• SONAR
  • What does "out of phase" sound like? (p.3)
2017/05/04 02:43:47
quantumeffect
Phase concerns show up in several different ways when mic’ing a drum set.  A couple that I notice are (a) with 2 mic’s capturing the whole kit (cymbals in particular) and (b) 2 close mic’s on one drum.
 
(a) 2 mic’s capturing the whole kit
When I mic the whole kit I use an A-B spaced pair technique.  That is, 2 overheard mics facing downward to capture the cymbals about 6 feet apart from each other … 1 on each side of the kit roughly equidistant from the snare.
If you stand in a room and hit a good cymbal it will have an initial attack and then a smooth decay.  My goal is to get the mic's set to minimize phase issues and get the recorded cymbals to have this beautiful decay:
 
 
CRRrraaaassssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
 
 
If you don't get the mic's set up correctly you end up with audible phase issues that sound like a rising and falling wooshing sound in the decaying cymbal wash:
 
 
CRRrraaaassssshhhhwwooosshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhwwooosshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
 
 
(b) 2 close mic’s on one drum
Here the drum is close mic'ed from the top and bottom with the 2 mic's (at least to some degree) facing each other.  Typically what you do when mixing the 2 tracks down to 1 ... is to listen to them with the polarity matched for the 2 tracks and then flipped for the 2 tracks.  One combination will usually sound hollow and the other combination will sound fat.
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