[Wylug-discuss] Seeking Advice: Quality Mobile Sound Recording

[Gareth Eason]

Dave Fisher wrote:
[snip]
> Hi Gareth,
> 
> There's an awful lot of questions there. I'll try to answer them in
> turn, but please be patient, because I'm quite ignorant of even basic
> concepts in sound enginering.
[snip]
	Don't worry - you'll learn about the basic concepts of sound 
engineering very quickly as you experiment with different techniques and 
contexts. Fortunately, the basics are really very simple and provided 
you're not trying anything too ambitious and are not afraid to learn 
from mistakes, you should go a long way. Exactly the same thing as 
applies to beginners taking Linux into use, I guess :-)

>   1. What do you want to use it for?  What type of recording are you
>   doing?
> 
>      Field recording, initially interviews, later acoustic music.
>      Often in places with lots of ambient noise (e.g. pubs).
>   2. What kind of microphones?
> 
>      I don't understand the technology well enough to be sure, but
>      dynamic microphones sound like the right thing (unintended pun) for
>      basic voice recording.

	Answering these together, you should try and minimise ambient noise (in 
general) to isolate what you want to record. Isolate your audio using 
frequency range and directionality. Look at cardioid, omni-directional 
and super-carioid shapes (you probably want cardioid to start with) and 
you'll want to consider a decent mic stand and shock-mount - to prevent 
ground vibrations from reaching the diaphragm and being recorded.

	Dynamic mics are generally cheaper and harder wearing - they can be 
thrown around a bit and still survive. They are a lot less sensitive for 
recording purposes though, and for voice and ethnic instruments I 
generally recommend decent back-electret or condenser mics. These 
generally are more fragile and require a power source (a battery or 
phantom power, or now USB) but tend to sound a lot better as they are 
far more responsive.

> 
>        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_microphone#Dynamic_microphones
> 
>      Several people have recommended the Shure SM58:
> 
>        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SM58

	The SM58 is a hard working, all purpose mic, specifically for lead 
vocals in a rock/pop type context. For ways to actually break SM58s, 
please check out John Otway's performances, though even he doesn't get 
through an awful lot of them, despite his song 'Head Butts' :-)

>      Eventually, I'll want to record acoustic music.  I imagine that a
>      suitable form of mic will be needed for that, since most
>      instruments won't have electric pick-ups.

	For music, you'll probably want multiple mics, since you'll either want 
to close mic, and mix down later - or use 2 x very good condenser (or 
back electret) mics in some kind of stereo configuration (spaced pair, 
coincident pair, etc.) There's lots on techniques on the internet, and 
many sound engineers who will be more than happy to share and discuss 
various techniques with you - we're all still learning and the 
technology changes on a daily basis.

>   3. What sort of instruments are you hoping to connect in and capture?
> 
>      Traditional instruments. Guitar, mandolin, fiddle, accordion,
>      harmonica, ... all the 'folky stuff'.

	Ah - music after my own heart :-)  I swear by a pair of Groove Tube 
GT33's and an AT4033 for my own guitar. AT Pro35x 's are excellent 
little clip-on mics for close mic'ing fiddles, mandolins, accordians, 
etc. But let's start simple :-)

	If, like me, you travel with a laptop almost everywhere, a USB mic and 
the laptop might be a very appropriate recording platform for you. 
Audacity runs quite nicely under Linux and provides you with a recording 
and editing platform in one. It will also export to MP3 (with Lame) and Ogg.

	Alternatively, a number of manufacturers are producing differential 
1-bit encoding recorders, which have sample rates of many MHz. Apart 
from this new technology, quality of recording is generally measured in 
bit-depth (usually 16 or 24-bit) and sample rate (usually 44.1, 48, 
88.2, 96 or 192kHz)

	You can get something like 
http://www.turnkey.co.uk/web/productAction.do?dispatch=showProduct&SKU=EDIR-R4&context=WEB

	or use a laptop, or 
http://www.turnkey.co.uk/web/productAction.do?dispatch=showProduct&SKU=MMAN-MICROTRK&context=WEB

	or get a decent MiniDisc recorder to start with. A minidisc recorder 
will probably not have phantom power or XLR connections, so you may be 
limited in your choice of Microphone types. Sony do some quite decent, 
quite small microphones specifically for the type of recording you're 
trying to do though - and results can be quite acceptable from them. 
Something like:
http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-SONY-ECM-DS70P-Condenser-Stereo-Microphone-MiniDisc_W0QQitemZ110057586994QQihZ001QQcategoryZ41466QQcmdZViewItem

	Whatever type of mic you get, remember to get some kind of shockmount 
and stand that can be used with it - because you really don't want to be 
holding the microphone for sit-down interviews and for recording ambient 
music.


>   4. What is your target medium?
> 
>      Ogg podcasting initially, possibly using bittorrent for larger
>      files.

	For speech based podcasts, mono (one mic) is fine, but for music you'll 
really want to look at two, and possibly more mics. MiniDisc is a fine 
format because the equipment tends to be cheap (relatively) - and ATRAC 
compression, while lossy, is still better quality than low bit-rate MP3/Ogg.

> In effect, the first milestone is to capture interviews with
> singers/musicians and publish edited versions as podcasts.
> 
> I hope that makes things a bit clearer.

	Good luck with that - it sounds like a noble aim. Let me know where you 
post your material. I'd certainly be interested to take a listen :-)

	Hope this rather-longer-than-intended treatise on recording options has 
given you some clues about how you might reach some decisions. Please 
feel free to mail on or off list (as it's not entirely relevant to Linux 
or the WYLUG, perhaps off is better?) and I'm happy to discuss 
music/recording/audio/etc. with you :-)

	Best regards,
	-->Gar