Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Want to know more about cables and adapters? Is DJing the right way to go? Which violins go well with your guitar? It's time to find out!

Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Postby Versilaryan » 24 Oct 2011 02:08

A Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Okay, so you want to record yourself singing or playing an instrument. Cool! And because you're a very clever pony, you want to get the best deal you can and choose the best mic for what you want to do!

But when you go to your local music store, or browse through microphones online, there are a million and a half specifications you don't know anything about. You don't know what to do!

I plan on changing that.

Instead of forcing you to go through the trouble of Googling definitions and sifting through tons of stuff you don't understand/need to know about, here's a quick guide on recording equipment. As always, if you want to add or change something in this guide, please let me know! I want this to be as informative as possible. ^.^


YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR.
That is the number one rule when it comes to audio equipment. If you shell out $20 for a microphone, you miser you, you'll get a pretty terrible mic that won't get you anywhere near a high-quality recording. Likewise, if you only spend $25 on an USB interface or a mixer, you'll end up with a terrible preamp that introduces all sorts of fuzz into your sound.

Unfortunately, be prepared to spend a lot of money if you want high-quality recordings. You'll need to spend at least $50 on a decent mic -- $100 if you want a professional one. Then, the $25 audio interfaces are absolutely craptastic. The next-least-expensive are $100-$150 and are significantly better.

If you aren't prepared to shell out that kind of cash, I'd highly recommend buying an okay, cheap USB microphone from RadioShack or someplace similar, and saving up for something more expensive. You won't sound as good as if you bought that $40 mic, but in the long run, you'll save yourself a lot of money and frustration. If you don't plan on doing too much recording at all, just get a $50 USB mic and be done with the whole ordeal.

In a similar vein, if you have cash to burn, don't go out and buy expensive stuff immediately. Settle for a good $100 mic (say, a Shure SM57, or an Audio-Technica AT2020 for vocals) and a $100-150 audio interface if you need one, and learn how to set up mics properly before upgrading your gear. While you'll probably ditch the interface later, that mic will probably stay in your arsenal for a long while.


Know your cables.
For the most part, all mics will only use XLR cables. That's simple enough. But when you get into audio interfaces, mixers, and all sorts of other equipment, there will be a ton of different options and limitations as to what sort of cable goes where. So it's a good idea to know something about them.

For starters, the ends of all cables are either male or female. The male jack plugs into the female jack in exactly the way you're thinking about. So when you're looking for conversion cables, cables to convert one kind of cable into another, you'll see things like female-to-male or male-to-male quite often. So that's what that means.

Image

XLR
See the image above. When you're dealing with microphones, this will be the most common one you'll see. There really isn't that much to say about them.

TRS/TS
More commonly referred to by how wide they are (quarter-inch/6.35 mm, eighth-inch/3.5 mm, etc.), these are the cables you know and love. Standard iPod earbuds use eighth-inch/3.5mm jacks, guitars use quarter-inch/6.35 mm jacks, etc.

With these, though, you'll have to be careful whether you're referring to stereo (TRS) or mono (TS). How can you tell? Stereo ones have an extra ring. (All guitar cables are mono, for the record.)

Still yet are cables that have two mono TS connectors to represent a stereo signal. That's something to look out for if you're looking into mixers. (Here's a stereo-to-two-mono TRS conversion cable)


There are also MIDI cables (technically, 5-pin DIN), which look very much like XLR. MIDI instruments require MIDI cables to function (unless they can plug into a USB port), so be careful with that, especially when you're looking at audio interfaces.

As a word of caution, most XLR cables have three pins while MIDI cables have five. However, some XLR cables do have five pins. For the most part, it shouldn't be a problem, but you can never be too cautious.

Lastly, there are USB cables to plug directly into your computer. You should know what they look like.


Know your microphones.
As far as we're concerned, there are two kinds of mics out there: condenser and dynamic. (There are others, but if you ever have to use them, you're probably faaaar too advanced for this silly little guide.) They're different in how they turn sound waves into electric signals; you can look that up on your own if you're interested.

