From: Curt Olson <>
> I appreciate your insight about Crown, Walt. My interest in boundary
> mics comes from my days as a music recording engineer. I found that a
> pair of PZMs taped to the underside of a piano lid delivered wonderful
> results in a wide range of settings. Source SPLs were sufficient that
> noise specs of the capsules never was a major concern. I liked the
> sound, and learned how to work them into some very nice multi-track
> music projects. But as you say, nature recording is altogether
> different. This year I experimented with a large boundary array
> composed of two low-cost PZMs mounted back-to-back on a 2' square of
> luan plywood. Stereo imaging was excellent, but noise specs of the mics
> were disappointing, as you can imagine.
I have a number of friends that record music and such like with Crown's
boundary mics, including some that use the original SASS-P. They are
very happy with the results, but as you noted they are recording where
self noise, and handling noise are not much of a problem. I've heard
their recordings, and there are some very nice ones where the mics are
used within their spec limits.
I have a SASS-P, working with it was one of the ways I evaluated if I
wanted to go to the trouble of making a SASS/MKH-20. The characteristics
I like about the mod SASS are there in the SASS-P, just degraded by the
capsule quality and the solid mounting of it. I had spent considerable
time looking into boundary mics before ending up with the SASS. It will
not be the end of my boundary mic experiments.
Since I completed the SASS/MKH-20 the SASS-P has seen little use. The
SASS/MKH-20 is a combination of the soundfield of the SASS with a mic
that can take full advantage of that soundfield. They complement each
other reinforcing each other's strengths. Even the SASS/MKH-110 is not
it's equal. I keep the SASS/MKH-110 going for it's low frequency abilities.
I've done the back to back PZM experiment. To me it seemed to have a
hole in the middle and I've not carried it farther as I believe angled
barriers are more likely to give a good field. Crown's literature gives
quite a few alternate mounting types you could try. I want to eventually
go into curved boundary surfaces, something Crown experimented with but
did not make commercial. They also only did mono experiments on those.
Walt
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
|