I've often wondered this. If somebody speaks into your ear, you do not hear
the pop you often get on a microphone in the same position do you. Likewise
when listening to music in a hall with your ears and then over headphones
from a set of mikes you notice the echo on the latter but not on your ears.
People say its the way the brain processes the sound, but if that is the
case maybe now we can actually emulate this in some way for recording?
No I don't mean going back to a close miked up every single instrument and
a mixer you need to be Twizzle to operate.
Brian

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On Thu, 10 Aug 2017 11:22:47 +0100, "Brian Gaff"
wrote:

I've often wondered this. If somebody speaks into your ear, you do not hear
the pop you often get on a microphone in the same position do you. Likewise
when listening to music in a hall with your ears and then over headphones
from a set of mikes you notice the echo on the latter but not on your ears.
People say its the way the brain processes the sound, but if that is the
case maybe now we can actually emulate this in some way for recording?
No I don't mean going back to a close miked up every single instrument and
a mixer you need to be Twizzle to operate.
Brian

Ears are pressure transducers. This means that the ear drum almost
doesn't move when sound hits. A blast of air from a pop has very
little pressure, but a lot of velocity. Any microphone that isn't omni
will respond to air velocity - it is a combination of velocity and
pressure response that sets directivity. All pressure is omni, all
velocity is figure 8. A mixture of the two is one of the many flavours
of cardioid.

d

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Sometimes I wish I'd never asked.
OK then, I was under the impression that directivity was due to phase of
the wavefronts on both sides of a diaphragm. In the case of the ear, there
is only one clear side though. Also ears are log, and most amps are linear,
so I'd always assumed that it was the loudness ratio that caused the effect
in the ear and using headphones etc makes the ears perform differently.
Brian

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"Don Pearce" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 10 Aug 2017 11:22:47 +0100, "Brian Gaff"
wrote:

I've often wondered this. If somebody speaks into your ear, you do not
hear
the pop you often get on a microphone in the same position do you.
Likewise
when listening to music in a hall with your ears and then over headphones
from a set of mikes you notice the echo on the latter but not on your
ears.
People say its the way the brain processes the sound, but if that is the
case maybe now we can actually emulate this in some way for recording?
No I don't mean going back to a close miked up every single instrument
and
a mixer you need to be Twizzle to operate.
Brian

Ears are pressure transducers. This means that the ear drum almost
doesn't move when sound hits. A blast of air from a pop has very
little pressure, but a lot of velocity. Any microphone that isn't omni
will respond to air velocity - it is a combination of velocity and
pressure response that sets directivity. All pressure is omni, all
velocity is figure 8. A mixture of the two is one of the many flavours
of cardioid.

d

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On Thu, 10 Aug 2017 15:32:44 +0100, "Brian Gaff"
wrote:

Sometimes I wish I'd never asked.
OK then, I was under the impression that directivity was due to phase of
the wavefronts on both sides of a diaphragm. In the case of the ear, there
is only one clear side though. Also ears are log, and most amps are linear,
so I'd always assumed that it was the loudness ratio that caused the effect
in the ear and using headphones etc makes the ears perform differently.
Brian

Nope - none of that. Sorry. It is about phase, but also amplitude. The
velocity response of a mic - the figure 8 aspect - has a positive
phase for air approaching from the front, and obviously a negative
phase for sound from the back. It has an amplitude response that is
the Cos of the approach angle. Take the vector sum of the pressure
response, which is unity and constant phase all the way round, and the
velocity response which is as I just described, and you get a
cardioid. From the rear the pressure response and velocity response
are the same amplitude and opposite phase so they cancel.

And that is pretty much it.

d

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On Thursday, 10 August 2017 13:22:52 UTC+3, Brian Gaff wrote:

No I don't mean going back to a close miked up every single instrument and
a mixer you need to be Twizzle to operate.
Brian

With the exception of classical, and some jazz recordings, close mic is and has been for many years, standard practice. One also adds "air mics" in a pair or Decca tree. So on a multitrack recording, 48 channels, each recorded close mic is by no means unusual.

