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T4.3 Intro to the StudioStudio A Manual
Content
Studio A Diagram 2
Health and Safety 3
Equipment In The Studio 4
The Channel Strip 10
Suitable and Effective us of
Microphones
14
Recording a Drum Kit 17
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Studio A
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Health and Safety
When hosting clients in a studio, you must ensure that their health and safety is not put at
risk, if they are put at risk then: a) If they fall ill or are injured, they can blame the host
which will ruin your reputation and b) they may not perform to their best ability.
There are a number of factors you must pay attention to in order to keep your clients safe.
1) Ensure they know where the fire exits are
2) Ensure they know where the fire extinguisher(s) are
Studios are often, either poorly ventilated or do not have ventilation fans to reduce
background noise. Therefore, you must
3)
Inform them that smoking is prohibited inside the building
4) Aerosol can should not be used inside the studio
Another health factor that must be paid attention is the clients, and your own hearing. A
typical conversation occurs at around 60dB (decibels), A bulldozer at idle (not bulldozing) is
loud enough at 85 dB to cause permanent damage after one working day (8 hours).
Listening to an mp3 player with headphones can reach a level of 100dB, loud enough to
begin causing permanent damage after just fifteen minutes per day and a clap of thunder at
around 120dB can cause immediate damage. By regularly asking your clients if the audio in
their headphones (when in the live room) or from the speakers in the control room are too
loud or not, you can prevent them from loss of hearing.
5) Ask clients regularly if the volume is too much for their ears to handle
Some professional studios even have indicators that show when the surrounding noise
approaches a dangerous level using green, yellow and red lights.
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Equipment in the Studio
In order for you to understand how the studio works, you must know what equipment
there is, what it does and how to use it effectively.
Soundcraft Sapphyre
First thing you will see as you enter the studio will be the mixing console, in this case it is
the Soundcraft Sapphyre.
The Sapphyre is a 36 channel, in-line monitor type console, meaning it has as many
monitoring paths as it does input channels. All channels can be routed to the eight mix
busses or bypass them all together with their own tape send.
Each channel features a noise gate with adjustable frequency, threshold and release pots.
Each channel also has a four band equalizer, 6 AUX sends, a fader for the input signal and a
fader for playback.
Outboard Effects and Compressors
Next to the console, you will see a rack
featuring a selection of outboard
compressors, pre-amps, equalizers
and power supplies; these are all
accessible by assigning channels to
two of eight busses which are then
patched into the device via a bantam lead.
An outboard compressor is a piece of hardware, usually found in a control room. It offers
control over all compression parameters found on the standard Logic compressor.
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Patch Bay
A patch bay is often found on larger consoles which contain accessible jacks that
correspond to the various inputs and outputs
of every access point within a mixer orrecording console. Most professional patch
bays offer centralized input/output access to
most of the recording, Effects and
monitoring devices or system blocks within
the production facility.
Patch bay systems come in a number of plug and jack types as well as wiring lay outs. For
example, some prefabricated patch bays use inch phone configurations, as well as RCA(phono) connections. These models will often place interconnected jacks at the panels
front and rear so that studio users can reconfigure the panel by simply rearranging the
plugs at the rear access point. Other professional systems use a telephone-type (TT or mini
Bantam-TT) plugs that often require you to hand-wire the connections in order to configure
or reconfigure the bay.
XLRs and Stage Boxes
In the live room you will find a stage box, this is a small
box with a number of XLR inputs, XLR leads are usually
used to connect microphones to a mixing console or
audio interface, or connecting a console/device to
speakers.
An XLR lead is made up of three pins; Left, Right and
ground. Always make sure, once you have finished
using them, to coil them like so.
A Stage box will usually have between eight and
sixteen inputs and even a number of XLR outputs for
fold back speakers.
In the case of Studio A, each input corresponds with
a channel on the Soundcraft console, input one is
channel one, input two is channel two and so on.
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Audio Interface
When putting together a DAW-based system, an audio interface deserves careful
consideration. Some have a single, dedicated purpose and some are multifunctional. In
either case their main purpose is to act as a bridge between analogue and digital audio.
