MS mics SFX recording

[JohnLoranger]

Hello,

So I've been humming and hawing for awhile now on which MS setup to get for my SFX gathering rig. I'm basically torn between the Schoeps and the Senns. I've read thru all the posts on the issue and most of my questions have been answered but...

My questions are:

They both seem well suited for the quiet stuff, wind, birds etc but which will do better as an all around setup, for grabbing hard effects with higher spl as well as the quieter stuff?

Which mic combo would be first choice from Senn? 30/40 etc

Which mic combo would be first choice from Schoeps? collettes or the minis etc

Was also curious if anyone has used a 30 with an Me66? Could I stuff both in my existing Rycote?

Thanks in advance!

Thanks

John


FYI - I can't get access to the schoeps so... I'm flying blind from that perspective. Local rep wont bring them in... ARGH

[boojum]

John, I wish I could be more helpful. I, too, hemmed and hawed about buying mics and settled on the Schoeps CMC64 + CMC68 combo. It has been good for me. I know many others have gone the with the Senns also with good results. These are both good lines. In the end I think it is a matter of personal taste.

The MS is good in that is easy to set up, minimally intrusive and gives a good localization of objects in its sound field. You can also fiddle with it in post to change the width of the sound field.

I like it. There are some long-time sound engineers who dismiss it as marginally stereo. I disagree.

Cheers

[JohnLoranger]

Thanks for the input!

J

[Baithak]

Hey John : I don't know your budget but since you are already in Schoeps / Senn territory, you may want to consider the Soundfield system as well. I have been a Schoeps shop myself all this time (and recommend it highly - my favorite capsule is MK41) but after hearing the stunningly realistic results from the SF system, I am so very tempted. If I were making this decision today, I would surely try the Soundfield for a week or so before making a final call.

If the ability to manipulate stereo field, go to 5.1 etc is important in your line of work, the Soundfield solution may just be what you need.

Good luck,
Baithak

[boojum]

^^^^^^ As an additional thought to Baithak there is also the Schoeps DMS system. The factory deal is pricey, but I am hoping someday to jury rig one with a couple of Schoeps $US20 mic clips and some carbon fiber or plastic, and, of course, some epoxy. I would go the Mk4 (2) + Mk8 route as I already have them. The decoder is free from Schoeps and also can give 5.1. I have seen it disputed that it is true 5.1 but Schoeps seems to think so as the diaphragms are all in the same vertical plane so that there is minimal phase difference. I cannot say but I trust Schoeps on this one. The DMS does not decode as a quad cardioid (90 degree separation).

Just a thought. And, you can also use the two Mk4/Mk4V in other spaced arrays should you wish.

Choices, choices. And, my rabid ethnic stereotyping - and German lineage - has me putting more faith in German engineering and product support than Soundfield. SF really hung some fellow out to dry on TS which I thought was rather shoddy. They eventually replaced the guy's gear but it took over six months of writing the US distributer and GB. I would like to think this was an exception but it does give me pause. And Schoeps is very, very good about repairs and maintenance of their gear. And reasonable. /rant

[Berolzheimer]

I'm not a fan of MS for this kind of work, for the reasons stated in this other thread:

M/S in Protools session - 2 track or 3 track ?

[JohnLoranger]

Hey Paul,
Thanks for your response.

What would you suggest instead of an MS set up?

Thanks

john

[NorseHorse]

Originally Posted by Berolzheimer

I'm not a fan of MS for this kind of work, for the reasons stated in this other thread:

M/S in Protools session - 2 track or 3 track ?

MS is a superior choice for the work (SFX) you are interested in doing. Your soundscape will be more open than XY, and you will have more options in post.

It's true, you lose side information when summed to mono (mid), but I consider this an advantage.

Sorry I can't tell you whether the Sennheisers or Schoeps would be better for you. I wouldn't be afraid of Soundfield either.

[Storyville]

I think you're going to be happy either way. I see Sennheiser used more frequently, in my personal experience, but Schoeps are badass and very natural captures generally speaking.

[JohnLoranger]

Originally Posted by Berolzheimer

I'm not a fan of MS for this kind of work, for the reasons stated in this other thread:

M/S in Protools session - 2 track or 3 track ?

Okay so I've read through this. I don't really see the purpose of the mono compatible argument as I'll probably just use the M if I want mono, not decode to LR and collapse back to mono.

I am however a little concerned about the MS -> LR -> Dolby matrix issue. Can anyone elaborate on this? I've heard and read about it before but am not really clear at what point it becomes an issue. Apple-q mentioned it's not an issue providing you don't try to spread the image too much...

