II. The Edit // JAN 18th

I hope you had an intensive first week of recording behind you, collecting different versions and takes of your very own playing in the workspace of our DAW!

After this live stream, you should be able to edit your recordings, thus creating a master take that inhabits the very best parts from all of your takes ✂!

Please use this thread if you have any questions concerning the workbook or general questions concerning The Edit!


Click here to access Session 2: The Edit // Jan 18th (Live!)

Find the other sessions here: Part 1 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5



Download the second workbook here


I will post the answers to the questionnaire on Jan 24th! 

After the live stream, submit your assignments by replying to this thread!


Answers to this week's questionnaire:

 

1. Why do we group tracks?

We group tracks for two main reasons:

  • When we record several tracks in mono to achieve a stereo sound  (using one mic source per channel), we need to be able to quickly apply all the main editing techniques two both of the stereo channels at the same time. This will save in the editing process.
  • Left and Right channel need to stay in their correct phase correlation. When L and R get "out of phase" several problems will occur: First, the track will sound weirdly shifted, as sound is coming into your ear from one side and out of your ear from the other side. Second, when summing in mono, your sound will become thin as due tue the phase shift frequencies might cancel each other out, resulting in a thin timbre.

2. Why should you make an edit plan?

We make an edit plan with our score to ensure maximum efficiency during editing, making the execution of the edit just a technical task. When you need to listen back to your whole take, deciding which measure to take from which recording, you are slowing down your editing process and will do edits simply because you can, not because you want to.

 

3. If you delete an item from your DAW, what happens to it?

Nothing, as the items in the DAW are just references to files on your hard drive. There is only one exception: Right after you stopped recording a take, Reaper will ask you whether to keep this recording or not. This is the only place where you can permanently delete a track from your hard drive.


Here is a link for a step by step instruction of how to implement 4-Point-Editing into Reaper, a workflow commonly used for classical music production but usually only to be found in dedicated DAWs like Sequoia or Pyramix.

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  • Here is my recording; two Neumann KM 184's 20 cm. apart. Suggestions?

    • david robinson fantastic! Wish I could get that sound 

      Like 2
    • David Chidsey Thanks much!

      Like 2
      • martinTeam
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      • martin.3
      • 3 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      david robinson  Awesome! Love it! And what a fascinating piece! The position in which you are playing or at where the mics are placed is accentuating a certain "boxiness" in your sound, which causes the sound to get a little nasal. This could happen when odd numbered harmonics are overly present in the recording
      Since the lower E-string is around 82Hz, I suspect that you have high energy frequencies present at around 250-300Hz which causes that boxiness. You could try to fix that with the "ReaEQ" and cut something around 2-4db in this area! 

      However, the sound seems to be Mono (in fact, the waveforms look exactly the same), have you adjusted the pan knobs in your mixer to the left and right since you have recorded with two microphones ?The boxiness could result from summing together the two signals to Mono, which causes frequencies to cancel each other out.

       

       

      Furthermore, since the pitch of the first notes is quite low at the beginning, I suspect that the timbre can be also caused by the distance of the mics as well (lower frequencies have longer wave lengths, thus the microphones need a little bit more distance in order to create spaciousness). I'd recommend try another position in your room and space the mics a little further apart (or try an ORTF or XY Position) and examine if you adjusted the pan knobs!

      If you recorded two mono channels, the mixer should like something like this:

       

       

      Thank you for sharing your recording with us, these are very insightful and help all of the other members as well to improve their home recording game! Thank you, keep going, this is awesome! 🧙‍♂️💪

      Like 3
      • martinTeam
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      • martin.3
      • 3 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      david robinson I ran your recording through a spectral analyzer, to verify what I was saying, let me share that with you:

       

      The lowest line is your base frequency at 82Hz, the low E-string. The lines above are harmonics, multiples of your base frequency. As you can see, the highest energy is concentrated in the third harmonic (being the base frequency the first harmonic), causing that sound. 

      Every instrument has its own sonic signature, the clarinet for example is classified as having strong odd numbered harmonics in the lower registers, while the higher pitches almost sound like a sine wave. 

