Always had the feeling that a microphone above the soundhole was a great spot, and the "vertical placement" completely confirms that. This is the most focused recording of the bunch, there is no "hole in the middle" and the image is nice and full. I once tried it with a single LDC on classical guitar, where the soundhole area is always a bit problematic, and it sounded really good, but this convinced me to try it with a stereo pair. Thank you!
Wow this is fantastic. Love the included call outs around mono compatibility. Got to hear a wide range of sounds in only a few minutes. Thank you!! The playing/tune is also very nice btw
Wow. Just sort of got my mind blown. The vertical placement's sound is simply wonderful. Still getting my head around the how, why, and what's of it :>) Much appreciated Sir!
Excellent video! I learned a lot about how these mic placements sound, and I especially love that you just play and let us hear it, along with some basic explanation.
Great video Doug. I was surprised how much info you packed into just a few minutes! Also, thanks for showing BOTH the overhead and side views as well as giving the distance, this is really helpful. I would be curious to know the size of the room you recorded in...
All subject to taste, and your results may vary! I usually find when I use one placement for a while, then try another, the new one sounds better. Then after a while, I try the old one and it sounds better :-) But it's good to get comfortable with them, as one or another may work better with certain guitars, in different rooms, or even for different tunes, depending on how you want things to sound.
Excellent explanation, how mic placement is most important while catching exactly the sound waves pattern which again important to depent upon how we going listen via headphones or stereo speakers placement aparted with right positioning.
With close stereo micing of an acoustic guitar, sometimes the stereo image shifts. Some notes may leap out from one side or the other. Also, if the player moves the guitar or shifts in the chair while playing, the image can swing dramatically. Mono is going to be perfectly stable - same sound coming from both speakers no matter what. Any stereo setup with guitar may have more unwanted shifts if you're not careful, and since spaced pairs are the widest, and also have mics aimed at different parts of the guitar, it may be a bit more susceptible to this than those that produce a narrower image or that are more focused on one part of the guitar.
Hi, all the gear is listed at the end of the video. The mics here are Schoeps CMC6 with Mk41 capsules. You'd get similar results with any small condenser cardiod mic pair.
@@DougYoungGuitar Thank you so much! Beautiful sounding mics but it's so expensive for me right now I am thinking of rode m5 or sE7 what do you think? Do you have a better recommendations? Thanks in advance!
@@arabian_guitarist I haven't tried either of those, but suspect either would be fine. I have a friend who has the SE7s and seems to get good results. Also check out this other video I did: ruclips.net/video/2b6E20BwSdU/видео.html where I'm using a pair of Audio-Technica AT2020s. They're about $100 each. I got mine on sale for $60 each, if I recall.
@@acousticavenues Thank you so much for helping. Well I heard a lot about AT2020 and It sounds really great! Unfortunately Here where I am it costs around 160$. I am a classic guitar player, would this make any difference as you used acoustic guitar in that video.
@@arabian_guitarist Sorry, I was logged in on a different channel. I don't think classical vs steel will make much difference. The mic hears what is in front of it. What matters most is mic placement, room acoustics, and of course your guitar and playing. The difference between mics can be quite subtle, especially at similar price points. The biggest issue with any budget mic is usually self-noise. As you pay more, the mics tend to get quieter. You can hear a difference as you move up, but it may be less than you'd expect. For example Audio-Technica has mics at all price points, from that $100 range to $3000. They sound "better" as you move up, better frequency response, more sensitive, quieter, and so on, but you might not notice the difference unless everything, the preamp, your room acoustics, your monitors and so on, are also of equally high quality. In any case, any of the mics you are looking at should be fine for recording anything, steel, classical, voice, and so on. It's a bit like guitars, you might find you like one better than another, but someone else might prefer the opposite.
