Not all pieces of your recording chain are created equally.
If you wanna know where to focus your effort to get a better recording, watch till the end of this video to learn the 5 pieces to ensure you capture a great recording every single time.
If you’re looking to improve the sound of your recordings, the answer to your problem is likely on this list! That’s because in a home studio you have to make things work with what you have. It can be easy to blame the lack of tools or lack of space for a less than ideal sound.
So keep this list in mind before your next session and make sure you nail every piece before lamenting about the next.
1. The Performance
The most important
Ever heard the phrase Garbage in garbage out?
If your source input isn’t up your desired standard, all the gear at Abbey Road wouldn’t make a difference.
But the opposite is true as well. If you put gold in, you don’t have to do much at all. I know which method I recommend.
Write the part before you go to record, especially when you’re working with other people.
Do not waste their time by noodling in the studio or trying out a million different guitar solo ideas.
Do this before you come to the studio.
2. The Instrument
A great player can make even a beginner instrument sound great. Their expert technique and listening skills will help them get the best out of a budget instrument. further more an expert performer can usually setup their instrument to function in peak condition.
I’m a guitar player.
So I’m always thinking:
am I in tune?” it in tune?
is my instrument free of buzz, rattle Are your strings new?
Drummers, consider your skins. Are they fresh or at least in good condition? All these components are gonna make a difference in your output, and build towards a better recording.
Become familiar with what you have, especially if you only have a few tools to work with. Personally I’ve been learning more about how to setup a camera. In earlier videos I was just really excited to share the ideas in the video that my camera process was pretty point and shoot.
Sometimes the footage work turn out a little blurry or the autofocus would go wild or the lighting would be really over exposed. Now I’ve learned to work with the camera and learn all its ins and outs to make sure it was set up to do what I wanted before pressing record.
Recording Audio is the same process. If you really need a fender strat tone, with a saturated fuzz , get it on the way in on your amp or with pedals, don’t rely on adding a distortion plugin later.
Getting the desired sound at the source is going to produce a much better result.
Sit there with your amp and tune it in so the tone you’re hearing out of your speakers really does something for you.
Make sure it really really gets you excited, because that is going to inspire your performance, and make it much easier to capture a great recording.
3. The Room
Ok so Quality Instrument Good performance. That should be all ya need right?
If you’ve got the perfect tone dialled in, and you’re playing really well, and you’re STILL not getting a good recording?
(I feel for ya)
It might be that, the invisible force ruining all your recordings, is your Room.
The room you use the record in is the next big variable in your recording chain.
Your room acts like a container for your sound to exist in.
If you instead recorded in some sort of infinity room that had no walls, the sound you produce would continue off into the distance until losing energy.
A microphone placed in front of your instrument would capture 100% of the direct signal.
This can be simulated with an Anechoic chamber, a room that is used to calibrate the frequency response of microphones to ensure a more accurate measurement.
This type of room is used because the normal hard flat walls of a domestic living space reflect sound waves.
You can add these room reflections and reverb into a dry recording to mimic a different space, but you cannot remove reflections that have been recorded from a lively room. You instead have to remove the impression of the room from your recordings.
This can be done in combination with Acoustic Panels mounted to eliminate room refections from parallel walls.
Utilize close mic techniques to catch as much direct sound as possible.
You could also build a booth with panels or baffles in your recording space, and use mic stands in a T-pose with blankets/towels draped over to further isolate your recording space.
Now that you’ve got a great sound at the source, let’s talk about recording gear.
4. The Microphone
a microphone is similar to a camera in that it provides us with a perspective with which to capture a performance.
the position of the camera will greatly impact the perspective of the image it records.
A camera With a Wide FOV will capture the entire stage.
We can move closer to focus in on a specific area of the stage, highlighting a few key players, and omitting the rest.
If you get even closer, you could get an intimate view of the hands of one specific player.
Microphones offer us a similar way to play with perspective. You can use a flashlight in a dark room to simulate this. Consider what the microphone, or the flashlight can ‘see’ from it’s position.
What gets lit up?
Is the microphone pointing at your living room? Your amplifier? The left speaker of your amplifier? A tiny marking in the middle of your amp’s left speaker ?