       

      To have your guitar sound more full and spacious, you would want to find a way to accent even numbered harmonics. Usually this can be solved by your playing position and mic placement! 🧙‍♂️🤓

      Like 3
    • martin Thanks much for your in-depth analysis of my piece. I have taken your suggestions and moved mics  back 6 inches, and panned left and right. Your thoughts?

      • MirceaTeam
      • Head of Guitar
      • Mircea
      • 3 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      david robinson Wow, on top of everything else already said, just taking a moment to appreciate Martin's incredible depth of knowledge, thoroughness, and helpfulness on this. (Can I get a big round of applause?! 👏😀) Thank you so much for providing such valuable insights throughout these threads!!!

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      • martinTeam
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      • martin.3
      • 3 yrs ago
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      david robinson Dear David, this is a very big improvement, I like it very much! Now I get the feeling of a realistic sound stage and a natural envelopment of the room acoustics (though it sounds like a small room). This recording can surely be more elevated by the post production tools we will look at in the next lessons. Furthermore, this recording gives  us a faithful recreation of your wonderful performance of and for you a valuable insight into your interpretation!

       

      Mircea I cannot help but to go into full nerd mode with these awesome submissions 🤓🧙‍♂️

      Like 3
    • Mircea I totally agree! Martin's enthusiasm for the subject is contagious. I have also learned much from his wonderful Villa lobos Etude 3 instruction. He and all the Tonebase instructors are top notch.     

      Like 2
    • david robinson Really excellent recording!  Beautifully played and recorded!

      Like 2
    • Rick Ankney Thank you!

      Like 1
    • Olli
    • Mr. Pizza
    • Saitenzwirbler
    • 3 yrs ago
    • Reported - view

    Dear Martin,

    here is my attempt in recording with Reaper.

    I used a pair of Rode NT5 together with the focusrite Safire 6 USB.

    The capsules are positioned in 110 degree angel and 35cm away from each other.

    The mics are approximately mounted in the hight of my shoulders ( maybe to eliminate some nails clicking ...).

    The distance between Guitar and mics is approximately 40-50 cm.

    Guitar is spruce/palisander

    Strings approximately 4 weeks mounted

     

    For my ears, the sound is:

    - not loud enough ( more gain on focusrite while recording ? )

    - not bright, dull ( dumpf )

    - some frequencies are much too loud and ( wummern, dröhnen ) thump ...

     

    A really was not sure how to mix the tracks together. I made the balance in track 1 left, in track 2 right, marked both tracks and rendered using the highest mp3 resolution ( 320 ).

     

    Do you have some ideas and tricks how to get a bright, nice sound.

     

    Thanks a lot 🎸🎶

    Best Regards

    Olli

      • martinTeam
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      • martin.3
      • 3 yrs ago
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      Olli thank you so much for that submission! Your remarks of your own recording show a very reflected view of your work, which is ultimately what we are striving for: Having a sound ideal in our head, listening back to what we just recorded, use the correct tools and techniques to achieve what we want to hear. You already almost went full circle on what I would call the "Correction Loop".

       

      1) You are right, your sound is maybe a little bit too soft, but overall this is not the biggest concerns as nowadays preamps, ad/da converter and 24bit-recording are of such high quality that a couple of db's here and there won't add up to what we would call the Noise Floor. In fact, after analyzing your recording, your peaks are at around -14db and -16, which is absolutely usable and within the margin of a soundcheck. I would tell the musician in a recording situation to give me a little bit more dynamic and emotion, that way I would probably get the dynamic range I would want! But overall, you're in a good spot concerning your levels!

       

       

      2) The sound of your recording is in fact a but focused in the lower mid-range. While we have some sparks in the high-end here and there, we are missing a certain airiness of your recording. This can be "faked" by adding a lush reverb, but ultimately doesn't change what is in the recording. One possibility that isn't used very often in classical music is the application of a saturation. This will add high frequency harmonics through mild distortion, but to be honest, I would first try to fix this problem with microphone and musician placement,