thanks Doug, but what do you think about fake stereo with one mic? double the track, panning, delaying etc? It's making pretty good results for only one guitar (no mix with other instruments needed) If you would chose mics between 1 good mic like neumann km184 and fake stereo or 2 rode's NT5 / Oktavas 012 / used AA CC8. Would you take first or second option? Or even 3rd, where I buy one neumann, but later if needed just add the second one? Really liked the sound of neumann, but 2 at same time would be pricely overkill :D
Probably an interesting topic for another video! In general, I don't think fake stereo is an ideal approach, and I don't see it being used on the fingerstyle CDs I listen to, where the guitar is totally exposed. Some of the techniques you mention will have issues with mono compatibility. If I had to record with one mic, I'd probably just do mono with a stereo reverb. But stereo almost always sounds better to me for solo guitar - if you're recording guitar to fit in a band track with lots of other instruments, that's a different story. The difference between mics is more subtle than we are usually led to believe. Other than clear-cut issues like self-noise, it's pretty tough to listen to a recording and identify what mic was used, or even whether it was a budget or high end mic. Room acoustics and mic placement make a bigger difference in most cases. At the risk of generalizing, I suspect most people who’d be struggling with that tradeoff are home recordists, whose biggest challenge is almost always room acoustics - which is something tends to override any mic choice. Anyway, for solo guitar, I'd probably use 2 Rode's over 1 Neumann, if that was my choice. You might find a different video I just recently did interesting, where I AB'd 5 mics, ranging from about $60 each to $1600 each (and one of the sets is the Rode mics).
@@DougYoungGuitaryeah, I've read about phase issue for mono. In terms of audio engineering and "quality, profession, job" its nogo, but not as relevant for such people like... where its just a hobby to record good progression tracks :D I remember I had one track with such technics and I tried to listen to it with my speakers, headphones on PC, wireless in ears on mobile, and on mobile phone itself and I didnt hear any difference between all those devices. So I would say - its already 99% of devices, which "normal" people using. There are so few people like us, who is interesting in audio equipment, so dono, even if somebody will find an issue - its like ok, sadly, but i saved up a tons of time and money 🤣 selfishly, but... Maximum, what I would do is maybe youtube covers. Room, yeah.... thaaaats a big issue. Especially for my case. I live in Maisonette flat type. No doors, ladder behind, hallway entrance to the sleeping room is large and open. I did basic treatment even earlier for music listening, it helped a lot, but its not what recordings requires... Bought additional acoustic panels, more bass traps (but I have only 2 full corners and 1, where one side of a corner is 90% window. Will see if it brings something in the case where I dont have a door 😀 Thanks for awesome feedback and advises! Going to watch your another video ^^ p.s. compleltely forgot to mention I have a Sennheiser MK4 right now, using it multiple years for discord, teams, work speech recordings etc. Maybe it would make sence to use one good SDC for 12th Fret and more precise guitar sound picking and Sennheiser for the body-Percussion? Or it will do even more headache while recording and post processing :(
I don't worry a lot about mono compatibility, and usually use spaced pairs, which are inherently not very mono-compatible. But there are lots of ways to mess up. For example, using the delay trick you mentioned will create a stereo effect, but also introduces something called the Haas effect, which makes the sound pull to one side. Someone sent me a stereo track the other day, and while it was "ok" there was something wonky about it. Checking the phase, it was *really* phase incoherent. I fixed that, and the sound became bigger, warmer, more focused. And yes, another big issue with recording is how the sound will be heard. You go to all the work of making something sound great on studio monitors, and then people listen to it on their phone. Can't win on that, you have to decide if you care enough to create the best sound you can, or just forget about it and figure no one really cares anyway :-) My view is that "I care", so I'll do it for myself if no one else. But everyone has their own goals, and there's nothing wrong with just recording into the memo app on your phone and not even worrying about mics, etc. Just a matter of what you want - I assume since you're checking out recording videos that you hope to do something better, so my goal in videos like this is to provide some assistance and education, which can be taken or ignored!
@@DougYoungGuitar nono, I'm not trying to ignore it. I like to do the best for myself aswell :) Just corious whats the real difference and where (which devices) it could be heard. Also found some technics, who is using 3 mics + inside of a guitar. After correct mix it really sounds incredible... But, thanks again, I think I will start directly with 2 mics :D
@@Therapyxx I often use 3 mics, or even more, and will also sometimes add a pickup to the mix. Lots of techniques can be useful. This video is just trying to focus on basic placements typically used for 2-mic stereo, which is often all that's needed - but there are endless options, all fun to explore.
Thank you Doug, very informative! Are these techniques applicable to a pair of LDC mics? Or would you not recommend using 2 LDCs on acoustic guitar at all?
Yes, you could use LDCs with any of these placements. Some of them will look a bit different. For example, usually to get XY with LDCs, you stack the mics, rating each one 90 degrees. I like LDCs on guitar myself.