Condenser mics are more sensitive to volume and feature a brighter sound. Because of the way they're made, condenser mics pick up everything. If you can hear it at all, that mic can, too. If things are bad, you might have to look for noise gating software to mute the little stuff in the background, though the absolute best solution is to just find a quieter room.

Unfortunately, that also means that they easily overload, clip, and produce feedback. If you record a sound that's too loud, you get this nasty crackling noise in the recording. It's easier to hit that threshold with condenser mics, so you'll have to make sure the input volume is low enough and physically back away from the mic when you get louder.

Feedback is what happens when a microphone hears itself (microphone-ception!) You know that really loud, piercing screech that sometimes floods the room when someone's onstage with a microphone? That's feedback. The best thing to do is to not use speakers when recording. When you listen to something with speakers, mute your microphone.

Condenser mics are usually also brighter than dynamic mics, and that's entirely due to the fact that condenser mics pick up a larger range of frequencies. They pick up higher sounds pretty well, giving you a more accurate recording than a dynamic mic would. The problem is that they can have some problem recording lower frequencies (especially smaller mics), and if you're too far from the mic, it can give you a tinny, fake sound.

Solution? Don't record far away from the mic, and use some EQ to boost those lower frequencies and lower those higher frequencies later.

Things to watch out for: Condenser mics are fragile, so be careful with them.
If you use one, make sure you can supply phantom power. USB condenser mics get their phantom power through the computer, but if you don't get a USB condenser, you'll have to make sure that your audio interface or mixer can supply phantom power.


Dynamic mics are hardier and feature a darker sound. You can still overload dynamic mics or cause feedback, but it's not nearly as easy to do that as it is with a condenser mic. They're also harder to break; both of those reasons are why they're so frequently used in live performance. They also don't require phantom power, which is nice.

They're also darker than dynamic mics and have a harder time picking up all sorts of unwanted ambient noise. Dynamic mics have trouble picking up higher frequencies, so that gives them a darker, sometimes warmer sound. Unfortunately, that means that with certain instruments, they sound boomy and you'll have to do all sorts of EQing to get it to sound right.


Alright, then, what about pickups? The big thing you should know about pickups are that pickups are not microphones. Pickups don't detect sound -- they detect the movement of the strings above them. Meaning, if you record an acoustic guitar using pickups, it will sound like an electric guitar. Now, there are benefits to doing this. If you have the software to turn that pickup signal into a legitimate-sounding instrument, you can record without the hassle of setting up mics. Not entirely professional, but it works.

But for the most part, unless you are going for an electric sound, record those instruments with microphones, not pickups. Leave pickups for electric instruments.


Directional Microphones
Cardioid? Supercardoid? Omnidirectional? What is this talking about?

A microphone's polar graph refer to where a microphone can pick up sounds from. Most microphones are cardioid, meaning they pick up sounds directly in front of them and can't pick up sounds coming from directly behind them. If you look at a cardioid graph, it makes sense. If you imagine that microphone is in the middle of that picture, pointing up, then where the graph is further from the center is where the mic can pick up sound better. As you can see, the mic can pick up sounds coming from in front of it, but not behind it.

There are two variants on the cardioid pattern: supercardioid and hypercardioid. They're both similar to cardioid, where they'll mostly pick up sounds from in front of the mic, but supercardioid and hypercardoid mics can also pick up sounds directly behind them, hypercardioid moreso than supercardioid.

There are also figure-eight mics, which can pick up sounds directly in front and directly behind them equally well (but not off to the sides), and omnidirectional mics, which can pick up sounds coming from any direction.

For the most part, you'll want to go with a cardoid mic if you're just going to be doing some simple self-recording. Omnidirectional mics are really good for picking up atmospheric noises (like natural reverb).

If you're trying to mic a drum set, good luck. There are guides for that elsewhere online. >.>


Right, so I play the _______. What mic should I get?
Really, there are guides for this online -- I hear Google's a good resource. =P I could tell you stuff, but there would be so many exceptions to said stuff that it's hardly worth it anymore.
Last edited by Versilaryan on 04 Jan 2012 02:38, edited 3 times in total.
User avatar
Versilaryan
 
Posts: 453
Joined: 03 Jul 2011 17:58

Re: Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Postby Versilaryan » 24 Oct 2011 02:09

Getting That Sound Onto Your Computer

Okay, so you have a microphone (or you're looking at one)! So now what? Now you need to be able to use that microphone! I'm not going to cover the software details on how to record things using various programs -- some are software specific, and it's not hard to find out anyways.

