Adveser wrote:
This one's for the fellow singers, producers and other kinds of people that capture sound. I recently mentioned the idea that I wanted to try to make multiple dynamic mics viable for voice recordings. I think I have a good idea about how to do this.
I'm not the first to figure this out because it is too simple to do.
Okay, so you have your microphone and do not like it's tone. Your voice is a little too low or high and the model you have does not sit well in the mix. Go ahead and take the screen off of it. Below the diaphragm, on the side, you will see a number of box shaped openings. These are tuning ports. They are covered with a breathable adhesive material. DO NOT TAKE THIS OFF. If you do so, the mic is finished and will never work properly again because a lot of times the ultra-thin wire leads to the diaphragmare sitting in a small gap right behind it. The super tiny PCB board that goes to the XLR jack is possibly being held in place by the tape too.
Say you want a warmer sound? take the thinnest needle you can find and gently rock it until you poke a very small hole in this porous paper. You must do this on equal 180 degree turns. I put three holes in each of the four slots in my mic and I am getting warmth that tube amps dream of. I suggest stuffing extra foam in the grill because a deep voice will cause mechanical resonance to the point that you can hear the offending note playback through the microphone. Eventually that is going to overheat if you do nothing about it, so be cautious and adjust slowly. I'm actually now able to capture (my) voice producing one half of a Hz, 1Hz wave forms and up to C(-2). I've been dicking around and having a blast. Range is up to 15 octaves now at the very least! Insane! If you slowly nudge the lowest part of your voice and keep the path to your resonances free and clear and keep very steady pressure it is not all that hard to do this. A 1Hz vocal note sounds like a heartbeat and you can feel the waveform gently open and close your lips as very quiet pop sound comes out. The recording sounds like the mother of all storms from hell though once boosted.
You want faster Bass? Tighter and sharper snare hits? a more focused sound, do this, AT THE COST OF FREQUENCY RESPONSE RANGE. Take a small piece of electrical tape and cover one of the tuning ports. Now gently, using any sort of small tool that willgive a consistent shape, such as a 1/4" stereo/balanced input jack begin pushing the tape inwards. You want to do it again on it's 180d axis on both sides. You can't completely seal this though, it will cause a delayed echo.
What is going on is that the longer it takes the air pressure to diffuse, the more counterpressure at opposite phase is occuring and it lessens the ability to vibrate freely. The whole thing may be another application of the damping factor or bass porting in speakers.
You must be patient though and carefully paying attention to the symmetry and realize tiny physically changes are going to be amplified on the order of millions of times the signal size, if you are adventurous, you can make it purposely off-axis. Remember, a net positive bias means faster thinner sound and less distortion (almost an application of negative feedback assuming multiple mics and a negative net bias means heavier, more analogue type distortion, but less clarity in the pitch of notes.
Again, I would definitely apply this technique to recording with multiple microphones due to proximity effect. There is a shitload of room to be creative.
But will it generate the 1.21 gigawatts of power we need to travel back into time doc?
