Hey guys, question for ya. I've been listening to a lot of different types of music and have been trying to focus especially on the cymbals and I have noticed that a lot of them seem to fade out rather quickly compared to anykind of sound I seem to be able to get. Is there something they put on the cymbal to get it to fade that quickly? Or is it just in all those cases they use the same types of cymbals which naturally have a quick fade. Thanks in advance for the help!
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Bob Seifert, SEIT
LiveSine Productions
Drummer of 3up3down

Hot sure what you're talking about. How close do you out the mics to your cymbals?

Try using a noise gate.

I THINK I know what you mean, you strike the cymbol and the sound gets recorded for what seems like a long time..

RhoneRanger wrote:

Try using a noise gate. I THINK I know what you mean, you strike the cymbol and the sound gets recorded for what seems like a long time..

Yes Rhone is spot on here, you use a noise gate with a very quick decay time, so the gate closed rapidly once the signal is below the threshold.

Also you can actually perfom a fade-out on each waveform in a DAW if you wanted to get into the fine detail.
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Recording Studio Suntans

This is probably a stupid question, but is a gate hardware or software? Can you put gates on a specific microphone in the software or do you need hardware for that? Thanks guys, you have given me a lot of good feedback since I've started up my studio, I've been doing a lot of experimenting and it's really awesome to have a resource like this. Thanks again guys.
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Bob Seifert, SEIT
LiveSine Productions
Drummer of 3up3down

CrimsonDrummer wrote:

This is probably a stupid question, but is a gate hardware or software? Can you put gates on a specific microphone in the software or do you need hardware for that? Thanks guys, you have given me a lot of good feedback since I've started up my studio, I've been doing a lot of experimenting and it's really awesome to have a resource like this. Thanks again guys.

A gate can be both, as can all processors these days, the software version are simply digital emulations of hardware, usually anyway.

Yes you can insert a software/hardware gate on any channel, group of channels or main mix.
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Recording Studio Suntans

Thanks AC, what do you usually use for a threshold on overheads for drums? I have the condensers about 4 feet above the cymbals. I'm just looking for a place to start in terms of threshold. Thanks again.
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Bob Seifert, SEIT
LiveSine Productions
Drummer of 3up3down

CrimsonDrummer wrote:

Thanks AC, what do you usually use for a threshold on overheads for drums? I have the condensers about 4 feet above the cymbals. I'm just looking for a place to start in terms of threshold. Thanks again.

It doesn't work like that, settings have no meaning as they are completely dependant on the particular situation, how hard the cymbals are hit, how much gain on the mic, how loud the cymbals are.. impossible to speak of settings in terms of numbers.

So you simply use a trial and error method and tweak until you like

Basically you want all of the cymbal signal affected though, then set the release to the timing of the track.
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Recording Studio Suntans

If I were looking to get a decent 8 channel gate/compressor, what would you recommend? Or maybe a pair of 4 channel gate/compressor modules. I've looked a little online and it seems like you have either low-end (Behringer) or high-end (PreSonus) and not really anything in the middle. I was looking at possibly getting two Behringer units to start off with, but if they are not going to clean up my sound at all, we should just wait and spend the money on a PreSonus. Let me know what you guys think.

Behringer link: http://www.guitarcenter.com/shop/product/buy_behringer_multigate_pro_xr4400_quad_expandergate?full_sku=182439

Thanks for the help guys..
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Bob Seifert, SEIT
LiveSine Productions
Drummer of 3up3down

Look at www.sweetwater.com and search around for Noise Gate. The dbx 1074 IMO is a solid piece of mid-range equipment. I would listen to the Behringer first, because I have had a lot of problems with the gate of the Behringer hissing and fluttering at the threshold settings. If you have Cubase, or Protools, their software gates are pretty decent too. Good luck!

Thanks for the advice, we were considering buying a plug-in package for ProTools (M-Powered doesn't have built in gates ) but then we thought it might be better to just get hardware gates. I will look into the dbx gates, but money is real tight right now so we'll have to see. Again, thanks for the advice!
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Bob Seifert, SEIT
LiveSine Productions
Drummer of 3up3down

I've been using the Behringer quad gates on kits and have had good success with them.
I've used AT Pro37's or near miking and sometimes even 2 AKG414's for higher overall miking.
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Scott McKinney
Solid Sound Entertainment Services
Loveland, CO.
www.solidsoundentertainment.com

Found out that M-Powered has built in gates, but what actually worked a whole lot better is squashing the crap out of the overheads with quite a bit of compression (I kind of know how to use it now after searching the internet for a place to start). I was originally going to use moongels on the cymbals, but it took too much away from the attack. Compression is my friend !!!!!!
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Bob Seifert, SEIT
LiveSine Productions
Drummer of 3up3down

Good you found a point,

Yes, compression can be your friend, but it can also be your worst enemy. I tend to not compress a lot on the recording chain, cause once you mess it up, you cant undo it.

I actually only have it in as an insert right now, once I start mixing I will actually create a backup so I have the original recordings, then I can do whatever I want to a track and just restore it from the backups The nice thing about having 800 gig worth of HD space in the PC (split between 4 HD's).
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Bob Seifert, SEIT
LiveSine Productions
Drummer of 3up3down