      Reading through your description of your setup, I wonder about the big distance of your recording setup. The angle tells me that you wanted to aim for a ORTF-Stereo-Setup, but you doubled the distance from 17,5cm to 35cm. As the ORTF-setup is in fact already designed for larger ensemble, you might get an attenuation in 0° degree line when you turn your mics away and increase the distance between the microphones. Remember that cardioid mics will have lower levels off-axis, especially in the higher frequencies. Knowing that, I recommend to narrow your mic distance. Here's a wonderful overview of different mic setups by DPA:

      https://www.dpamicrophones.com/mic-university/stereo-recording-techniques-and-setups

       


      By the way, nerd alert: DPA makes great microphones, the 4006 which are in fact GREAT for classical music recording, especially for choirs, organs, strings ... actually everything. Two of those microphones are on board the mars rover Perseverance, which is supposed to land on February 19th: https://www.dpamicrophones.com/mars-rover

      This will be the first true acoustic recording of entering another atmosphere! I marked that date in my calender, this is going to be awesome, cannot wait for the recordings. (all the other recordings we have from mars are just mathematical constructs of vibrations which got picked up by on-board sensors, having two microphones on board is something very different. The coolest thing is: the microphones have not been altered for entry into mars atmosphere, these are the same microphones I've already used for recording).


       

      3) I would suspect that working on your mics will also improve the frequency pick-up pattern and thus improve the balance of your sound! Since lower frequencies are longer in wavelength, cardioid microphones are actually omnidirectional for very low frequencies. So fixing your mic setup will improve the sonic imbalance for the better. 

      Another point to be aware of are room modes of untreated rooms. In lower frequencies, we tend to have several points within a room (and especially in the corners), where some frequencies are boosted by up to 6db (which is double the volume). Trying different spots in your room (moving around 50-100cm will already alter the sound) and you will hear a difference!

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_modes

      Like 2
      • Olli
      • Mr. Pizza
      • Saitenzwirbler
      • 3 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      martin thank you so much for your advice.

      I‘ll try to improve the recording-setup/technology and do a new Recording of „Air on G-String“ ( Luft auf der G-Saite ).

      Changes:

      - new Strings

      - ORTF with 17,5cm (instead of 35)

      - Microphone height on Guitar-Soundhole height

      - a little bit more preamplification

       

      Best Regards

      Olli

      Like 2
      • Olli
      • Mr. Pizza
      • Saitenzwirbler
      • 3 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      martin the newer version....

      • Olli
      • Mr. Pizza
      • Saitenzwirbler
      • 3 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      martin here i tried a "ribbon" Microphone. I bought this years ago - had the idea to maybe make a recording with vintage equipment. 

      It´s mounted approximately 30 cm in front of the guitar.

      Are those kind of microphones still used today in recording classical guitar ?

       

      I also have a question: you said, we should make 3-4 recordings in preparation to the upcoming part 2 workshop ( to have enough material to fix some issues on a recording ).

      What about the tempo and articulation of the piece ? We can´t use a metronome ( i made this in "Luft auf G-Saite" ) ... there is no place to breath." Is it possible to fix a recording with parts from recording 2,3,4 etc. if the are not played in 100% same speed, volume and articulation ?

      Sorry for that strange question. I am so depressed when doing a recording . Often everything goes fine at he beginning and then, after playing near to the end of the piece, i play "bad" ... and the whole recording is "thrash".

      The more tries i risk, the more thrash will happen. For that reason i stopped doing recordings for a very long time...

      Best Regards 🎙️

    • Olli Sounds fabulous!

      Like 2
      • Olli
      • Mr. Pizza
      • Saitenzwirbler
      • 3 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      Rick Ankney thank you - I think it needs improvement ....?!

      Like 1
      • martinTeam
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      • martin.3
      • 3 yrs ago
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      Olli Hi Olli, it sounds wonderful, I love the sound of a ribbon mic, which one is it exactly? 

      It's just a tiny bit too heavy in the fundamental bass frequency for my taste, I don't know where you put your mic, but I suspect it was close to the sound hole. Try place it a little bit more off-axis or apply a soft high-pass filter of 6db/octave 

      And please, PLEASE, try to make an MS-Recording with that wonderful mic, I'm sure the ribbon will provide a nice airiness for the side signal I'm sure it will sound very unique! Just use the NT-5 as your middle mic and route your ribbon on two channels, pan them L and R and phase invert the right channel! 

