AP has just been on a 4000-mile road trip. He took his “road Rig” with him for sessions as they cam up.
He recorded samples and too photos (see below). o this week we dissect the setup ad analyse the results.
All you need to know to set up your own travelling voice-over booth is revealed in this episode..
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this is the pro audio suite podcast
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quick bytes welcome to another pro audio
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suite quick byte this week we’re talking
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about working on the road and I
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mentioned this a couple of weeks ago
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that I kept a file from working on the
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road and then one that I did back in the
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studio here so we can compare the two so
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without further ado Bravo’s gonna press
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the play button this is the bite-sized
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business breakfast exclusively on do by
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I 103 8 comm get caught up on the
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business headlines with the bite-sized
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business breakfast just the highlights
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this is the bite-size business breakfast
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this is the bite-sized business
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breakfast exclusively on do by I 103 8
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comm get caught up on the business
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headlines with the bite-sized business
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breakfast catch up on the business
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headlines with the bite-sized business
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breakfast so there you go you can
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probably hear a bit of room noise in the
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second one more reverb than anything
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else but what do you guys think I mean
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is that kind of manageable what you were
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hearing for me I could use that
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absolutely but I’ll alter I’ll divert to
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the the man who really knows his stuff
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George well here’s the thing
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everything comes down to context and how
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it’s going to be used so clearly if this
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was you know if Andrew had recorded a
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job and then he was on the road and the
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client said hey we need you to record
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some Corrections so we need to pick up
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this line this line this line and then
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swear that back in because it’s gonna be
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used as a corporate narration video
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corporate you know video blah blah blah
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in that context probably wouldn’t fly
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you know they because if you hear the
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two tracks in a vacuum
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you know without a mix without
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production and music and everything
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certainly when they’re sold out like
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that you definitely hear the difference
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as you guys get here it’s the thing it’s
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all about the context and if it if that
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file was dropped into a Pro Tools
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session with music and effects and sound
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on tape whatever is on that
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and you know going through some
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processing that reverb tail you hear
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that liveliness from the room would just
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kind of get swallowed up
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it just wouldn’t you just wouldn’t hear
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it and so really the end of the day
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reverb like a little bit of liveliness
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from the room is actually the you know
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easiest thing to deal with for the
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production it’s not gonna be so
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noticeable in most cases what is a
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problem to deal with is when the sound
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of the microphone is being colored
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somehow and how it’s colored means
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basically or what colors the sound of
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the mic and your voice is what the mic
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is you know in close proximity to that’s
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the biggest problem so so in your case
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Andrew you’re using what are you using
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for your setup well that was interesting
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I did something completely different for
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this trip and I used an NT one rode nt1
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large diaphragm condenser mic I used the
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road AI one and I used a and I can’t
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even think it’s like a you know the
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normal SC kind of you know mudguard
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thing or whatever you want to call it
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that was a reduction filter type thing
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yeah I know Mike yeah he’s one of those
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but I also had the port of booth Pro
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with me so I grabbed the top of the
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porter booth Pro and stuck it on the top
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of the the the thing I was using so I
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should get the name of so I stuck that
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on the top just to stop any sound coming
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in from overhead off the ceiling yeah
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and then I would get like a running
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board
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pull it up behind me and hang like a
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quilt or whatever you want to call it
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dinner or do they over the ironing board
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behind me so anything coming in from
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behind was hopefully stopped by that and
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that was how I worked but these were
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like really open lively rooms so I mean
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there was nothing in there was just
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drywall lucky if I heard there’s carpet
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on the floor but drywall and drywall
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ceiling so pretty lively rooms so I
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thought it was it to me working on
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headphones while I was away it didn’t
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sound
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I couldn’t hear necessarily the
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reflection that much
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I must admit when I got back and put
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that file together we just heard then it
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was like oh it was pretty obvious but
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one of the clients I did a session with
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as I mentioned before the show I sent it
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to him but he just loaded it straight in
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it the processing before he started
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editing and he couldn’t tell the
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difference
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so that fascinating it’s all in the ear
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of the production and the beholder like
