In Week 2, we talked about sound recording. But firstly, we defined… What exactly is sound?
SOUND: Oscillations in air pressure.
DYNAMIC MICROPHONES: Often used for live performance to capture louder sounds. For this reason they aren’t very sensitive. Inside this microphone is a diaphragm, which is an electromagnetic plate at the end of the microphone. These electromagnets get turned into electrical signals.
CONDENSER MICROPHONES: More sensitive microphones which capture more delicate sounds. Often used as studio microphones or for field recording, as it can omit certain frequencies. Blue Snowball 32 mic, we recorded sound into it too
INTERFACE: A device which allows microphones and instruments to be connected, and then recorded into a computer (often into a digital audio workstation). In class we used an IRigPro Duo interface. FocusRite Scarlett interfaces are fantastic, I own a 2i2 one at home.
Then, we learned about cables.
XLR CABLE: Used commonly for microphones.
QUARTER INCH JACKS: Often called an ‘instrument cable’, these are used for guitars and some keyboards.
In groups of 5, we connected a dynamic microphone into an interface using an XLR cable. As the interface is connected to the computer, we were able to use SoundTrap to combine loops and recordings to make a short piece of music.
We also were given a basic rundown of some audio effects:
REVERB: An effect used to emulate certain spaces. DAWs often have presets of a hallway, wide room, medium room, church, closed room. And you can adjust how much reverb you want to be applied (dry/wet).
EQ: Equalizer. It adjusts frequency output; it can increase or decrease different frequencies of sound. For example, when mixing vocals, often any frequency under 100 Hz can be cut. This removes muffling from the low end, keeping the bright, crisp sound.
COMPRESSOR: A way to ‘even out’ and compress sound. It works through setting a threshold, where anything that goes over the threshold will be turned down (this is called gain reduction), and lower will be turned up. So e.g if the threshold is set at 44.3 decibels, anything above that will be turned down. It is also important to note that the lower the ratio, the less is sound compressed.
FILTER: A way to use EQ to change the tone of the sound.
- Low Pass Filter: Cutting high frequencies, letting the lows pass through.
- High Pass Filter: Cutting low frequencies, letting the highs pass through.
- Band Pass Filter: Cuts high and lows, leaving the middle.
DELAY: How much of the sound is delayed, and time is how long the delay is for.
LFO: Low-frequency oscillation. It is modulation of any waveform (Sine, Square, Saw and Triangle Waves) in which the amount and rate can be adjusted to create vibrato or tremolo.