Recording - July 2015 - 14

Acoustic Guitar For The Recording

Songwriter

I will mention some of my personal choices below, but a comprehensive list of
mics and manufacturers is impossible to include here. I use mics by AKG,
Neumann, Royer Labs, Sennheiser, and Shure on a regular basis, but there are
great mics out there from ADK/3Zigma, AEA, Audio-Technica, Audix, Blue, Bock
Audio, Brauner, Cascade, Chameleon Labs, Cloud, Coles, DPA, Ear Trumpet Labs,
Earthworks, Electro-Voice, Josephson, JZ, Kel, Lauten, Lawson, Lewitt, Manley
(shown in the photos), Microtech Gefell, Milab, Mojave Audio, MXL, Oktava, Pearl
Labs, Pearlman, Peluso, Placid Audio, RØDE, Samson, sE Electronics, Shinybox,
Sontronics, Telefunken, and many others.

As I mentioned before, since the acoustic guitar incorporates a lot of important high-frequency information, using a condenser mic instead of a dynamic or
ribbon is rather common. Despite that, dynamics and ribbons most definitely
have their place in any recording, whether in a home studio or at a high-end
professional studio.
The Shure SM57, a workhorse on snare, electric guitar and vocals, is also useful
for acoustic guitar. Most studios typically have at least one 57, so give it a try-it can
be useful if you only can afford one microphone for tracking vocals and guitars.
SM57s have a woody percussive tone when used to track acoustic guitars. For adding
beef to a song or mix via acoustic guitar, the 57 just might do the job.
Paul Logus of PLX Mastering has the following to say. "For home projects, my
go-to mic for acoustics is a 57. I set the mic at same height as my head, about two
feet or so in front of my face, angled down 45 degrees at the sound hole. Also, I
sometimes use a Radio Shack PZM [a "pressure-zone" or boundary mic], placed
on my right knee, to record my 12-string with a light pick. Best $50 I ever spent."
14

RECORDING July 2015

An interesting and unexpected microphone
choice is the Copperphone by Placid Audio. It
sounds like an old AM radio, and sometimes gives
just the right amount of vibe for a part. [To learn
more, see Paul Vnuk's review of the Copperphone
Mini on page 18.-MM] Another suggestion,
while slightly off topic, is the use of a DI or onboard
pickup to send your acoustic to an amplifier, which
you can mic up. This can be an interesting tool for
eliminating bleed or spill if tracking vocals and guitar at the same time, and with the added benefit of
being able to drive the guitar amp near or into harmonic distortion for some unexpected crunch and
even fuzz on your acoustic.
With the specific microphone type in mind, I
think the next thing you ought to do is determine
your budget, as the microphones mentioned vary
from affordable, to serious money. You get what
you pay for with these microphones as quality
and tone doesn't come cheap. On the other hand
you don't absolutely need to spend a lot of
money to capture great tone. An old studio
adage comes to mind here: "It's the fool, not the
tool."
In terms of what to buy, I think being hands on
makes the most sense. I suggest spending some
time and money renting microphones or borrowing friends' microphones to try out, and get
a sense of what works best with your setup and
room. Reading reviews and doing your homework also makes sense. With that being said,
there is nothing more educational than being
hands-on, doing comparisons of microphones to
see what works best for you. Again, there is no
predefined or "best" microphone to choose,
only what is right or best for you and your budget.
Microphone setup
There are a few ways that I recommend trying first, as they are tried and true recording
methods. Later, we'll look at less common methods and explore some interesting ideas to try in
your studio recording space.
The most common miking technique is placing
your mic about six inches to one foot away, somewhere in the vicinity of where the guitar's neck and
body meet. This is where with a single mic you can
typically get a good balance of body warmth and
resonance, as well as detail and brightness from
the strings. This is a great starting place, but fine
tune adjustments usually let you dial in the sweet
spot. To this end, I suggest aiming somewhere
between the 12th and 15th fret, and adjusting from
there.
The next mic position to try would be to put
the microphone out in front of the guitar's body,
and in line with the sound hole-basically
where it was designed to project sound from!
With this setup it is important to avoid the resonance of moving too much air via the sound
hole and capturing boominess and rumble. This
is especially true of cardioid and figure-8 mics
with their proximity effect. I would advise
against pointing straight at the sound hole, but
rather off towards the bridge a bit, to capture
strumming and body warmth/resonance. This is
especially true if you have a brighter, more narrow-sounding guitar.

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recording - July 2015