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Re: recording rig advice

Subject: Re: recording rig advice
From: "Walter Knapp" waltknapp
Date: Thu Aug 24, 2006 12:05 pm (PDT)
Posted by: "Rob Danielson"

> I can't see the resonance associated with better 
> mics on any of the real time sonogram plugs I 
> use. Wish I could!  Rob D.

Is that because it's actually a function of your playback system and 
room? Or particular to the state of health of your hearing? Do you 
consider either of those to be a accurate representation of everyone 
else's hearing and soundroom?

I have no problem spotting the resonance in the site I recorded in 
sonograms. Though I'm pretty picky as to the sonogram software I choose. 
Lots of sonogram software gives a pretty poor representation of the 
actual sound signal. And no sonogram is perfect, you have to learn how 
to read what it gives you. It's certainly worlds better than looking at 
instantaneous frequency distribution snapshots.

To me a better mic does not produce resonance or mess with the sound but 
accurately produces a signal that's a clear and accurate representation 
of the sound that arrived at the mic.

A lot of the resonance that's talked about with studio mics is a 
function of the recording room interacting with the mic design. The 
recording "room" of outdoor sites is rather large with extremely complex 
resonance of it's own. To think you are going to get the simple 
resonance of the studio outdoors seems a bit simplistic as is choosing 
mics based on studio use. Nature recording is a field of it's own, not 
some branch of studio recording. I work at things like getting a clearly 
defined echo from each treetrunk of the forest. If the mic is adding 
resonance it just interferes. The same holds for overprocessing the 
recording afterwards. One of the reasons why I don't like unattended 
remote recording, I then don't really know what it sounded like out there.

Walt





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