# Microphone Placement

As far as I'm concerned, this much more critical than the actual microphone used 99% of the time. Getting the microphone is precisely the right place is the name of the game. Sound waves sound drastically different when you move just a few inches most of the time. The key to get the magic snare sound is often getting the mic within an inch or so of the sweet spot (assuming the snare is tuned extremely well and being played by a great drummer).

Proximity effect makes a huge difference on the tone of a recording. Some mics will gain over 12dB of deep low end as you get extremely close to the source. However, omni microphones have no proximity effect at all. So putting a mic with multliple patterns such as cardiod, figure 8, and cardiod may have 12dB or more difference in bass response in the patterns.

Keep in mind that putting the microphone in the perfect position will only mean that microphone is picking up the source the best it can. If the sound of the room, instrument, or musician sucks, the expensive microphone will be picking up a shitty tone, too. This is a concept that people need to understand. Typically, we can expect a $3,000 microphone to be more sensitive than a $300 mic. If this is the case and the room is terrible, it's possible that the expensive mic will pick up more crap and actually sound worse. However, the same source in a great room may sound amazing with the more expensive mic because we want the extra room detail in there.

Of course, there are some very sensitive cheap microphones as well. Price doesn't have a direct correlation with sensitivity. The only thing an expensive mic pretty guarantees is that it cost more to make the microphone.

# The Preamp

You may want to search for my article, Preamp Fundamentals I Learned At Wagener's for a detailed analysis of preamps. Basically, preamps fall into the same category as microphones above. They have a frequency response, a speed, and a character. However, expensive preamps are usually much more subtle that microphones so keep that in mind. You'll hear big boys pushing that you need $20,000 in preamps and $50,000 in microphones but if the other criteria aren't equally maxed out, you've wasted your money!