That's right. Virtually all of the common mic setups, XY, ORTF, NOS, AB, Spaced Pairs, and so on were developed for longer distances, and mixing ensembles. We're sort of abusing them when using them for solo guitar. They still produce different results, but it's not quite the same as the way they were originally intended.
@@DougYoungGuitar I believe that XY can actually produce some good results in solo instruments and I wonder how MS with either a cardioid or omni as the M microphone would sound in this situation.
@@AndreGranjo I love MS for guitar. This video was originally done as an add-on for an article in Acoustic Guitar, where I was trying to limit the scope to cardioid mics. I did another video a while back entirely about MS: ruclips.net/video/TWQdCsEMPYw/видео.html
@@DougYoungGuitar thanks! And you think is better sabra stereo bar? Here in Colombia is more easy for me found rode sb 20, wich is better? Thanks a lot for the information!
This was originally done for an Acoustic Guitar article, where space is at a premium, so I limited this to techniques you could do with a cardiod mic and no special gear. So no MS, no Jecklin Disc, etc. However, I did an entire video on MS (a technique I really like): ruclips.net/video/TWQdCsEMPYw/видео.html. MS really warrants an entire article, not just a mention in a list...
This by far the best video on this issue.
Congrats and thanks
The best tutorial on RUclips hands down!
Always had the feeling that a microphone above the soundhole was a great spot, and the "vertical placement" completely confirms that.
This is the most focused recording of the bunch, there is no "hole in the middle" and the image is nice and full.
I once tried it with a single LDC on classical guitar, where the soundhole area is always a bit problematic, and it sounded really good, but this convinced me to try it with a stereo pair.
Thank you!
Wow this is fantastic. Love the included call outs around mono compatibility. Got to hear a wide range of sounds in only a few minutes. Thank you!! The playing/tune is also very nice btw
Wow. Just sort of got my mind blown. The vertical placement's sound is simply wonderful. Still getting my head around the how, why, and what's of it :>)
Much appreciated Sir!
Excellent video! I learned a lot about how these mic placements sound, and I especially love that you just play and let us hear it, along with some basic explanation.
Everything in ONLY 3:18!!
Thank you 👍👍👍
for switching quickly:
0:28 XY 8 inches far
0:50 XY 20 inches far
1:16 ORTF
1:49 "Reverse ORTF"
2:12 Ultra Wide ORTF Inspired
2:38 Spaced Pair
Great video Doug. I was surprised how much info you packed into just a few minutes! Also, thanks for showing BOTH the overhead and side views as well as giving the distance, this is really helpful. I would be curious to know the size of the room you recorded in...
This is a Guide how to produce a great video with focus, knowledge and talent. Very useful. Thank you!
so good Doug!!
Fantastic video!!
I can't believe the reverse ORTF was the one that sounded the best!!
All subject to taste, and your results may vary! I usually find when I use one placement for a while, then try another, the new one sounds better. Then after a while, I try the old one and it sounds better :-) But it's good to get comfortable with them, as one or another may work better with certain guitars, in different rooms, or even for different tunes, depending on how you want things to sound.
Excellent explanation, how mic placement is most important while catching exactly the sound waves pattern which again important to depent upon how we going listen via headphones or stereo speakers placement aparted with right positioning.
I am really glad I found this video! Thanks!
Super helpful! Thank you!
Tremendously helpful! Thank you, Doug!
Excellent video!
what do you mean when you say (about the spaced pair) that this technique is not as STABLE?
With close stereo micing of an acoustic guitar, sometimes the stereo image shifts. Some notes may leap out from one side or the other. Also, if the player moves the guitar or shifts in the chair while playing, the image can swing dramatically. Mono is going to be perfectly stable - same sound coming from both speakers no matter what. Any stereo setup with guitar may have more unwanted shifts if you're not careful, and since spaced pairs are the widest, and also have mics aimed at different parts of the guitar, it may be a bit more susceptible to this than those that produce a narrower image or that are more focused on one part of the guitar.
Thanks a lot for sharing these helpful informations! Can you please share the mics names you are using in this video?
Thank you so much! 😊
Hi, all the gear is listed at the end of the video. The mics here are Schoeps CMC6 with Mk41 capsules. You'd get similar results with any small condenser cardiod mic pair.