       

      Edit: And I like the second version as well, very much actually! It has much more to offer in the high end, but is an overall balanced recording! The phantom image is somewhat blurry, but this can also come from my headphones (as I said, I did a DIY recording on them, haha).

      Like 1
      • Olli
      • Mr. Pizza
      • Saitenzwirbler
      • 3 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      martin Hi Martin, your advises are so helpful - thank you very much. I takes me very much time to watch through the whole stream and also repeat the things you are showing. But it´s great. Today i spend much time on comparising different Micros and their Sound.

      Your advice with ORTF, using the Rode NT-5, are sounding very cold and bright to my ears. I played the introduction of " Nothing else matters -first bar" with the right hand and simultaneous tried different spots and distances focussing one NT-5 on the guitar top withe the left hand. Everything sounds not fine to my ears. After that i put the T-Bone Sc450 (big membrane micro cardoid) 1,5m away from the guitar and the Ribbon-Microphone (Phonemic RM-1) in front of the guitar ( the way you showed in Part 2 on Monday with the Sennheiser C414), it sounds fine to my ears... It was a little tricky, because the focus rite has two channels and only one button to switch on/off the phantom Power. For the condenser i put an additional Phantom-Power-Supply between the Mic and the Converter...I don`t want to kill the holy Ribbon... So, this is just the beginning of the journey through the recording sessions. 

      Here is a short sound comparison between two Microphone-Settings...

      For my ears it´s fine..maybe there could be some less clicky trebles.

      But with this setup/sound I will try to make my recordings for the workshop.

       

      Best Regards

      Olli

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      • Olli
      • Mr. Pizza
      • Saitenzwirbler
      • 3 yrs ago
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      Olli left mp3 is Condenser only - right recording is condenser + Ribbon

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      • martin.3
      • 3 yrs ago
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      Olli Hi Olli! Playing the introduction of "Nothing else matters" with a cold sound does seem to be a good fit, doesn't it? 🤘 But you are right, the ORTF will sound dramatically different in different spots, rooms, with different mics etc., it needs a lot of care considering placement, since it was designed to not accentuate any frequency ranges!

      I really like the combined sound of the RM-1 and the large diaphragm, is it with the MS-Setup and the correct routing in Reaper? It does sound a little "phasey" so maybe you can turn the side channels down a tiny bit! But very interesting workaround with the additional power supply to save your precious ribbon mic!

      Like 1
  • Hi Martin, the first recording with an Oktava MK 012-01 at 30 centimeters from the bridge, with the AKG p120 at one meter will be the 12 fret.

    The second recording with the Zoom H4n at 40 centimeters from the hole.
    What parameters to improve them EQ and Reverb

      • martinTeam
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      • martin.3
      • 3 yrs ago
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      Giuseppe Gasparini Hi Giuseppe, thank you for your submission of this wonderful piece!  

       

      The first recording has a very mid-range quality of sound. I think this is coming from the microphone  which is pointed at the twelvth fret. If we don't like the sound of a certain microphone, we should not be afraid to not use it, if it doesn't benefit the overall sound!

      But to help you with your first recording: I would apply a EQ which looks approx. like this

       

      No.1 is for getting rid of some low-end rumble which was present in your recording.

      No2. is for adding a little bit more body to your sound.

      No3. is to get rid of the boxiness of the mic at 12th fret.

       

      Overall, I prefer the sound of the second recording, as it sounds more natural (you could here in the first recording that the microphones where recording totally different parts of the guitar). But the sound is very heavy in the low frequencies, probably because of the position of the zoom. I would recommend to point the Zoom a little bit more to the right, so it doesn't get all the low frequencies from the sound hole!

       

      This is what I would apply to the second recording:

       

      Although we will talk about reverb and all the other signal processors in-depth in the third lesson, this is what I would apply as a reverb:

       

      Especially look at the EQ I applied to the reverb and ask yourself: how does a Reverb naturally sound! :) 

       

      Additionally, you were very loud in the second recording, try to adjust the Rec Level on the side of your device accordingly, so that your peaks land between -12db and -6db!

       

      Thank you so much for your submissions! 🧙‍♂️

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