Recording Manual For Studio

Lee Partridge

Contents
Health & Safety (Page 1) Channel Strip (Page 2-10) PatchBay (Page 11) Diagrams (Page 12-13) Drums (Page 14-21)

Health & Safety

Dont eat or drink Watch out for trip hazards Test Equipment No running No smoking Do not move fire hydrants Do not block the fire exits

Channel Strip

Channel Strip Continued

1. Channel Path This section of the channel strip consists of both microphone and line inputs which share the gain control. The knobs of the gain have a range of +10dBu to 20dBu. One point of the line input is clearly marked and it is the 0dBu point. We can add phantom power to the microphone by pressing the +48 switch. If you press the 100hz switch, it will input a fixed frequency of 100Hz to the input path. We can do a subgrouping on the channel strip where we can get 2 or more channels to be on the same channel. We can do this by pressing the SUB switch, this uses buses to create a channel path. If we press the button with a circle and a line through it () it will reverse the selected inputs phase to compensate on conflicting microphones.

Channel Strip Continued

2. Monitor Path

By pressing the noisegate button (IN) we can stop certain frequencies getting through in our mix, we can also set a window in which the noisegate is shut or open. The THR control is the threshold control which allows the gate to vary in frequency from -40dB to +10dB The Range switch increases the range switch of the gate which the default setting of it is 15dB The sidechain is fed from the input source feeding the gate. The flip switch on the other hand changes the source from sidechain to another signal path. If we press the Hold button a release time to the noise gate is fixed at 0.1 and the REL button control the hold time in which we can delay the release time between the trigger signal opening the gate and the gate closing. The IN switch places a wide bandpass filter in the sidechain with a middle frequency which changes from 70Hz to 4kHz by the FIL knob. The LED lights tell us when the gate is shut!

Channel Strip Continued

3. EQ Path

The equalizer (EQ) is a arranged as 2 separate sections. Both sections are normally placed in the channel path, but may be individually switched into the monitor path for mixdown by pressing the MON switch. The INSERT point is located before the EQ section and moves with it when the MON switch is pressed. The send is unbalanced and the return is balanced The HF section is the second row giving a 15dB cur or boost to a fixed frequency turnover of 12kHz The LF section which is under the HF section gives a 15dB cur or 60Hz boost The HMF & LMF sections have a peak boost/notch cut response at a middle frequencies between 600Hz-12Hz & 100Hz-2kHz on the knobs to the right and 15dB cut and boost on the left hand side. We can switch in or out the EQ sections by the EQ IN switch.

Channel Strip Continued

4. Auxiliary Path

There are six Auxiliary Sends and are arranged in two sections.. AUX 1 & AUX 2. They are primarily used for foldback and a per-fade in the monitor path. By pressing CH; it sources them from the channel and POST makes them post-fade from the monitors. AUX 1 is a stereo send and follows the monitor or channel panpot even when using pre-fade. AUX 3-6 are used primarily for effect sends. They are always in the monitor path and post fade.

Channel Strip Continued

Channel Strip Continued

5. Channel Fader

The channel fader can set the level sent to the TAPE SEND, SUBGROUPS BUSSES or MIX The fader has 10dB of gain at the top its fader travel. It can be cut by the CUT switch. XFX moves the source point for the channel fader to post the monitor fader so we can use the tape send or as an additional routing matrix when mixing. When we bounce we press the BNCE button on the monitor path. It moves to feed the group routing switches from the mix bus. This allows easy bouncing of tracks & makes the monitor channel safe from solo (this protects the the input groups when solo is active). The PFL switch allows direct monitoring of the signal from either the input channel fader or the input of the channel CUT switch (AFL) The MIX switch routes the channel signal to the stereo mix bus which helps us use the channel path as another input on the mixdown. The REV switch swaps the function of the channel fader and the long-throw fader. The CH PAN control selects the position of the signal within the stereo and routes the signal to any of the group buses (8 of them) via the routing switches. (PAN to the left=ODD number. PAN to the right=EVEN number)

Channel Strip Continued

6. Monitor Path
The monitor path is normally fed from the tape return input. This makes use of the automatic input/repro switching in the tape machine. A trim control with a range of -/+10dB is seen on the lower section of the input gain control and this has a normal center of 0dB. The SOLO button on the monitor mutes all other channels and plays only the channel selected. The LED lights on the PEAK shows us that there is less than 6dB headroom remaining at the 3 main places of the signal chain. Pressing down the SEND tape switch feeds the monitor path from what is inputted to the tape send enabling you to hear the signal being sent to the tape. The Pan control positions signal across the stereo bus at a level determined by the long-throw monitor fader.

Channel Strip Continued

7. Mute Switches
The I/O bar graph is sourced from the monitor path and follows the monitor send switch to show either off tape or group bus levels. The four mute switches by the fader allows us to group channels together if we need to mute certain channels. For instance if we recorded a band and every channel had different instruments and you are trying to get all the drum channels to fit perfectly with each other instead of hitting solo on all the drum channels you can hit M1 and all the channels which have M1 pressed down will mute

PatchBay

Line In-34 Tape Return Insert Return

Monitor Input

Tape Send ( Can use this on computer as this is what we record on) INS Send INS-Insert (like on logic)

Channel Out (Used when we havent got enough group outputs also another way to record audio

Diagrams
Birds-Eye View Of College Music Rooms

Red=Fire Extinguisher Green=Fire Exits

Diagrams Continued

Control Room Layout Plan

Drums

Micing Up A Drum Kit

Micing Up A Drum Kit Continued

Micing Up A Drum Kit Continued

Parts of The drum kit we mic up: Kit drum Top Snare Bottom Snare High Hat Rack Tom Bottom Tom 2 Overhead Mics (to get an overall sound of the drum kit)

Micing Up A Drum Kit Continued

The order to mic up a drum kit is as follows: Kick Drum Top Snare Bottom Snare Rack Tom Bottom Tom High Hat Overhead left Overhead right

To know which overhead is left and which one is right we mark the mics from the way we see the mics in the control room not from the drummers point of view.

Micing Up A Drum Kit Continued

Kick Drum Overheads Bottom Snare

Top Snare

Bottom Tom

Rack Tom

Hi Hat

Micing Up A Drum Kit Continued

On taking down the miced up drum kit we do it in reverse order: Overhead Right Overhead Left Hi Hat Bottom Tom Rack Tom Bottom Snare Top Snare Kick Drum