The closer your mic is to the source, the more direct sound you’ll record. That’s the sound coming directly from the speaker that hasn’t yet bounced off the walls of your studio. And don’t worry, you’ve already used all the tricks from step 3 to deal with those reflections you should be getting much less reflected sound in your recordings.
This allows you to do 2 things:
Move your Microphones further away from the source (where applicable)
This will record more of the room sound, the extra distance creates a truer listening position.
(Because when was the last time you had your ear directly next to a speaker cabinet?) avoid this.
Frequencies develop at different rates, depending on their length. This means lower frequencies take longer to reach full intensity than higher frequencies.
This means a mic placed directly in front of a speaker cabinet is going to capture a more biased impression, based on how the sound has developed up to that point.
Whereas a microphone further away from the source will capture a more even balance of frequencies because they have had more time to develop to full intensity. In this position however, the risk for unwanted early reflections is much greater. It’s also really difficult if not impossible to get rid of these reflections in post. Which is why room treatment is so important so you can record a dry signal, and add a room that works in the mix later on.
In Practice, it’s common to want to remove as much of the room as possible. Which suggests close micing is the answer, especially in live sound where feedback from the room is your biggest enemy,
Use Condensor Microphones
When compared to Dynamic microphones, Condensers feature a wider frequency response which allows you to record a fuller, more detailed sound with more content to adjust with EQ.
This is also in part because they are more sensitive and pickup more of the room – another reason why acoustic treatment is necessary.
If you’d like to learn more about digital recording basics and how to choose the right microphone for the job, download my book:
►How to Record Anything with Clarity and Character
5. The Preamp/Recording Interface
I could make a whole video on choosing the right audio interface (let me know in the comments if that interests you!)
The most important things to consider when choosing an interface are
first and foremost:
Preamp Quality – low noise, high gain, transparent
Most of today’s audio interfaces will offer more than enough gain for your recordings and
As shown in this video you won’t need a cloud lifter if you have a quality interface- link video
Preamp Quantity – more mics you can use at once = more detail in your recordings – the more performers you can record.
ADC – Connection Type/speed – what works best for your computer (future proof) (Thunderbolt was a thing)
Headphone Amp Output – a higher output will allow you to use high impedance open back headphones like these 300ohm Sennheiser 6xx
offer wonderful 3D sound for mixing.
Total Harmonic Distortion + Noise
Total Harmonic Distortion +Noise is the measure of distortion and noise present in a signal. This is measured by looking at what’s left after the wanted signal is filtered out.
Usually by adding a 1kHz sine wave generator and then filtering it out with a notch filter, thereby revealing the harmonic distortion and noise present in the system.
It is usually expressed as a percentage of the wanted signal. like .1%
Some interfaces also come with Bonus Features, like the ability to buy more analog modelled plugins from the the same company. and once your foot is in the door, your might as well complete the set right? Personally, this doesn’t interest me. But it might be of interest to you, so something to keep in mind.
Behind all the frills, A great recording consists of a great PERFORMANCE, on a quality INSTRUMENT, in a Treated ROOM, with the right MICROPHONE technique, using a quality PREAMP/Audio Interface.
No one in your audience is gonna care if you used an API, NEVE, or Behringer preamp, as long as it’s low noise and gets the job done.
Different microphones types offer a larger sonic fingerprint, the difference between using a SM58 on your voice and a big expensive condenser mic is a much a larger difference. Both can work in the right situation, but I’d bet that with the condenser, you’ll pickup more of the room.
That’s why having some acoustic treatment in your recording and listening space will help you create better recordings, and more importantly give you a more accurate perspective on the sound you’re recording to ensure you’ve got the tone dialed in on your instrument.
You don’t need an expensive custom instrument to make a great recording, but you do need something that is set up with good tuning, intonation, and as free of un wanted noise as possible. This is because it is very difficult to go in and edit something that doesn’t work, when you should have got the right performance to begin with.
So besides keeping your chops up, work out your ideas before the recording session, or get really good at improvising, because ultimately it’s your performance that’s going to determine the success of your project.