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in that context it just whatever
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deficiencies were in the audio just
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disappeared
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yeah they’re just lost in the mix so so
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what kind of so the genre of what you’re
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doing here this is a for commercial it’s
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for radio is it promo what is this the
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stuff I do when I’m on the road he’s
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always and I’ll tell you another thing I
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did as well which I’ll go into an attic
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but mostly it’s it was radio promos and
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imaging yeah that was the one half of
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the work I was doing while I was away
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there were a couple of commercials I did
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and and the the other part was the
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sessions for run the TV network out of
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Singapore and when it came to those guys
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I know they don’t do anything they don’t
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do any processing necessarily when I
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send them files so that for me is an
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issue so what I did was I also have a a
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waves plug-in a ships 73 which is that
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is 10 73 and I didn’t use the EQ at all
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all I used was the preamp and for some
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reason I don’t know I don’t know how
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this worked but I’ll go through when I
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do the Edit I’ll get rid of the peaks
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normalized to minus 3 and then run it
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through the Shep 73 just the preamp not
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the EQ and I’ve played that back here
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and I tell you it’s pretty close and for
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some I don’t know what it was doing but
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it seemed to get rid of some of that
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light in this out of the room flip that
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one out yeah that’s sorry oh yeah I will
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say that the liveliness
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so so reverb so so you’ve got a couple
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different kinds of acoustical issues
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right one of them is what we call early
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early reflections that’s caused by the
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things that are close to the mic the
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tabletop the screen of your computer the
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window that’s right next to you the all
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those hard serve
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that are near the mic even surfaces that
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may not appear hard that are hard behind
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the layer of surface on the outside so
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like you would if you have foam over
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something else you’re still gonna get
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some of that reflection off that thing
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that is the early reflection that you
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can somewhat correct for with EQ that’s
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when you sort of get that mid-range boxy
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hollow sound you can maybe a little
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correct for that reverb is that is the
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now the sound has bounced off of
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multiple surfaces you know it’s bounced
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off this wall that wall that wall by the
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time it reaches its way back around the
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room and gets picked up by the mic
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that’s reverb and that is can be reduced
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or exacerbated based on the processing
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you’re using if you use compression and
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limiting that reverb will become more
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exaggerated so if Evandro if you had
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applied some like a two-to-one
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compressor at you know -15 threshold or
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something that reverb would have been
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become that would have become more
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obvious hmm clearly would have been made
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more obvious but if you use like an
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expander or a Knick or a noise gate type
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thing you can control the reverb time so
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when the reverb decays away the expander
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or the gate will close down and it will
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shorten the reverb time so you can
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actually control it to some degree with
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processing yeah and I’ve done that for
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some folks who are traveling where they
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just have to get a job done but they’re
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really worried about the sound of that
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room I’ll I’ll actually build them a
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processing chain to help correct for
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that and review or a rabo actually have
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you use any of those kinds of tricks to
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mitigate reverb time in a file or is
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that a very context of an issue you have
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to deal with yeah definitely nice to
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work on a program at a news program here
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similar to 60 minutes called Sunday
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night and I it started off as a real
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budget sort of program as opposed to the
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amount of money they splash on 60
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minutes and I don’t know what they were
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doing in terms of location sound but I
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would get location sound that was just
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terrible
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so on you know early we flirt with early
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reflections work
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smooth that out so early reflections
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were my worst nightmare
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and a regular occurrence and actually
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the gate and what’s the fact it’s gone
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out of my head so the gate and the c6
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multiband compressor slash expander
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became my best friend know and I would
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just become the gate more than anything
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would would sort of solve the situation
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and then the c6 just sort of whether you
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could be a bit more frequency specific
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you could sort of I sort of found she
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could almost push some of those later
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sounds out of the way like they actually
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discussion right down we’re sort of
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saved my ass on a couple of occasions
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wasn’t so much it was always the gate
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was the biggest one but some but yeah
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absolutely I haven’t had it since so
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that was probably like ten years ago and
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haven’t really seen it so much since but
