Gearslutz.com - View Single Post - Level matching acoustic guitar recording in ORTF and NOS

Joost · 4th November 2005

Ok, so I tried a few mic techniques with my stereo pair of Gefell M300s for my solo acoustic guitar recordings in the past few weeks (M/S, xy, ORTF, NOS, 3-1) and it turns out I like NOS the best, but with all those setups (except M/S) I have one problem:

I setup the mics and sit facing the mics straight:

mic 1 / \ mic 2
. . ._______ guitar

Then mic one is pointing towards the 12th fret and mic two is pointing towards the bridge. Then I set the levels on my preamp to the exact same setting and play. Then, of course, one channel will be louder than the other (mic1 picks up less energy than mic2).

I can correct that by changing the distance to mic one and until the levels are matched and thereby probably introducing phase issues, because mic 1 will be much closer to the guitar than mic 2, or I can change the level on channel 1 until I have a close enough match. I would say that the second method is better, but it still feels wrong.

I know this is probably a dumb question, but what should I do?

4th November 2005	#1
Joost Gear maniac Joined: Aug 2005 Posts: 155 Thread Starter	Level matching acoustic guitar recording in ORTF and NOS Ok, so I tried a few mic techniques with my stereo pair of Gefell M300s for my solo acoustic guitar recordings in the past few weeks (M/S, xy, ORTF, NOS, 3-1) and it turns out I like NOS the best, but with all those setups (except M/S) I have one problem: I setup the mics and sit facing the mics straight: mic 1 / \ mic 2 . . ._______ guitar Then mic one is pointing towards the 12th fret and mic two is pointing towards the bridge. Then I set the levels on my preamp to the exact same setting and play. Then, of course, one channel will be louder than the other (mic1 picks up less energy than mic2). I can correct that by changing the distance to mic one and until the levels are matched and thereby probably introducing phase issues, because mic 1 will be much closer to the guitar than mic 2, or I can change the level on channel 1 until I have a close enough match. I would say that the second method is better, but it still feels wrong. I know this is probably a dumb question, but what should I do?