audience mics - live show recording

Hi all,
i'm pretty new around here, and still pretty newbie at things. hopefully you can offer some suggestions...

i'm recording some live shows of my band (and potentially other bands as i practice and work through the issues). The first time i did it i just used a combination of direct channel outs from the house mixer, and a few additional mics i put up on stage. the recording came out pretty good, but i realized i was missing all the crowd noise and ambiance (cheers, boos, beer bottles breaking over someones head, whatever).

So, to the point... my question is, what types of mics, and what positioning are typically recommended to capture the audience in a live situation? (typically medium sized bars)

large diaphragm condenser, or small? dynamic? omni or cardiod pattern?

Where is recommended placement? close to stage pointing out towards crowd? out in the middle of the crowd pointing further out, or pointing back towards the stage?
sorry for dragging this out...

any suggestions are welcome. Thanks for listening.

thanks for the advice Pmac. i agree, putting mics in the audience would be bad... i kinda meant perhaps hanging them from the ceiling somehow. but, if you think keeping the mics on stage and pointing them out to the crowd is good, thats even easier than trying to find a way to hang them.

i guess if i go with that placement, cardiod is the best, to minimize the stage sound and maximize crowd ambience? any rec's on specific, fairly inexpensive mics?

Mics don't have to be particularly high quality here any of the cheap condensers would be fine. Obviously, use a pair if you want stereo - and as yep says, as far away from individuals in the audience as you can. Overall, for simplicity & security, I like the idea of mics on small 'desktop' stands on top of the PA.

great advice, thanks everyone. got a gig next month and i'm going to try it out.

ORIGINAL: fooman

If you play on a stage with PA speakers on some stands, where do you position the mics so they don't pick up an insane amount from the PA itself and the stage monitors??

Just use a directional mic and find the best spot you can. I imagine you aren't going to need too much crowd noise while the band is actually playing, so some bleed-through shouldn't be a big deal.

Secret tip-- there's no need to record in stereo, just keep the mic running and you can double up sections of crowd noise to make it sound a lot bigger.

Cheers.

Hi There,

On September 24, I recorded an entire set of worship songs played at a young adult worship movement called The Spot, that has been held in my city for the last 4 years. I used to play keys for it, and was in the house band for some time (www.jeffsomersband.com), but now i'm just the recording tech. Anywho, I used 2 ADK SC-1 condensor mics, plus also recorded each track direct from the main board.

I was right beside the board, and set the mic stand up beside me. I raised the boom mic stand up as high as it would go (straight up), and so it was about 15 feet off the ground. Even better, you could put it on a table, and then raise the mic stand as high as it would go still... I have a mic mount that allows me to put two mics on one stand. The stand was in the centre between the two house speakers, with each mic aimed directly at it's own speaker (Left mic aimed at left PA speaker, Right mic aimed at right PA speaker)... I think I put the mic's at a 90 degree angle this time... I think I was probably about 50 to 60 feet from the stage...

Here's one of the songs I just finished mixing:

http://www.greenroomeast.com/Mp3/Come%20Thou%20Fountain.mp3

If you listen closely, you can hear that the crowd noise was picked up nicely....

Yeah, so anyways, this technique seems to work fine for me...

EDIT: by the way, the way I recorded it with the mic's aimed left and right, ended up making a stereo recording of the event... sounds pretty nice... even the mic'd tracks with no direct tracks layered on them still sound pretty good...

Dave