Thanks

John

On a side note I was looking at getting a single point stereo shotgun for awhile but they seem so much more limited (no xy or spaced pair options for the future), and are all MS anyway except for the Sanken.

[John Willett]

Originally Posted by NorseHorse

Sorry I can't tell you whether the Sennheisers or Schoeps would be better for you. I wouldn't be afraid of Soundfield either.

The Sennheiser MKH are better outside in damp conditions (they are RF condensers) and the fig-8 is truly symmetrical.

The Schoeps fig-8 has a slightly different response on the rear lobe at high frequencies (it shows on the 16kHz plot) which would make the stereo image very slightly treble light on the right channel (NB: it only shows on the 16kHz plot and I am not sure how noticeable it would be in practice).

The Soundfield is a very nice mic.. Earlier ones tended to be a bit noisy, I'm not sure about the latest versions.

[JohnLoranger]

Hi John,

Which Senn's would you suggest for SFX gathering birds to car bys?

Is adding a 30 to Me66 a ridiculous idea?

Thanks

John

[panatrope]

If you are intending to record SFX for film/video, all I can comment is that I saw the Schoeps MK4/MK8 in use for this work 25 years ago, in a presentation made to our first AES Convention by Tom Holman on sound for major motion pictures. I went out and bought an MK8 for use with one of my C460B/CK61s but never did serious M-S until I bought a matching MK4 in 2002 for classical recording.

For SFX/ambo, the M-S is ideal because you know you have a good mono track (if your field recorder doesn't decode M-S, then monitor only the M channel) and the image width is easily adjustable in post. It is relatively easy to mount the combo in a standard short Rycote (with or without furry animal). Download the following

www.nagraaudio.com/doc_en/NagraNews_25.pdf

and note the even more compact but more expensive CCM version.

I would also agree that the MKH RF condensor mics might stand up to damp weather a bit better. Also, amongst film recordists, the MK41 hypercardioid can be favoured over the MK4. But these are all top drawer professional mics ... from then on "yer pays yer money and yer takes yer chance!"

[JohnLoranger]

Thanks Panatrope for chiming in.

Yes these recordings will be for Film/TV/Games.

I was all set to get an MS setup but am now concerned about the dolby matrix phase issue. Which I understand can happen during the LT Rt fold down of a 5.1-7.1 Mix. It can potentially throw your L R (MS encoded) stereo recording to the rears. I myself have never experienced this but have been reading about it over the past fews days and its got me a little gun shy.

So does anyone know about this issue here? I've read that it only becomes an problem if you mix the sides in too much, but what is too much? no one has explained the theory or math behind the problem so I don't really understand it except that the fig 8 S+ and S- are 180 degrees out of phase which each other and because the dolby matrix is flipping phase to get the 5.1 down to the LtRt it can throw the MS stuff into the rears.

Schoeps (Rob James) briefly mentions the problem in a review of their DMS plugin and states that it's not a problem anymore. Which is great but doesn't really make sense because the issue is caused by the sides being flipped which still has to happen when creating the L R from an MS recording..

Here's what he says

"From the location recordist’s point of view, MS mics are very useful since they enable recordings to be made using the same techniques as mono. I write from the perspective of a re-recording mixer with extensive experience of being on the receiving
end of stereo MS recordings. I have observed that many of the mic combinations used result in ‘phasey’ recordings that are very uncomfortable to listen to. This is equally applicable to ‘all-in-one’ designs and to separate capsules. Still worse, such recordings played havoc with the matrix used in Dolby stereo. This led to blanket advice from re-recording mixers not to use MS for film. However, in reality there are some honourable
exceptions and one of the more notable has always been Schoeps."

Not sure what he means by this.

If anyone can shed light on the subject I'd really appreciate it.

Thanks

John

[boojum]

He means the Schoeps mics work for MS.

[Mikkel Nielsen]

I use a 416 with this one:
Ambient Products Emesser

Works well I think.

Best wishes,

Mikkel

[pkautzsch]

Originally Posted by JohnLoranger

I was all set to get an MS setup but am now concerned about the dolby matrix phase issue. Which I understand can happen during the LT Rt fold down of a 5.1-7.1 Mix. It can potentially throw your L R (MS encoded) stereo recording to the rears. I myself have never experienced this but have been reading about it over the past fews days and its got me a little gun shy.

