so much that goes into a good recording. Frequency response of the mics, acoustics of your location, phase, etc... Moving your mic an inch can make a huge difference. I always make sure to get the best sound I can before I hit record, then do a few test recordings to make sure it sounds the way I want it to.

There are many people who say that if you record properly, you barely need to touch an eq. While I believe this pertains more to music than to sfx and post, it still does. You can get most of the effects you'd want with an eq just by moving your mic.

So get to know your mics, how they react, and how to tweak them!

Answer 3

From what i understand, the waves used to represent sounds are graphs of pressure over time. So sound is pressure fluctuations in the air caused by a vibrating object; the whole wave thing is a pretty useful representation, but can cause a lot of misconceptions about how sound travels.

It seems to me that, whether you're near or far to a bassy object (ie. kickdrum), the pressure waves will pass over you in more or less the same way (low frequencies can travel a long way). What people mean by "letting the waves develop" seems to be a not-very-accoustical way of talking about getting a mic into a position that has a pleasing balance of frequencies. High frequencies lose power before low frequencies (ie. Jay's kickdrum); too close and you'll have too many high freqs, too far and you won't have enough.