recording acoustic 12 string

Hi

I've been recording my acoustic 12 string into my laptop straight through the mic socket but the sound is a bit hit or miss. Should i be miking it up for best results or going through some kind of box ?

Second problem was in doing this when i put the metronome on it recorded this as well onto the track..thn the metronome went off beat. Any ideas what i'm doing wrong..

Hi

Thanks...the acoustic is nice..very lush..any advise on mics i should use ?....i know this sounds pretty crap but i havn't a clue what sound card i have.....i checked out hardware devices on system and it looks like i have legacy ?? is this the correct place to locate it

ORIGINAL: martinlemonkiss
any advise on mics i should use ?...

Martin -

Just two questions:
1. What's your budget?
2. What else will you be recording with your mikes other than your acoustic 12 string?

Cheers

Yes, but how much do you want to spend? What's your limit? $199gets you a Studio Projects C1 which is good for guitar and vox:
http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/C1Mic/

It's often a good idea to use 2 mikes on an instrument, especially a 12 string.

The Marshall V67G is also pretty good value at $99, I'd say.
http://www.jrrshop.com/product_info.php?manufacturers_id=71&products_id=174

But ask ten different people and you'll get 10 different opinions...

ORIGINAL: martinlemonkiss

I'm looking at £150 pounds whic i guess i about $300 dollars..thanks for the advice much appreciated...but this may be a stupid question but how do you mic up two mics with one mic input.because what i want to capture is the that lush twelve string sound without multiplying tracks

First... don't use the 'mic' input of your Creative card... they really don't sound very good. Trust me. Buy a small mixer and run it's stereo outputs to the 'LINE' input of the card. Most small mixers have at least two mic inputs. Macky and Beringher both make decent and cheap small mixers.

For $300 I would say you could get a decent USB interface with a decent set of MXL mics and be very happy.

I use to record alot of simular stuff with a M-Audio Mobile Pre USB interface and a MXL Studio Pac(MXL 2003 Large Diaphram and a MXL 603S Small diaphram mic).

I had great results. You may want to look at getting some nice Headphones as well to monitor your stuff. Also the Mobile pre USB has the pre-amps built in so that one less thing to buy as the Phantom powered Mic-pre amps are the key here.

Also I use a simple drum loop for a click track in sonar, Its better than a click for my uses.

Just some advice.

-Reco

And ditto on the Studio Projects C1. It's good for guitar and vocals. Although most people use a small diaphragm condenser for guitars.

I use a Variax Acoustic 700 and plug it into a Line 6 PodXT and then into an MPA Gold Preamp. The 12-string emulation is very realistic, I don't have to worry about mic positioning, and I have a lot of control over the direct signal. This costs a bit more, but you can get the sound you want without any problems with room acoustics and if you have a good reverb plugin (I use Waves IR1, Voxengo Pristine Space, or sometimes even an old spring reverb I have in my rack from Furman which is noisy as heck but has a lot of character) you can get a great acoustic guitar tone.

Paul

I just run my Fender GN45SCE Grand Nylon straight into my mixer, then add a touch of Stereo Chorus from a Fostex DE-10 before sending into the Delta 44.

Yeah a combo of both a line in and a mic does sound nice.
I have the best of four world as I have a Wechter guitar with a three pickup system in it.
So I mic the guitar with a Samson C01 (not the USB model! Avoid it at all cost! Its a hunk O' Crap), Then I run the line out of the wechter into my machine and blend the internal mic with the magnetic and the piezo.

It sounds pretty dang good! I would like to get a real mic as aposed to my Samson.
I realy like the M-Audio Luna or Solaris.

P.S. Get the interface, you wont be sorry.

-Reco