Recording electric guitars with Royer 121...room?

[Navigator]

I'm considering getting a Royer 121 to guitar amps in my apartment studio. I'm concerned about the roll that the room might play in the sound given the mic's figure-8 pattern. I would be most likely be close mic'ing a Bogner 1x12 cube or Top Hat combo, either with the Royer alone or paired with an SM57 or Senn 609 silver. My room is not bad for an apartment, approx 17 by 15 with very few hard surfaces and 10 foot ceilings. Even so, I'm concerned about how much of the room the Royer is likely to pick up. Any insight from experienced users about this, or how to minimize the room pick up?

I'm doing mostly modern pop to classic rock styled stuff and recording at moderate volume (trying to keep things from getting too loud).

Thanks for your help.

[tubedude]

Originally Posted by Navigator

I'm considering getting a Royer 121 to guitar amps in my apartment studio. I'm concerned about the roll that the room might play in the sound given the mic's figure-8 pattern. I would be most likely be close mic'ing a Bogner 1x12 cube or Top Hat combo, either with the Royer alone or paired with an SM57 or Senn 609 silver. My room is not bad for an apartment, approx 17 by 15 with very few hard surfaces and 10 foot ceilings. Even so, I'm concerned about how much of the room the Royer is likely to pick up. Any insight from experienced users about this, or how to minimize the room pick up?

I'm doing mostly modern pop to classic rock styled stuff and recording at moderate volume (trying to keep things from getting too loud).

Thanks for your help.

I have an almost identical room, and here is what is working for me almost too well to beleive. (with ribbons) I put a 2x12 cab up on a chair. Mic it up right dead on center of a speaker. I made some 2x4 baffles with rockwool, and I completely surround the cabinet about 4 feet away with these baffles. Its like an 8 foot circle of baffles with the cab/mic inside. Yes, it takes a bunch. But I feel like keeping the baffles back off the mic gives it some room to breathe, and really levels out anything bad the room would ususally try to instill. Even lie one on top of the cabinet out past where the microphone is to kill anything coming off the ceiling. This works better than anything I've tried so far. Its fast and simple and hardly any fussing with placement.

[Navigator]

Hmm...thanks for the reply Tubedude. I don't think I can really find the space to keep baffles like that around. I do have a 6x6 or so folding wall with Auralex panels that I could try to use in a similar fashion, though they won't kill the sound nearly as effectively.

What happens if you close mic with the Royer but don't use the baffles? Does the Royer pick up a lot of the room?

I wonder what would happen if you were to stick some foam or baffling directly behind the rear of the mic? That is, could you effectively (somewhat) turn the figure-8 into more of a cardioid pattern?

[Meriphew]

I use a 121 on amps in a smaller room quite a bit. No special baffles or gobos. I'm loving the sounds too.

[DAWgEAR]

To the extent that the room is an issue, I use these:

http://www.auralex.com/sound_isolati...n_xpanders.asp

[popmann]

Point the amp out into the longest length of room. Fig8 is dryer, IMO, than a lot of other positions by nulling the side/top reflections which are much closer and stronger than the ones coming back from a wall 17 feet away.

[Ol' Betsey]

Sheesh...

Get a mic stand and hang a couple of hefty blankets over it and set it up behind the mic.

Easy peasy.

Aurelux Borelux.

R.

[mixerguy]

Originally Posted by Ol' Betsey

Sheesh...

Get a mic stand and hang a couple of hefty blankets over it and set it up behind the mic.

Easy peasy.

Aurelux Borelux.

R.

[Rogervandeberg]

I also heard from other people they achieved very good results using a SE reflexion filter behind the 121......

[Fletcher]

Originally Posted by Navigator

I'm concerned about the roll that the room might play in the sound given the mic's figure-8 pattern.

Don't be.

I would be most likely be close mic'ing a Bogner 1x12 cube or Top Hat combo, either with the Royer alone or paired with an SM57 or Senn 609 silver.

Key words here are "close mic'ing". You have two ears, stick one of them where you might put a close mic in relationship to the speaker cabinet. How much of the room do you hear with the other ear? Not a whole hell of a lot.

You will be setting up the gain on your mic-pre so that you're not clipping the pre which means that the lion's share of the signal your pre-amp will amplify will come from the "front" side [or the side closest to the sound source] of the mic. There will be damn little return of the room to the other side of the mic because there will be no where near the SPL [Sound Pressure Level] coming from the room when you compare it to the SPL of the speaker source.

If you add some compression you will indeed suck up some additional room when the guitar isn't playing [a rest, end of the song, etc.] but other than that you're not going to experience a whole lot of "roomy" texture to the tone... same holds true with omni pattern BTW... except you don't get the added bottom from the proximity effect nor a couple of other groovy things that only figure 8 pattern mics can do.

[Navigator]

Thanks for all the input guys. Sounds like it's pretty much a non-issue ultimately given Fletcher's points. Now I've got to get myself the Royer!

[Meriphew]

You're gonna love it.

[brendondp]

Or, if you get your Royer and you're still worried about sound from the rear, get a duvet and drape it over the front of the cab and over the mic stand.

Believe it or not, this has been used on some "big (producer, engineer, studio, budget)" recordings in the past.

It works.

Cheers,

bdp

[stellar]

what about with a band?

[uncle duncan]

Originally Posted by stellar

what about with a band?

I think that's what the SE reflexion filter was designed for. That and baffle would probaby help.

[tubedude]

They are figure 8, but the drums in the null. Very good rejection.

[Fletcher]

Originally Posted by Navigator

Thanks for all the input guys. Sounds like it's pretty much a non-issue ultimately given Fletcher's points.

I don't know if they're still using them or not but I put a couple of Royer R-121's on Joe Perry's rig for an Aerosmith tour many moons ago... they worked fine.

That said... while I love R-121's they're not necessarily the "be all-end all" of ribbon microphones so you might want to get a few different ones into your environment and give them a whirl to decide which [if any] will best suit your purposes.

Best of luck with the search.