Homebrewed Music

Most mic comparisons I find on the web use different performances for each mic. In my experience, most mics are lot more similar than most performances, so this tutorial shows how to reduce the outside variables in mic (and other electronic gear) comparisons.

In my last blog entry I described the process for merging audio and video recorded on two different devices, for instance, replacing the audio in a Flip Mino HD video with audio recorded on a Zoom H2. This is a very handy technique, and can give great audio quality in the final video, but sometimes [...]

I have a lot of fun with Flip Mino HD camcorder. I’ve already done a few music videos with it and in my opinion the audio is far behind the quality of the video. Of course, even with expensive video equipment, having the mic on the camera keeps it some distance from the subject. Having [...]

This post will reveal the identity of the comparison clips in the post comparing the M-Audio Profire and the Lynx and John Hardy recording chain. But before providing the answers, I’d like to pose a question. I (naively) expected that people would embrace an opportunity to do some controlled testing, using an easy but very [...]

This is probably about as close to a political post as I am likely to write. I think that listening “tests” that are not conducted as double blind side-by-side comparisons are just wishful thinking. We wish that human hearing were not so totally dominated by the vagaries of our brain/mind, but it is. We wish [...]

I record solo acoustic guitar almost exclusively, but a couple of months ago one of my buddies wanted to lay down a few tracks with vocal and `ukulele. And he wanted to sing and play at the same time. I remembered reading about an arrangement of figure 8 or bidirectional mics that gave maximum separation [...]

The Zoom H4n includes a Mid-Side decoder. I connected a pair of figure 8 mics to the H4n and compared Mid-Side recording to a Blumlein array.

The H4n has made quite a splash, with its terrific feature set and dramatic appearance. Brad Linder has posted some clips at his blog comparing the H4n to the Sony PCM-D50. He seems to think the Zoom is disappointing, but I’m not sure I’m hearing the same problems he describes. I got a long and [...]