Although audio interfaces come in many shapes,
sizes and functionalities, they will usually be:
- Built into a computer but this may limit the
quality and functionality
- A simple, 2 input/output device
- Multichannel, offering multiple input/output
channels
Most audio interfaces feature a controller surface, providing a hands-on DAW operation.
These devices may be designed as hardware cards that fit directly into the computer;
others might connect via USB or FireWire. An interface might have as few as two inputs and
two outputs but on the other hand it might have as many as 24. It might offer limited
sample rate and bit depth options or it might be capable of handling rates up to 96 kHz/24
bits or higher.
One issue that can be raised when talking about audio interfaces is the issue of latency or
the build-up of delays (measured in milliseconds) in audio signals as they pass through the
audio circuitry of the audio interface. Latency can be experienced as short delays between
the input and monitored signal. If the delays are excessive they could throw the performer
off time. Because we now have faster computers, improved audio drivers and better
programming, latency has been reduced to such low levels that its not even noticeable.
Signal Levels
The signal level is exactly what it says; it is the amplitude level of the signal.
A 1 dB change is barely noticeable to most human ears. Turning something up by 3 dB will
double the signals level which wont increase the perceived loudness as much as youd
expect. Likewise, turning something down by 3 dB will only halve the signal.
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Direct Injection (DI)
Recording direct of direct injection (DI) allows the
signal of an electronic instrument to be directly
injected into a console, recorder or DAW withoutthe use of a microphone. This produces a cleaner
sound by bypassing the distorted components of a
head/amp. It also reduces bleed into other mics and
eliminating room sounds.
A DI box serves to interface an instrument with an
analogue output signal to a console or recorder in
the following ways:
- It reduces an instruments line level output to mic level so it can be inserted into the
consoles mic input.
- It changes an instruments unbalanced, high source impedance line to a balanced,
low source impedance signal that a console input requires.
- It can electrically isolate the audio signal paths between the instrument and the
mic/line preamp, reducing potential for ground loop hum and buzzes.
Usually the instruments output is plugged directly into the DI box, where its stepped down
in level and impedance. The output of the DI box is then fed into the mic pre of a console or
DAW.
If a dirtier sound is desired, some boxes will allow high level input signals to be taken from
an amps speaker output jack.
When recording a guitar, the best sound and lowest hum occurs when the instrument
volume control is fully turned up.
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VU Meter
Signal levels at an input, output bus, and other console level point, is often measured by a
visual meter. Meter and indicator types will often vary from system to system. For example,
banks of readouts that indicate console bus output and tape return levels might use VUmetering, peak programme meters or digital/software readouts. Its also not uncommon to
find LED overload indicators on an input strips preamp which give a quick and easy peak
indication as to whether youve approached or reached the components headroom limits.
The traditional signal level indicator for
analogue equipment is the VU meter. The
scale chosen for this device is calibrated in
volume unit or VU and is designed to display
a signals average RMS level (an average
loudness value during a certain time frame).
Although VU meters do the job of indicating
RMS levels, they ignore the short term peaks
that can overload a track. This means a professional console must often be designed so that
unacceptable distortion wont occur until around 14 dB above 0 VU (The standard
operating level for most consoles and mixers).
Noise Gate
A noise gate allows a signal above a selected threshold to pass through to the output,
however as the signal falls below the threshold, the gate effectively mutes the signal by
fully attenuating it. This allows the desired to pass through while background sounds,
instrument buzzes, bleed or other unwanted noises that occur between pause in the music
arent.
A noise gate can be useful when recording a drum kit, reducing bleed from other parts of
the kit.
The rules of attack and release also apply to gating, attack is how long it takes for the gate
to open and release is how long it takes for the gate to close.
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EQ
Parametric EQ
A parametric equalizer allows you to
adjust most or all of its frequency
parameters. Although the basic design
layout will change from model to
model, you will always be able to alter
the center frequency, bandwidth and q
factor.
Shelf EQ
A shelf equalizer allows the adjustment
of boost or cut to a frequency and all
other frequencies above or below it.
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The Channel Strip
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Suitable and Effective Use of Microphones
Purpose Microphone How to use +48V?