@@DougYoungGuitar Thank you so much! Beautiful sounding mics but it's so expensive for me right now I am thinking of rode m5 or sE7 what do you think? Do you have a better recommendations?
Thanks in advance!
@@arabian_guitarist I haven't tried either of those, but suspect either would be fine. I have a friend who has the SE7s and seems to get good results. Also check out this other video I did: ruclips.net/video/2b6E20BwSdU/видео.html where I'm using a pair of Audio-Technica AT2020s. They're about $100 each. I got mine on sale for $60 each, if I recall.
@@acousticavenues Thank you so much for helping.
Well I heard a lot about AT2020 and It sounds really great! Unfortunately Here where I am it costs around 160$.
I am a classic guitar player, would this make any difference as you used acoustic guitar in that video.
@@arabian_guitarist Sorry, I was logged in on a different channel. I don't think classical vs steel will make much difference. The mic hears what is in front of it. What matters most is mic placement, room acoustics, and of course your guitar and playing. The difference between mics can be quite subtle, especially at similar price points. The biggest issue with any budget mic is usually self-noise. As you pay more, the mics tend to get quieter. You can hear a difference as you move up, but it may be less than you'd expect. For example Audio-Technica has mics at all price points, from that $100 range to $3000. They sound "better" as you move up, better frequency response, more sensitive, quieter, and so on, but you might not notice the difference unless everything, the preamp, your room acoustics, your monitors and so on, are also of equally high quality. In any case, any of the mics you are looking at should be fine for recording anything, steel, classical, voice, and so on. It's a bit like guitars, you might find you like one better than another, but someone else might prefer the opposite.
thanks Doug, but what do you think about fake stereo with one mic? double the track, panning, delaying etc? It's making pretty good results for only one guitar (no mix with other instruments needed)
If you would chose mics between 1 good mic like neumann km184 and fake stereo or 2 rode's NT5 / Oktavas 012 / used AA CC8. Would you take first or second option? Or even 3rd, where I buy one neumann, but later if needed just add the second one? Really liked the sound of neumann, but 2 at same time would be pricely overkill :D
Probably an interesting topic for another video! In general, I don't think fake stereo is an ideal approach, and I don't see it being used on the fingerstyle CDs I listen to, where the guitar is totally exposed. Some of the techniques you mention will have issues with mono compatibility. If I had to record with one mic, I'd probably just do mono with a stereo reverb. But stereo almost always sounds better to me for solo guitar - if you're recording guitar to fit in a band track with lots of other instruments, that's a different story. The difference between mics is more subtle than we are usually led to believe. Other than clear-cut issues like self-noise, it's pretty tough to listen to a recording and identify what mic was used, or even whether it was a budget or high end mic. Room acoustics and mic placement make a bigger difference in most cases. At the risk of generalizing, I suspect most people who’d be struggling with that tradeoff are home recordists, whose biggest challenge is almost always room acoustics - which is something tends to override any mic choice. Anyway, for solo guitar, I'd probably use 2 Rode's over 1 Neumann, if that was my choice. You might find a different video I just recently did interesting, where I AB'd 5 mics, ranging from about $60 each to $1600 each (and one of the sets is the Rode mics).
@@DougYoungGuitaryeah, I've read about phase issue for mono. In terms of audio engineering and "quality, profession, job" its nogo, but not as relevant for such people like... where its just a hobby to record good progression tracks :D I remember I had one track with such technics and I tried to listen to it with my speakers, headphones on PC, wireless in ears on mobile, and on mobile phone itself and I didnt hear any difference between all those devices. So I would say - its already 99% of devices, which "normal" people using. There are so few people like us, who is interesting in audio equipment, so dono, even if somebody will find an issue - its like ok, sadly, but i saved up a tons of time and money 🤣 selfishly, but... Maximum, what I would do is maybe youtube covers.
