Micing Acoustic Guitars

[Noah Berends]

Hey fellow Synners, I got a question more directed towards the fellow sound engineer-minded among us but I’d love everyone’s thoughts. When you’re micing an acoustic guitar, what’s your go-to setup? It’s definitely a hot topic as to what pickup pattern/mic model/direction/distance is best for recording. For example, some say you should mic by the 12th fret for an equal balance between body and string, while others swear by that putting too much emphasis on the strings and losing body dynamics. This is a topic I’m very interested in right now so I’d love to hear y’all’s thoughts.

 

[Filip Tomiša]

Yes, that’s correct what you said about the 12th fret, people usually do it that way but it doesn’t mean that that’s how it’s meant to be. My advice is to play around and see what sounds best to you. You can even put your mic at the head of your guitar where the tuners are to get some interesting echo. Try positioning the mic with a slight angle. As for the mic pattern go with omni cause it will pick up the room sound. Best thing to do is to test everything and see what sounds best to you. As for the mics, use a small diaphragm condenser mic cause they will pick up way more detail. Neumann and AKG have some great mics. We used neumann km56c and it sounded amazing but that mic is pretty much impossible to get.

 

[Noah Berends]

For sure. It really depends on the qualities of the instrument as well. Paired mics are great for mixing regional qualities of the instrument but those are mostly beyond a home budget, haha. I feel like omni would be detrimental though unless you have a well conditioned room. But for capturing the widest dynamic range it’s definitely optimal.

 

[Filip Tomiša]

Yeah that’s true. Like I said experimenting is the best way to figure out what works for you.