Howdy y'all.  I'm working on a song and I think it needs hand claps in one part.  I've been trying to record them this morning and, well, no bueno penuder.  That's gutter Spanish for it sucks. They sound more like vocal pops but they're not.  Any tips for this poor old desert baked brain?  I hope everyone is doing well.  TIA

Try it in the shower.




Find a room that has some echo and use some distance with the mic placement.

Layer a few of them for each pulse.

Use reverb, maybe even with some slap back.


Stuff like that.


best regards,
mike

Thanks, Mike.  I did see that I was peaking the meter on the first clap, causing the pop.  As you said, I did 4 tracks and it was sounding better.  I've sent it off to Mark for enhancements.  We don't even know if it is going to fit in the song, but......  I'll try a couple other things you suggested.  I really appreciate your help, buddy!

I use the clapomatic :-) 

http://www.fxpansion.com/index.php?page=83&tab=229

Because I'm a clap-fanatic, I use the Claps in Sonar 853 (Beatscape) and X2 (Samplers and Rex files).  I suppose a humid shower room might yield great claps per Mike.  But 'twould be a pain to get my Pre-Mic stuff in there.

It is also better to get multiple people doing hand claps too. One person just wont cut it so much. You don't have to do it in reverberant spaces either. I have recorded them dry, it is better in some ways. Then you have more control over the reverb you do use. It is the sound of multiple persons doing it that you are after. That gives you the fatness of the claps, not the space so much.

There are some very good hand clap samples and VST's out there, you don't need to record them at all. 

A good trick is to use an odd number of claps too. For example record a small group and pick 5 of the best samples. If you place them on beats two and four and use the 5 claps sequentially you wont hear the same claps in those positions for many bars. Do not use the same claps on beats two and four. It will start to sound obvious quite quickly.

try layering in different physical motions , the cup clap / the slap clap / exc.
as mike said placement has a lot to do with it. a way from the mic.
also with claps ive found it doesn't build character until 5-8 layers.

there is also a flac file in session drummer 3 you can load in to a module, or any good clap sample, load it in to a module then use the knob to tune it in.

this is best way ive found

multiple claps, each recorded in different areas and multiple people clapping at once. Layer and edit to taste.

In the Brandon and Seth webinar on big drums there 's a neat section on how they grab a Beatscape hand clap simple and drop itin to Session drummer for playing as needed. It's a cool technique that they spell out clearly.

This one surprised me too when I first tried it. The way I like to do it (much has already been covered):

 - Dry room for flexibility in post
 - Multiple mics for more sound difference (a condenser with a dynamic might be good - different takes)
 - Recording samples at different distance from the mic (I found this was minimal in effect in a dry room)
 - Make sure your timing ISN'T perfect! This is a big one. You need to record (or shift in post production) some takes a little early, some a little late. If you're a good muso and your claps are all perfect, it sounds thin and too snappy (unless you want that)
 - Lots of takes
 - Different samples for each clap (as Jeff pointed out) is very important to not sound stale and robotic
 - Pan individual claps differently
 - Group bunches of claps into close, mid and far where the close ones will have minimal stereo spread, a short reverb pre-delay and low mixing, but the far ones will have a longer and less bright verb with more pre-delay and higher verb mixing. You might also want to put the majority of your samples into this section. Eg put 4 claps in front, 10 in mids, and 20 claps in the rear.
 - Clap differently. Palm of hand, on the fingers, flat hand, cupped hand etc
 - Layer with sampled claps
 - Lots of compression may help thicken it out a lot, but I tend to find if the rest isn't right, all this really does is bring up the noise floor without adding too much to the weight of the clap.


Anywho, a combination of those things tends to work well for me.