High SPL Situations, MK012, and MKH416

W

wick

New member
Hey all, hoping someone can throw out some advice.

Situation: High SPL, small club shows.

My Plan: CH1: Oktava mk012 w/hyper cardiod capsule and -10db filter. CH2: Board feed or a different room mic. Im also planning on doing an offboard audio recording. Somewhere in there I should hopefully get something useable.

I havent had the Oktava very long, but running some tests by placing the mic in front of my monitors and recording audio at 100db-110db the results seem decent but not incredible. Granted, the location situation is not going to be 6 inches from a controlled audio source. I could expereince higher SPL at varying levels and Im wondering if there is a better mic for the job. Or even as my CH2 room feed with the Oktava on CH1.

I'm considering a MKH416 for other purposes and I'm wondering how this mic performs in high spl situations. I have an sm57 I know could work but I'm wondering what other peoples experiences are with something like an MKH416 in high spl environments.

Any thoughts or advice is much appreciated.

-Wick
 
i haven't done a ton of live show recording but probably more than most folks who don't specialize in live show/sound stuff

if you can get a clean feed off of the soundboard all you need to do is to have another mic pointed at the audience/crowd and then in post mic the clean soundboard track with the noisy live track and try different mixes until you are happy with the sound.

i haven't tried the oktava mk-012 for this but it would probably work. i have done it with shotgun mics in the past.

with the clean soundboard feed the other track isnt as critical as long as neither track is distorted etc.

matthew
 
We've done a lot of live music stuff... It's a can of worms. In fact we try to keep it to a minimum these days, as there are just too many variables, especially when you're dealing with paying clients.

It's not as simple as just taking a stereo feed from the sound desk-- the mix from the desk will invariably be vocal heavy with almost no bass guitar, and sharp overbearing drums. If the vocalist isn't perfect (who is), then the vocals high in the mix will sound really bad. Bass guitar sometimes doesn't even go through the house mix at all (particularly at smaller venues), as it's own amp is so damn loud. Also, the house mix isn't optimised for you (a recordist), it's optimised and EQed for the audience, the room, and for interaction with the kit on stage.

If you get lucky it can sound fine ... but if you're being paid, then you can't take that risk. Multitrack recording (with post mixing/mastering) is logistically very demanding, and therefore expensive, but the only way to get a real solid mix from a live show.

Even then, a multi-track setup doesn't guarentee a good performance.

If you really need to do a decent cheap recording, get the clean mix from the sound desk AND at least 2 mics. If you're any good at audio mastering, you can play with combining the signals in post. With some clever EQing and compression you can combine the "mic" sound (which will be reverby but 'decently' balanced), with the house mix (which will be super clean but badly balanced).

You may find that the house mix sounds awful (mostly vocals, with dull lifeless guitar in the background), or you may find that it sounds fantastic. Typically, the bigger the venue the better the house sound will be (various reasons-- better desk, better engineer, less on-stage spill, and less spil from the onstage amps/etc).

In some cases, the hot "live" feel from one of your mics will just rock, and give far more atmosphere and life than your desk mix.

So .. my tip, cover your bases, don't put all your eggs in one basket, and be prepared to learn some mixing/mastering tricky to pull it up to scratch if it comes out less than ideal!
 
I've done a few audio only live recordings, but never with these mics (oktava mk012 and MKH416). I have no experience with these mics and I'm wondering if I shoud pack something else in my kit. I'm going to be in Japan so I can't run home and grab something I happen to be missing.

I expect the board feed to be as you've described, all vocals, a little guitar, some bass drum and snare. I'm totally comfortable mixing that with my room sound so that's not really an issue.

I've come across a couple of posts about boundary/pzm mics. Do they really work well in high spl scenarios? The concept of the mic itself (measuring spl betweem the plate and the mic VS. open air pressure) seems like it might but I don't really want to be totally overloaded since all my gear is going in my carry on. The boundary mics look kind of big and Im not sure I want to sacrifice the space.

If you had a board feed on one channel, which mic would be prefered: MK012 or MKH416 on the other channel? I will also have a stand alone recorder with a stereo mic I have had decent success with in the past.

I understand about mic placement, slapback, and that acoustics are going to vary from room to room.

I appreciate your suggestions so far, thank you.
 
416 starts to clip at v high spls, if you're close to a speaker you will see the self-limiting effect in the waveforms .... but obviously this is analogue clipping, it's nowhere near as unpleasant as digital clipping. it's completely usable in most cases when it comes to live music- it just sounds like slight analogue distortion.

don't have an oktava, but I do have an akg blueline hyper, which does EXTREMELY well with very high SPLs .... 416 is more directional (obviously), so more prone to varying sound if it's cam mounted .. while a good hyper will sound more open / wide (which can be bad unless you're mixing with house sound).
 
every mic has it oun specification, look at spl number - as grater the number as grater the sound pressur level it can acsept
 
wick said:
I havent had the Oktava very long, but running some tests by placing the mic in front of my monitors and recording audio at 100db-110db the results seem decent but not incredible.
Click to expand...

Can you explain what you mean by "decent but not incredible"?

The Oktava can certainly take a lot more than 110 dB. If you are really close to the speaker, air motion might cause distortion - "wind noise" from the speaker - depending on the speaker design. Make sure that's not the cause of any problems.
 
I just have high expectations, I think that's my problem. Live sound is obviously subjective to many variables and I always try to do the best job with the tools that I have.

I was poking around over at archive.org and searched their live music archive for mk012 and returned a whole slew of recordings with the oktava. They sound great, a lot more bass response than I was getting in my somewhat hokey controlled tests. They list distance and height from the source too. I'm not into most of the bands there but it is a decent reference.

I leave for Japan in 2 days so it's time to just go with it since Im out of time and cash. I plan on running the single oktava and whatever mix I can get from the board to sweeten the vox.

As far as the board feed, I just had the idea of using my sennheiser g2 buttplug to pass over the board feed if the board is off center (most likely, small clubs). Not sure how that will turn out but seems worth a try at least for one of the five shows and see whats up.

Oktava will be camera mounted, camera on monopod possibly with the leg in my pocket and bungied around my shoulder/neck. A friend suggested this so I plan on giving it a shot, it's kind of comfy. Im traveling extremely light so I wont have a tripod.

If you're in Japan oct 25-29 come out to a show!
http://thelifeandtimes.com/Campaign.aspx

Thanks for all your replies.
 
I have done many live recordings both multitrack and stereo feed from the house board. I would suggest using the stand alone recorder you have for the feed from the house board. If the board has a matrix out I would suggest asking the sound guy (during sound check) to feed the instruments to seperate subgroups. i.e. Drums to Grps 1&2, Bass to 3, gtr to 4, Keys, horns etc to 5 & 6 and Vocals to 7 & 8. Then on the matrix master you can do a sub mix of the groups, which will be different from the L & R out to the house. This way you'll be able to get a better balance of all the instruments and vocals going to tape. You will need a good set of headphones plugged into your recorder to be able to hear the mix that's going to tape. Then just use your Oktave as on board camera mic. The main problem with on camera mics is that as you move about the room the sound will change, depending on where you are in relation to the on stage amplifiers.
 
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