Iain

On Thu, 10 Aug 2017 09:21:18 -0700 (PDT), Iain
wrote:

On Thursday, 10 August 2017 13:22:52 UTC+3, Brian Gaff wrote:

No I don't mean going back to a close miked up every single instrument and
a mixer you need to be Twizzle to operate.
Brian

With the exception of classical, and some jazz recordings, close mic is and has been for many years, standard practice. One also adds "air mics" in a pair or Decca tree. So on a multitrack recording, 48 channels, each recorded close mic is by no means unusual.

Iain

This pic of how the BBC handle St. John Smith Square is helpful. There
are two Blumlein pairs high above the orchestra, and a single spot mic
on the solo harpsichord. Just visible on the high balcony on the right
is one of the ambience mics.

https://www.gearslutz.com/board/atta...t_johns_01.jpg


In the past when I have been there, they have also had a Jecklin disc
a few yards behind the conductor. I'm betting they aren't going to use
the output from all of there, but tracks are cheap so why not record
them all?

d

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In article ,
Brian Gaff wrote:
I've often wondered this. If somebody speaks into your ear, you do not
hear the pop you often get on a microphone in the same position do you.

The closest type of microphone to the ear is an omni type. And those are
also the least prone to popping. Look at some old TV studio shows where
the hand mics were much smaller/neater than today's incredibly large and
ugly devices. All omnis.

Sadly the vast sounds levels of just about everything these days requires
a directional and or noise cancelling type. Most of which pop just by
looking at them.

Sadly, many seem to think the mic their favourite pop star uses must also
be the best mic for any use. And they are very very wrong.

--
*I feel like I'm diagonally parked in a parallel universe*

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On Thursday, 10 August 2017 20:46:30 UTC+3, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
Look at some old TV studio shows where
the hand mics were much smaller/neater than today's incredibly large and
ugly devices. All omnis.

By hand mics used in TV, do you mean hand held mics? If so they have never been serious contenders in high quality recording.

Sadly the vast sounds levels of just about everything these days requires
a directional and or noise cancelling type. Most of which pop just by
looking at them.

Vocalists and solo instrumentalists who are taught correct microphone techniques rarely have a problem, and modern pop shields are very effective.

Sadly, many seem to think the mic their favourite pop star uses must also
be the best mic for any use. And they are very very wrong.

Do they ever get the chance to find out? A Telefunken 47 costs as much as a small car.

Iain

On Thursday, 10 August 2017 13:22:52 UTC+3, Brian Gaff wrote:

when listening to music in a hall with your ears and then over headphones
from a set of mikes you notice the echo on the latter but not on your ears.

What you are hearing from you "set of mikes" is often not representative of
the acoustic sound in the venue, in many other respects. But it can be. A good example is a classical ensemble recorded with a tree (three omnis, or one omni and two cardioids, with or without outriggers - there are many possible variations) The main mics, (the tree) are set above the conductor's head. During rehearsals, I like to sit at the top of a step ladder, just behind the conductor's rostrum at about the same height as the tree. I listen with wireless headphones (Sennheiser 1200) and am impressed by how close the tree sound (headphones on) is to the acoustic sound (no headphones)

Iain

Brian Gaff wrote:

------------------------

I've often wondered this. If somebody speaks into your ear, you do not hear
the pop you often get on a microphone in the same position do you.


** Likewise when outside in a wind, microphones produce a roaring noise that ears do not normally hear. However, if you blow air directly into your ear via a flexible tube they certainly do.

Wind impinging on a flexible surface causes it to vibrate at a low frequency, so all mics are subject to "wind noise". Cardioid types produce more since they have the proximity effect boosting low frequency output.


Likewise
when listening to music in a hall with your ears and then over headphones
from a set of mikes you notice the echo on the latter but not on your ears.
People say its the way the brain processes the sound,


** Yes, ears "listen through" room reverberation and the longer you remain in the same reverberant space the better they get at it - so it is very much a brain thing.

Microphones have no such ability so when you monitor a mic with headphones you hear the true ratio of direct to reverberant sound.


...... Phil