So does anyone know about this issue here? I've read that it only becomes an problem if you mix the sides in too much, but what is too much? no one has explained the theory or math behind the problem so I don't really understand it except that the fig 8 S+ and S- are 180 degrees out of phase which each other and because the dolby matrix is flipping phase to get the 5.1 down to the LtRt it can throw the MS stuff into the rears.

Not a REAL expert on that, so please correct me if I'm wrong, but if I understood the Dolby Stereo principle right, it works basically like this:
The one (1) rear channel is encoded into LtRt via a pair of "90° filters". The rear signal is fed to L, but phase shifted by 90°, and it's also fed to R, but shifted by -90° (or, inverted from the 90° shift fed to L). So, it's the same signal, but inverted in one channel. The C signal will just be fed to both L and R, like you would do with a phantom source panned dead center.
In decoding, all material which is exactly the same in both channels will be fed to the Center speaker. All material which is exactly the same, except for being inverted in one channel, will be fed to the rear speaker(s) - and the decoder doesn't (can't) differentiate between what's been encoded and what's been recorded that way. Actually, that's what happens when using stereo backgrounds too: the "phasey" part will come from the rear. Not necessarily a bad thing, but it seems viable to listen through the decoding chain even when doing a simple LR mix.
If I remember correctly, Dolby put in some kind of dominance matrix to estimate which channel was "the most important" and to attenuate the neighboring channels by some dB. I think it was 3 dB.

Now if you decode an MS recording, you feed the S signal to L, and you feed the inverted S signal to R. See where this gets us? Right, we have the same signal in L and R, just inverted in one channel, and therefore the decoder will send it to the rear (and the M part will be fed to C).

[JohnLoranger]

Originally Posted by pkautzsch

Now if you decode an MS recording, you feed the S signal to L, and you feed the inverted S signal to R. See where this gets us? Right, we have the same signal in L and R, just inverted in one channel, and therefore the decoder will send it to the rear (and the M part will be fed to C).

Yes here in lies the issue... ARGH

Thanks Peter.

I'm going to contact Dolby and see where they stand.

[Suda Badri]

Any word from dolby yet?

[MBishopSFX]

I've made countless SFX recordings with both Schoeps and Sennheiser mics, and both will give excellent results. The Sennheisers will work better in high SPL conditions yet will be very low noise for your bird pickup. I suggest the MKH-30 with MKH-50 for M/S. As mentioned above, the Sennheisers will not have issues in high humidity due to being RF mics.

.

[JohnLoranger]

Originally Posted by Suda Badri

Any word from dolby yet?

Unfortunately they never responded. In the end the math is what it is.

[Suda Badri]

Fair enough...

[ggegan]

By the time you get to the Dolby SR print mastering process where steering issues arise, there is very rarely anyone on the stage other than the mixers and the Dolby rep, certainly almost never the person who knows how a particular sound effect was recorded, so you never know for sure why a sound that was panned L/R wound up in the surrounds, but it is going to have something to do with either acoustical or electrical phase relationships between the left and right channels.

According to my understanding, pkautzsch is correct about the way the Dolby matrix works. The matrix decoder will send in-phase stereo signals to the front and out-of-phase stereo signals to the surrounds.

On a purely theoretical basis, MS would seem to present a situation that will produce front/rear steering issues because of the opposing phase of the two sides of the figure eight mic. If the left and right sides of the figure eight cancel each other in mono, leaving just the mid mic audible, then when panned to the front left and right speakers, the audio that canceled in mono should be sent to the surrounds by the matrix, with the mid mic sent to the center speaker. Phase relationships can be very complex, so the shift probably wouldn't be absolute, but I would think it would be fairly audible.

XY or ORTF recording technique may pick up sounds that are out of phase due to comb filtering or delays created by acoustic reflections, but they are generally considerably lower in level than the coincident direct sound, so any front/back steering problems in the matrix should be fairly subtle, although there could still be a fair amount of collapse into mono due to identical in-phase audio being present in both the left and right sides.

Of course this is all just theorizing and I readily concede that there could be a flaw in my logic, which I would hope someone would point out. In order to verify it someone would need to sit down with a lot of MS and XY recorded tracks and run them through the matrix individually, taking note of the outcome. In the meantime, I'm sticking with XY.

[cherryfields]

Originally Posted by Mikkel Nielsen

I use a 416 with this one:
Ambient Products Emesser

Works well I think.

Best wishes,

Mikkel

Hi Mikkel
How is the noise from the "emesser" compared to the SH 418 (fig 8)?

I also have e SH 416 and I was thinking about putting a schoeps CCM 8 on top for M/S recording but I haven't found anyone who has tried that so it might be a bad idea

/Mikael