But how do you get that microphone to plug into your computer? What's all this fancy talk I hear about preamps and audio interfaces and mixers?

To start, the big thing to know is that a preamp takes a microphone's signal and then makes it audible. The signal you get from a microphone is REALLY weak, so you need to amplify it to hear it. So that's what a preamp does -- it amplifies that signal before passing it on to something else. Preamps are located in your audio interface, or mixer, or exist as their own little machines. They can even be located in the mic itself!

Okay, so cool. But you didn't answer how to get that mic plugged into my computer and recording some music!

Well, there are basically two ways to get that mic into your computer. The first, and easiest one is:


USB Microphones
If you have a USB microphone, you might as well stop reading here. What happens with a USB mic is that the preamp is located inside the mic itself. Then, it sends the signal to your computer and the rest is history, as they say. No need for expensive audio interfaces or mixers. Easy as Pinkie Pie.

So if something's that easy, there are obviously downsides to it. The first, and most obvious downside is that you use your USB ports for a lot of different things. I know that I've got a USB keyboard, a USB mouse, external hard drives/flash drives... All of them need to be plugged in somehow.

The second main downside is that the preamp on board the microphone might not be the highest quality. And you can't adjust the levels on that preamp, either, so you have to use your computer's microphone levels to change what volume the input is, making recording from multiple mics a pain.

So if you don't want to put up with that and are willing to spend more money, there's the other option.


Non-USB Mics
So you've got a mic with an XLR output. There aren't any XLR plugs on your computer -- what do?

That's where audio interfaces come into play. An audio interface accepts audio inputs and sends them to your computer's USB port. Like microphones, they come in all shapes and sizes, but unlike microphones, you can't neatly categorize them depending on what you need.

I use an M-Audio MobilePRE, which is one of the best ones you're going to get for around $150. Like I mentioned at the very beginning of the guide, you get what you pay for: I do not recommend getting a cheap interface, even if it has a recognizable brand name on it. My previous rig was an M-Audio FastTrack USB with a Behringer Eurorack mixer -- never again.

You'll have to do a lot of shopping around based on what you need to record -- if you have an ensemble of MIDI instruments, you're going to need MIDI ports, and if you're a guitarist, you probably want a way to plug that directly into the interface. And so on.

Okay, that's cool. What's this I hear about mixers and external preamps?

The quick answer? You probably don't need one. (If you need to ask about external preamps, you don't need one. They're disgustingly expensive.)

The long answer? Having a mixer is far more suited for live playing than it is for recording. Live, you might not have the luxury of a powerful laptop with low latency to run EQ programs and fancy effects through. So that's where the mixer comes into play. Everything goes in the mixer, gets EQ'd and has effects put on it, and then comes out of one convenient place to be amplified by the venue's speaker system.

But for recording, its only use is basically to add more inputs to your audio interface. If you apply an EQ or any effects to your recording before it enters your computer, it'll be much harder to undo any mistakes you made, and besides, it's much better to do more precise EQing through software EQs.
Last edited by Versilaryan on 24 Oct 2011 02:11, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar
Versilaryan
 
Posts: 453
Joined: 03 Jul 2011 17:58

Re: Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Postby Versilaryan » 24 Oct 2011 02:09

Anything else I should know?
First off, be aware of latency when you're recording. This is going more into the software side of things, but long story short, you can't write information directly from your audio interface to your computer. Instead, all that information gets placed in a buffer so that the information can stream uninterrupted from that buffer. This means that there will be a delay (latency) between when you record and when that information reaches your computer.

The trick is to find a buffer size that will let your computer stream uninterrupted without getting those clicks and pops that happen when the buffer is too small. Naturally, better computers mean smaller buffers. But there will still be an ever so slight delay.

So unless you have an interface with direct monitoring, mute the track you're recording into, pop an ear free from your headphones, and listen to yourself play/sing naturally instead of through the computer. Not only will it stop latency from messing with your timing, you'll perform better than if you weren't listening to your own performance.