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um yeah it’s it’s out there well I know
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like iZotope and waves both I’m pretty
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sure I know isotope does they have you
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know D reverb plugins and they’re
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designed to try to soak up that reverb
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that is killin and have you used any of
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those yeah well I’ve got the iZotope
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suite and I do use that now yeah
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occasionally on on pot in fact I’ve got
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I’ve got a guy who I do a podcast for
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who really doesn’t care about the sound
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of his podcast we connects like we
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connected the same way we connect for
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this show over source connect now he
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dials in yeah but um he leaves the door
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open so there’s birds chirping in the
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background and I don’t know what room is
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in but I can’t imagine there’s and
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anything if there’s much if anything on
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the walls and there’s certainly no
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carpet so it’s just a big echo a mess
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and it’s the mic button to his Mac or
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woof yeah the mic just plugs into his
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Mac and and he sends that down the line
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and and you know I just record it here
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and and then occasionally he’ll send me
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there recording other times he’ll forget
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so um maybe instead of reading the
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newspaper he’s actually doing the
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podcast for his morning constitutional
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I don’t know
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but anyway look at the end of the day
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iZotope saves my butt regularly with
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your podcast yes indeed they’re talking
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about on the on the road those stuff
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apart from plugins processing I did
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actually I’ve normally used the porta
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booth Pro from our on the Hogan and I
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think out of doing this exercise I’ve
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worked out how I can make the porta
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booth Pro work really really well and
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that’s pulling the mic out of the port
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of is Pro so it’s actually instead of
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kissing the edge it’s actually more out
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of the out of the booth would you reckon
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that will work George so in essence
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you’re using the booth is like a
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reflection filter yeah I like those ones
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that curve around behind the mic and
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yeah the the theory behind that is
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totally makes sense so so now the the
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mic isn’t in that chamber its outside
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the chamber yeah and you know try as you
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may whenever you create a chamber of any
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kind even if it’s made out of cloth
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vinyl plastic and foam and whatever it’s
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made out of it’s gonna have some
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character it’s gonna have a character
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it’s gonna have a sound I mean if it
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didn’t we wouldn’t be arguing about what
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pop screen sounds good yes all engineers
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will argue like well no I like this pop
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screen I like this pop screen or you got
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to take the windscreen off it changes
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the sound of the mic you know there’s so
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damn sensitive about every little thing
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well if you add anything around the
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microphone it’s gonna change the way
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that mic sounds so the less you can do
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of that the better and so that makes a
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lot of sense it’s like I said the porter
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booth pro has it’s got a chamber behind
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it and another thing you can do is get
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rid of the chamber and a good buddy of
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mine here in New Jersey in the in the US
12:52
no one goes by uncle Roy and he’s a
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voice-over producer and he’s been a
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producer for a heck of a long time
12:59
certainly knows his stuff he
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experimented with just stuffing things
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in the back of the booth like a teddy
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bear or some towels and he said it’s
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very effective it really if there’s any
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of a chamber sound to that container it
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kills it and ends up sounding a lot
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better so you know there are ways to
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make an improvement
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on what you’re already doing in fact if
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you ever taken a speaker apart take
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apart an old speaker a good quality
13:28
professional or you know high-end
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speaker it’s not usually an empty box
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it’s actually usually has somehow
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fiberfill or some white cottony stuff
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inside and that helps reduce resonance
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inside the box so it’s not all that
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different than I concept yeah yeah
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interesting so I think the key to this
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is experiment but try and learn from the
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professionals as well that was the pro
13:55
audio suite if you have any questions or
13:57
ideas for a show let us know via our
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Facebook the pro audio suite podcast
14:07
you
Don’t forget to like our facebook page and if you have a question of your own you’d like us to answer, post it there and we will answer it as best we can.
You’ll also find us on the web at theproaudiosuite.com
The Pro Audio Suite Podcast copyright George Whittam, Andrew Peters, Robert Marshall & Darren Robertson.
Products or companies we discuss are not paid endorsements. They are not sponsored by, nor do we have any professional or affiliate relationship of any kind with any of the companies or products highlighted in the show…. sadly! It’s just stuff we like, think is cool and may be of interest to you our listeners.
“When the going gets weird, the weird turn professional.”
― Hunter S Thompson
The team investigate the different options when it comes to monitoring in a home studio )or any environment for that matter. Why you may or may not need monitoring, and more importantly how much do you need to spend?
In this episode, Robert, Andrew, Robbo and George discuss the Pros and Cons of listing the gear you’re using.
Don’t forget to like our facebook page and if you have a question of your own you’d like us to answer, post it there and we will answer it as best we can.
You’ll also find us on the web at theproaudiosuite.com
The Pro Audio Suite Podcast copyright George Whittam, Andrew Peters, Robert Marshall & Darren Robertson.
Products or companies we discuss are not paid endorsements. They are not sponsored by, nor do we have any professional or affiliate relationship of any kind with any of the companies or products highlighted in the show…. sadly! It’s just stuff we like, think is cool and may be of interest to you our listeners.
“When the going gets weird, the weird turn professional.”
― Hunter S Thompson