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How do i make my acoustic sound proffessional?


Zeno Phobia

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Eq is a matter of taste.

It takes time to learn how mixes sound on different systems without checking them all.

This is an art. You don't distinguish yourself by copying others but you can hone your skills that way.

Play with presets and spend some time playing with the fx.

Try sharing a mix you think is garish and see if your friends agree or not.

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13 minutes ago, Gswitz said:

Eq is a matter of taste.

It takes time to learn how mixes sound on different systems without checking them all.

This is an art. You don't distinguish yourself by copying others but you can hone your skills that way.

Play with presets and spend some time playing with the fx.

Try sharing a mix you think is garish and see if your friends agree or not.

Compare plugins like Melda's Mcompare can help in trying to match a mix with a guitar in it you like. While I agree that EQ is a matter of taste, I think almost everyone would agree that mud is mud. Sort of like a sprinkle of salt is ok and subjective but if you dump the whole bottle on the food no one will like it. This is basically what you get with a small room picking up all of those standing mid bass reflections :) 

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I suppose my initial response of "You cant get a good sound with a 14 dollar microphone" is a bit unfair (it is however true, but unfair). I still stick by my previous comments, but for the aspiring musician who doesn't have a hundred bucks to drop on an entry level microphone, well.. I've been there. So I understand. The best thing you can do without spending more money is try to fudge it the best you can. This would be the practical thing to do.

- Hang some blankets to cut down on reflections.

- Point the mic more towards the sound hole and closer to the sound hole. The reason being, the BM800 lacks low frequency's.

- Experiment with pre amps (even a Mackie mixer via the interface) Just make certain to bypass your A.I. Pre.

- Boost some lows with EQ

 

After reading my fellow forum members comments, It made me understand that sometimes you have to get creative and work with what you have.

This is simply another great example of how this forum has made me a better person. Sometimes I forget what it was like starting out with one realistic microphone and a five string acoustic (missing the low E tuning peg). That was me as a 12 year old kid.

 

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1 hour ago, msmcleod said:

I've had great results using the Piezo pickup on my Crafter acoustic DI, then running it through a Taylor or Martin IR:

https://www.3sigmaaudio.com/items/category/acoustic-guitars/

 

Got to say I am impressed with these impulses, they sound amazing.

but it is just another great example of a marketing scheme to sell people a sound they will never likely attain. Some of the examples in the video were double tracked guitars playing two different parts, had quality FX and obviously a quality pre amp. The DI examples were purposely turned down in volume to add the "dramatic effect" of "Wow listen to how much better this sounds".

Totally agree with you about Piezo pick ups though, a great foundation can be laid using them. For all intent and purposes, sometimes that's all that's needed. I choose to blend piezo with mic'ed tracks.

Edited by chuckebaby
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  • 2 weeks later...

Although I have what I consider to be a decent quiver of mics for a home studio (Audio Technica, MXL, Sterling, Shure), every so often I like to set up something weird just to see what I can do with it.

The other night I recorded some acoustic guitar stereo mic'd using a tie clip lav of unknown provenance into the mic in on my Dell laptop for one channel and the laptop's built-in mic for the other. Once I pulled the room resonance out of it with proximity eq and put on MAutoAlign it started to sound like it could be usable as a background atmosphere track.

A BM800 is not a useless microphone for a beginner to start using and man I would have loved to have one 35 years ago.

The best thing to do when asking for help in improving tracks is to post an example track so that we can hear how your track sounds now. The BandLab site is a great way to host tracks for free for those of us on the forum to listen to.

I'm in agreement with the others who have suggested that from the photo, putting up some sound-deadening on your walls or going to a room with as few reflections as possible will probably make things easier.

With a Chinese medium diaphragm condenser, which I believe the BM800 is, I'd start out with the "address" side of the mic facing the 12th fret about 12" away. Record and see how it sounds. If it's too boomy, move it away, too thin, get closer.

Once recorded, use a para EQ to roll off the bass up to about 200Hz, and find the "honk" frequency and notch it down by about 5dB. Then add a bit of medium room reverb. Tezza's suggestions are excellent.

Trial and error, there's going to have to be some of that. YouTube viewing, some of that, too.

Post recording(s)!

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