Room, yeah.... thaaaats a big issue. Especially for my case. I live in Maisonette flat type. No doors, ladder behind, hallway entrance to the sleeping room is large and open. I did basic treatment even earlier for music listening, it helped a lot, but its not what recordings requires... Bought additional acoustic panels, more bass traps (but I have only 2 full corners and 1, where one side of a corner is 90% window. Will see if it brings something in the case where I dont have a door 😀
Thanks for awesome feedback and advises! Going to watch your another video ^^
p.s. compleltely forgot to mention I have a Sennheiser MK4 right now, using it multiple years for discord, teams, work speech recordings etc. Maybe it would make sence to use one good SDC for 12th Fret and more precise guitar sound picking and Sennheiser for the body-Percussion? Or it will do even more headache while recording and post processing :(
I don't worry a lot about mono compatibility, and usually use spaced pairs, which are inherently not very mono-compatible. But there are lots of ways to mess up. For example, using the delay trick you mentioned will create a stereo effect, but also introduces something called the Haas effect, which makes the sound pull to one side. Someone sent me a stereo track the other day, and while it was "ok" there was something wonky about it. Checking the phase, it was *really* phase incoherent. I fixed that, and the sound became bigger, warmer, more focused. And yes, another big issue with recording is how the sound will be heard. You go to all the work of making something sound great on studio monitors, and then people listen to it on their phone. Can't win on that, you have to decide if you care enough to create the best sound you can, or just forget about it and figure no one really cares anyway :-) My view is that "I care", so I'll do it for myself if no one else. But everyone has their own goals, and there's nothing wrong with just recording into the memo app on your phone and not even worrying about mics, etc. Just a matter of what you want - I assume since you're checking out recording videos that you hope to do something better, so my goal in videos like this is to provide some assistance and education, which can be taken or ignored!
@@DougYoungGuitar nono, I'm not trying to ignore it. I like to do the best for myself aswell :) Just corious whats the real difference and where (which devices) it could be heard. Also found some technics, who is using 3 mics + inside of a guitar. After correct mix it really sounds incredible... But, thanks again, I think I will start directly with 2 mics :D
@@Therapyxx I often use 3 mics, or even more, and will also sometimes add a pickup to the mix. Lots of techniques can be useful. This video is just trying to focus on basic placements typically used for 2-mic stereo, which is often all that's needed - but there are endless options, all fun to explore.
Thanks for the video, very useful :)
Thank you Doug, very informative! Are these techniques applicable to a pair of LDC mics? Or would you not recommend using 2 LDCs on acoustic guitar at all?
Yes, you could use LDCs with any of these placements. Some of them will look a bit different. For example, usually to get XY with LDCs, you stack the mics, rating each one 90 degrees. I like LDCs on guitar myself.
thank you~~
ORTF was designed to record Orchestras (specifically the Orquestra of the French Radio), not a solo instrument, especially at such a close distance!
That's right. Virtually all of the common mic setups, XY, ORTF, NOS, AB, Spaced Pairs, and so on were developed for longer distances, and mixing ensembles. We're sort of abusing them when using them for solo guitar. They still produce different results, but it's not quite the same as the way they were originally intended.
@@DougYoungGuitar I believe that XY can actually produce some good results in solo instruments and I wonder how MS with either a cardioid or omni as the M microphone would sound in this situation.
@@AndreGranjo I love MS for guitar. This video was originally done as an add-on for an article in Acoustic Guitar, where I was trying to limit the scope to cardioid mics. I did another video a while back entirely about MS: ruclips.net/video/TWQdCsEMPYw/видео.html
@@DougYoungGuitar yeah, I just saw that video. MS works really well. Good work.
I gave up trying to record my classical guitar in stereo.. just too difficult
Hi! the mic stands is a Dr PRo DR259 low profile? Thanks!
Yes, that's right!
@@DougYoungGuitar thanks! And you think is better sabra stereo bar? Here in Colombia is more easy for me found rode sb 20, wich is better? Thanks a lot for the information!
@@Miltondk I haven't tried the Rode bar. I think any of them will work.
@@DougYoungGuitar thanks! I will try with the rode!
What was the mics you were using
Those are Schoeps CMC6 with MK41 capsules. All the gear is listed at the end of the video.
Super!
Looks like you found your answer - the gear's all listed at the end!
No mid/side? Really?
This was originally done for an Acoustic Guitar article, where space is at a premium, so I limited this to techniques you could do with a cardiod mic and no special gear. So no MS, no Jecklin Disc, etc. However, I did an entire video on MS (a technique I really like): ruclips.net/video/TWQdCsEMPYw/видео.html. MS really warrants an entire article, not just a mention in a list...
I’m more surprised that all of those positions sounded great despite the differences.