Lesson 5: Microphones - Posted on 2013-11-27 by Brian Mulvany

The level of enjoyment I got out of this week's lesson will be hard to beat, considering how the microphone is one of the fundamental pieces of recording gear, and the nicer, more reputable ones are somewhat the "gems" of the industry. Being able to listen to recorded demonstrations of these hallmark microphones and compare them to each other was just plain great and is something that makes me even more glad that I enrolled when I did, into the updated interactive version of the course. Interestingly, the studio session itself started out with a discussion about acoustic treatment since Phil had just received his large order of new acoustic treatment foam which he will begin installing this week. It turns out that the lesson for that subject isn't actually until Chapter 18 so it was a bit of a nifty head start. In getting into this week's lesson I learned a method, that by which, one can implement the use of very expensive microphones into their recordings at an extremely low cost - by renting them from music equipment stores! With this method, my mentor has been able to use top of the line microphones including various Neumanns and AKGs for numerous recordings, thereby achieving that great sound while reducing overhead expense tremendously. We talked extensively about microphone designs and brand quality, and even some specific models one should consider adding to his collection including various ribbon microphones. We ended the session after he showed me his latest mix, in which I was introduced to a few amp simulator plugins, specifically one that was quite effective on a DI bass track which I just might have to try out for myself.