jazz drum miking exp - results

XY setup - Two cardioid patterned mics angled 90 degree as overheads above the drum set. One bass mic is miked outside of the kick drum instead of close-miking to avoid punchy kick sounds.

Results: XY - Cardioid overall resulted in a rather tight and centered sound as compared to the other recordings. The snare and toms were emphasized much more than the cymbals in a consistent way. Timing differences were cancelled with this setup as both of the capsules are placed at the same location.

XY - Hypercardioid provided a similar sounds as the XY Cardioid but when the snare drum entered it sounded rather abrupt and spiky. There are also certain loss of low frequencies as the mics are set as overheads and therefore, for directional mics, they had difficulties capturing the low ends from a distance.

XY Wide Cardioid overall sounded much balanced and involved non-spiky sound in the recording.

The AB Omni sounded more blended with each other and overall has a much spacious sound as compared to the other three. Though it managed to produce a stereo sound, it does not quite suit the sound we were looking for Jazz as it needs to sound much tighter and less blended together. This was speculated as the AB setup principles are meant to create a wide stereo image of sound.

The kick bass mic (AKG P2) provided a suitable sound to this Jazz standard as it was subtle and non striking. However, the analysis of the results may also vary when listening through different sources. These are the observations listed according to what is heard through headphones. With that being said, we also realized that we should be using SDC instead of LDC mics for both of these setups, as recommended, the AKG C451 stereo pair. This is is because small diaphragm condenser mics have faster transient response compared to the large ones. This makes them better at picking up instruments that are played in a fast pace. Other than that it also provides an off-axis coloration whereby it rejects sounds outside the polar pattern much better and receive bleeds that are rather pleasant and smoother.

Reference:

After completing this experiment, we learned that selection of mics should be more precise and suitable for according to the setting. We should also experiment with more miking techniques in order to find a go-to-setup that pretty much is able to perform a decent recording.