Learn proper mic technique.
There are other websites detailing this for various instruments, but it all boils down to this: Before you do your actual recording, do sound tests with the mic in various locations to figure out what sounds best. There is no real best location, so figure it out for yourself. You'll become a better sound technician that way. In fact, experiment with location in the room, too. You sound different depending on how the sound bounces off whatever's close to you.

If you're a singer, eat the mic. Buy/make a pop filter and move up uncomfortably close to that mic. I see too many people standing onstage with the mic a good foot from their face, and they always sound terrible. Please don't be one of those people.


So that's all I have to say for now. Hope you guys learned something, and as always, comments are welcome! Thanks for reading! ^.^
User avatar
Versilaryan
 
Posts: 453
Joined: 03 Jul 2011 17:58

Re: Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Postby Stars In Autumn » 24 Oct 2011 03:47

Man, you couldn't of had better timing for this. I just started looking into mics this weekend. A lot of what you say seems pretty much in line with what I've been reading. It looks like I'm going to order a MXL 990 condenser mic with a shock mount and a ART tube MP preamp, some sort of audio interface, a stand, and a pop filter. I think that should cover it.
-Stars In Autumn aka Jeffthestrider
User avatar
Stars In Autumn
Site Admin
 
Posts: 471
Joined: 29 Jun 2011 18:38
Location: Colorado
OS: Windows
Primary: FL
Cutie Mark: Myself

Re: Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Postby X-Trav » 24 Oct 2011 09:26

This should be a sticky.

Awesome tutorial, taught me loads. The mic i've been using came with a DJ Hero 2 Bundle, and i've been hoping to get a real one sometime for my piano. Thanks for letting me know that Omnidirectional is a thing, because I would've probably gotten Cardioid out of ignorance.
Long time pianist and mediocrity extraordinaire.

Current Projects:
Manestream media
    EOE003
Call of The Crusaders
Album
User avatar
X-Trav
 
Posts: 185
Joined: 10 Aug 2011 21:11
Location: Florida

Re: Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Postby [voodoopony] » 01 Nov 2011 23:40

This is what tutor of the week should look like.

Thanks for taking the time to make this; I've been looking into getting a microphone myself. I'll definitely have this in mind.
Warning: May cause rapid chest hair growth.
Youtube - Bandcamp
User avatar
[voodoopony]
 
Posts: 185
Joined: 29 Jun 2011 22:24

Re: Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Postby Versilaryan » 02 Nov 2011 00:37

Thanks for the comments, guys! ^.^

X-Trav wrote:The mic i've been using came with a DJ Hero 2 Bundle, and i've been hoping to get a real one sometime for my piano.

To record piano, you probably want at least two microphones. It's more expensive, but the piano's a large instrument (meaning the sound comes out of a /large/ area of the instrument). If you get one mic, even an omnidirectional one, it'll sound loud and boomy at a certain range of the piano and not nearly as loud when you play elsewhere.

If you've got a mini grand, you probably could kinda get away with just one mic, but if you have an upright piano, you definitely should think about getting two.
User avatar
Versilaryan
 
Posts: 453
Joined: 03 Jul 2011 17:58

Re: Beginner's Guide to Microphones!

Postby Dr_Dissonance » 02 Nov 2011 05:18

Versilaryan wrote:If you've got a mini grand, you probably could kinda get away with just one mic, but if you have an upright piano, you definitely should think about getting two.


If you do have a grand of somekind, a stereo mic placed just above the middle of the strings works real well!
That's what we use at uni whenever we need to record piano!

But this guide is amazing! I'll consider this the standard for the tutor of the week idea when it gets implemented!
Tubeyou
You are the hero My Little Remix deserves, not the one it needs.
So we’ll hunt you. Because you can take it. Because you’re not our hero.
You’re a silent guardian of music, a watchful protector of songs.
A doctor of dissonance.
-Phillypu
User avatar
Dr_Dissonance
 
Posts: 634
Joined: 01 Jul 2011 07:45
Location: Australia


Return to Hardware/Tracking/Performance Advice



Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 8 guests

cron