Angle in an XY OH setup

[mdoelger]

Hi everybody!

I'm going to record a band in town in their practice room for a demo.
Since it is a very small room with low ceiling. I think I'll go for a XY setup for drum OHs.
When it comes to angles I will try to experiment a bit.
The original angle between the two mics is 90°.
What are typical situations in which you would want to change the angle. Wider or smaller. Or is there a technical reason, why I should stick to 90°?

Another thought is to use recorderman for OH. But I don't like the stereo spread. I'll close mic every drum. So the OHs will be mostly for cymbals and a little ambience.

thanks for your comments.

[tINY]

90 deg is a bit narrow for cardioids. But there are no hard and fast rules....




-tINY

[mdoelger]

Alright. No technical reason. Do whatever sounds good.
thanks

[AmplitudeAudio]

I was taught 120° if using a cardioid pattern. Works great for me.

[bgrotto]

Since you're thinking of the OHs as cymbals/ambience mics, the way I set up XY overheads may not work for you, but I'll offer it up anyway:

- I start with whatever angle aims each mic at the spot my gut tells me is best
- I bring up the gain on the OHs preamp, then flip the polarity on one, adjusting the gain until the snare disappears
- I flip the polarity back, and check out the imaging. If there are any issues, I change the angle of the mics relative to one another, or I change where the pair are pointed
- I repeat these steps till I'm happy

I personally never have great luck setting up OHs for just cymbals and ambience. The better the image and balance of the kit in the OHs, the more natural the close mics sound. I often find that the greater the percentage of drum sound is coming from the OHs, the better the overall result. As usual, YMMV.

[mdoelger]

Originally Posted by bgrotto

I personally never have great luck setting up OHs for just cymbals and ambience. The better the image and balance of the kit in the OHs, the more natural the close mics sound. I often find that the greater the percentage of drum sound is coming from the OHs, the better the overall result. As usual, YMMV.

Thanks a lot. I also tend to use the overheads for an overall picture of the whole kit. Most of the time I use an A/B setup. However, this is going to be a very fast session, they do not have the money to pay for the time needed for the perfect mic positioning. So I'll go for just cymbals to minimize phase issues. I'm not expecting the drums to sound really good. My desicion is more of a work around here.
And the drummer is an evil cymbal smashing bastard . So if I rely on OHs for the whole kit it's most likely going to end up with to much hi-end.

I'm not looking forward to that session. But I'll end up having 300 bucks more in my pocket. For 7 songs!!

[DCtoDaylight]

....it will help you!

http://www.microphone-data.com/pdfs/Stereo%20zoom.pdf

[tINY]

Originally Posted by lunale

.

I'm not looking forward to that session. But I'll end up having 300 bucks more in my pocket. For 7 songs!!

Wow, I should send my bands over to you for demos....




-tINY

[MarkRB]

35 degrees.

[mdoelger]

Originally Posted by MarkRB

35 degrees.

[warhead]

Try ORTF while you're at it...you only have to separate the mics by 7" and start with a 110 degree angle. I greatly prefer this sound to XY for drum overheads but it's a personal choice.

I start with 110 degrees and work around from there to optimize it per kit.

War

[mdoelger]

Originally Posted by warhead

Try ORTF while you're at it...you only have to separate the mics by 7" and start with a 110 degree angle. I greatly prefer this sound to XY for drum overheads but it's a personal choice.

I start with 110 degrees and work around from there to optimize it per kit.

War

Isn't that going to get too much phase smearing? It'll be a small untreated room.

[tINY]

Your head is about that wide, and your ears don't have issues with this...

At 7" distance you will get comb filtering if you sum to mono. If you put the pair a few feet in front of the kit, you won't even get much of that.



-tINY

[mdoelger]

Originally Posted by tINY

Your head is about that wide, and your ears don't have issues with this...

At 7" distance you will get comb filtering if you sum to mono. If you put the pair a few feet in front of the kit, you won't even get much of that.



-tINY

Ok. I'll take the time to experiment with that. I think I'll try to get it to sound as good as possible. even for 300 bucks. I have such a big heart.

tINY, you're really cool. Your posts almost always show that you're always trying to be very helpful. Thanks for that.

[kats]

Originally Posted by lunale

Hi everybody!

Another thought is to use recorderman for OH. But I don't like the stereo spread. I'll close mic every drum. So the OHs will be mostly for cymbals and a little ambience.

thanks for your comments.

Personally I default to "recordermans" (and by that I assume you DON'T mean the technique commonly associated with Glyn Johns) if I'm in a crappy room. I prefer SDC's in this situation and also mic the snare, kick, and toms (although I rarely need the tom mics).

I have a feeling though that you are referring to the Glyn Johns technique because some people have a problem with thge stereo image - recordermans OTOH has a brilliant image IMO.

[mdoelger]

Originally Posted by kats

Personally I default to "recordermans" (and by that I assume you DON'T mean the technique commonly associated with Glyn Johns) if I'm in a crappy room. I prefer SDC's in this situation and also mic the snare, kick, and toms (although I rarely need the tom mics).

I have a feeling though that you are referring to the Glyn Johns technique because some people have a problem with thge stereo image - recordermans OTOH has a brilliant image IMO.

I don't like the image of both of the setups. Glyn Johns I find actually worse. And the main problem with recorderman is IMO, that often drummers/bands feel uncomfortable with it because it looks so weird to them. Even if it hides the acoustics of a crappy room to some extend, I want the drummer to feel as comfortable as possible.
It's a punk rock style band with fast drums, so I also fear the drummer could kill the "snare OH mic". stike