Kick Drum Dynamic mic with
a large diaphragm,
these are usuallyfairly bulky
microphones
Place facing into the hole in the
front
skin of akick
drum
capturing both the attack on the
first skin and the resonance of
the second
No
Snare Drum 2xShure
SM57/SM58,
dynamic mic, often
used for live vocals
1stMic) Place at the edge of the
snare pointing towards the
centre of the skin
2nd
Mic) Place directly under the
centre of the drum, about an
inch
away from the snare
Remember to reverse the
bottom mics phase, because
the two snare mics are facing
each other, the diaphragms
pulse the same way, losingclarity in the sound
No
Hi-Hat SM57/SM58,
dynamic mic
Place
pointing
down
towards
the edge
of the bell
No
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Rack Tom Medium sized
dynamic mic, with
a diaphragm
smaller than a kick
mics but bigger
than an SM57s
Place at
the edge
of the
tom
pointing
towards
the centre of the skin
No
Floor Tom Medium sized
dynamic mic, with
a diaphragm
smaller than a kick
mics but bigger
than an SM57s
Place at
the edge
of the
tom
pointing
towards
the centre of the skin
No
Drum Overheads 2xinstrument
condenser
microphones
There are two main
configurations for placing
overhead mics.
1) Stereo Pair: both
equidistant from a
specific point of the drum
kit
i.e.
the
snare drum, producing an
overall narrow sound
2) Coincident pair: position
the two microphones in a
V
shape pointing away from
each other
Remember to pan overhead Left
to the right and overhead Right
to the left
Yes
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Vocal Studio vocal
condenser mic
such as a Rode
NT1A
Set up
with a pop
shield and
position
about an
inch away
from the vocalists mouth
Yes
Guitar Electric) SM57
Acoustic) Studio
Vocal condenser
mic
Electric) Position about half an
inch
from
the
edge of
the
guitaramplifiers speaker cone
Acoustic)position facing the
centre of the neck of the guitar
for a sound rich in high
frequencies, position facing the
bottom of the neck of the guitar
for a sound equally balanced
withbass,
middle and high frequencies and
position facing the centre of the
body of the guitar for a sound
bass frequencies
No
Yes
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Recording a Drum Kit
Often a band or artist will rely on their drummer to get them through a track; therefore you
need to get them recorded first and well. For a successful and good sounding recording,
you will need: a dynamic microphone with a large diaphragm for the kick drum, two orthree dynamic microphones with medium sized diaphragms depending on how many tom
drums the kit has, three dynamic vocal microphones i.e SM58/7, two condenser instrument
microphones, sufficient mic stands and sufficient XLR cables.
Kick Drum Dynamic mic with
a large diaphragm,
these are usually
fairly bulkymicrophones
Place facing into the hole in the
front
skin of a
kickdrum
capturing both the attack on the
first skin and the resonance of
the second
No
Snare Drum 2xShure
SM57/SM58,
dynamic mic, often
used for live vocals
1st
Mic) Place at the edge of the
snare pointing towards the
centre of the skin
2nd
Mic) Place directly under the
centre of the drum, about an
inch
away from the snare
Remember to reverse the
bottom mics phase, because
the two snare mics are facing
each other, the diaphragms
pulse the same way, losing
clarity in the sound
No
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Hi-Hat SM57/SM58,
dynamic mic
Place
pointing
down
towards
the edge
of the bell
No
Rack Tom Medium sized
dynamic mic, with
a diaphragm
smaller than a kick
mics but bigger
than an SM57s
Place at
the edge
of the
tom
pointing
towards
the centre of the skin
No
Floor Tom Medium sizeddynamic mic, with
a diaphragm
smaller than a kick
mics but bigger
than an SM57s
Place atthe edge
of the
tom
pointing
towards
the centre of the skin
No
Drum Overheads 2xinstrument
condenser
microphones
There are two main
configurations for placing
overhead mics.1) Stereo Pair: both
equidistant from a
specific point of the drum
kit
i.e.
the
snare drum, producing an
overall narrow sound
2) Coincident pair: position
the two microphones in a
V
Yes
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shape pointing away from
each other
Remember to pan overhead
Left to the right and
overhead Right to the left
Your final layout should look a bit like this: