Acoustic guitar and singing - vocal bleed and out of phase

Modellista

I wonder if anyone has any suggestions to solve this little dilemma.  Recording live takes of myself playing and singing simultaneously, I'm getting bleed on the acoustic mic which sounds phasey when combined with the vocal mic.  I don't mind a bit of bleed but the phasing isn't very nice.

The acoustic mic is an SE electronics GM10 small diaphragm condenser, which clamps on to the guitar body.  I'm pretty happy with it, it allows me to move a bit without affecting the sound, and the mic is always in the sweet spot.  For vocals I'm using a Shure Beta 57a which sounds fine.  I could use a condenser for the vocals but I'd get more bleed.

I could sit further back from the vocal mic to reduce the time differential but then the mic would be much quieter, and I like a decent signal and a bit of proximity effect to taste.  The phasing isn't disastrous, but annoying.

Any thoughts?

andy_k

Hard to say really, without hearing the problem. I suspect it is caused by your movement, The mic on the guitar is getting a constant, and your vocal is fairly constant, so it is a combination of the cross bleed between both.
I would suggest trying to be more static while you record, or record isolated vocal, guitar parts, in the past I have used an overdubbed isolated vocal to mask the 'Live' vocal that was recorded with a band, it worked well enough for me, but it would be interesting to hear what your particular problem is, you could offset the tracks if there was a constant phase problem-but if it changes over time-it could be tricky to fix.

Modellista

andy_k said:

Hard to say really, without hearing the problem. I suspect it is caused by your movement, The mic on the guitar is getting a constant, and your vocal is fairly constant, so it is a combination of the cross bleed between both.
I would suggest trying to be more static while you record, or record isolated vocal, guitar parts, in the past I have used an overdubbed isolated vocal to mask the 'Live' vocal that was recorded with a band, it worked well enough for me, but it would be interesting to hear what your particular problem is, you could offset the tracks if there was a constant phase problem-but if it changes over time-it could be tricky to fix.

I'll definitely put up a recording of what I mean when I can.  I see what you're saying, for a phase problem to be most noticeable there will be an ongoing difference in time shift which gives you the characteristic phase sound.  What I'm hearing is a more "cocked wah" sound I think, with some constructive and destructive interference going on... or perhaps I'm reading too much into it and it's just my singing!

I could indeed do separate takes, but I really like the idea of making a collection of properly live bare-bones recordings - no overdubs, no separation.

TheBigDipper

Modellista said:

<snip>

I could indeed do separate takes, but I really like the idea of making a collection of properly live bare-bones recordings - no overdubs, no separation.

I sometimes record me and my mate playing acoustic (both) and singing (me) in the kitchen using just a single omni mic or a stereo cardioid pair. That's pretty bare bones! Sounds best in a room with some natural reverb. I've been thinking about a mic with a bi-directional pattern for this at some point. 

Winny_Pooh

First reverse the phase of one mic and see how that sounds. 

Next try having the vocal mic under the chin facing up and the guitar mic below it facing down and move them around till it works.  That way the null points are away from the other sound source. (Listen with headphones) 

I'd had good results also from a vertically stood (figure 8) ribbon on guitar near the 12 fret pointing at the soundhole and a LDC near the mouth and angled slightly up. 

Stuckfast

I sometimes use the Eventide Precision Time Align plug-in for this sort of thing. If you apply a delay to the vocal mic that corresponds to the time taken for the sound to travel from it to the guitar mic, you can ensure that the vocal is maximally in phase on both mics. It'll only be a few milliseconds.

Modellista

Stuckfast said:

I sometimes use the Eventide Precision Time Align plug-in for this sort of thing. If you apply a delay to the vocal mic that corresponds to the time taken for the sound to travel from it to the guitar mic, you can ensure that the vocal is maximally in phase on both mics. It'll only be a few milliseconds.

Ha. Awesome idea. I’ll look into that. 

p90fool

You can do it manually in your DAW just by advancing or delaying one of the tracks by a few milliseconds. 

Modellista

p90fool said:

You can do it manually in your DAW just by advancing or delaying one of the tracks by a few milliseconds. 

Yep, come to think of it.  I've not made such small changes before but can easily look up how to do it.

In fact I recorded a song this week and there was no such problem and no idea why.  But I'll take it!

Ché

All great suggestions, I'll add ribbons mics on vocals are very good for this purpose given their extreme null points due to the figure of 8 polar pattern.