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[Jason Lucas]

Any tips on how to approach micing a drum kit that's in a plexiglass shield?

My problem so far has been bleed. Now, obviously I expect some, since the drums are so close together and the sound is bouncing all over the walls of the shield, but sometimes the bleed can be bad enough that a mic is picking up more of the rest of the kit than the individual drum it's pointed at.

It's mostly the kick drum and toms that need the mics. The cymbals are already louder than I would like without any mics so I don't even bother putting them into the mains most of the time. The snare can go either way depending on the drummer or the song. Sometimes it's so loud I pull the mic all the way off and other times I give it a boost. The toms on the other hand can almost always use a little boost.

The problem often with tom mics though is that they often pick up just as much snare and cymbals as they do toms, even if they're pointed directly at the toms and no more than an inch away from the heads.

I've used gates/expanders before but it doesn't help if the drummer is playing that drum plus a cymbal at the same time. For instance playing the high tom and the hi hat or ride at the same time.

The kick drum I think I basically have figured out, although I wish I had two of them so I could blend the beater sound and the body of the drum instead of having to choose one or the other.

Anyway, thoughts?

[g'bye, Dick Rees]

 Frequency sensitive gates.  You need real gates with filters that narrow the trigger frequency such that only the intended source will open the gate.  Your basic on/off gate that comes as a bonus feature on your average inexpensive compressor will be of no use whatsoever.

If you have the ability to side-chain either a graphic or parametric EQ into whatever gate you have, you can set a trigger frequency to open the gate. 

So there are basically two ways to do it:

1.  the type which uses a selected center frequency

or

2.  the type which excludes all unwanted frequencies by using high and low shelving filters.

[Jason Lucas]

Frequency sensitive gates.  You need real gates with filters that narrow the trigger frequency such that only the intended source will open the gate.  Your basic on/off gate that comes as a bonus feature on your average inexpensive compressor will be of no use whatsoever.

If you have the ability to side-chain either a graphic or parametric EQ into whatever gate you have, you can set a trigger frequency to open the gate. 

So there are basically two ways to do it:

1.  the type which uses a selected center frequency

or

2.  the type which excludes all unwanted frequencies by using high and low shelving filters.

hmm, unfortunately there are no side-chain filters on the gates on our board, so in order to get that we'd have to get some outboard dynamics processors of some kind.

[g'bye, Dick Rees]

hmm, unfortunately there are no side-chain filters on the gates on our board, so in order to get that we'd have to get some outboard dynamics processors of some kind.

In your case, I would use a small sub-mixer for anything you need to gate and properly process them before they hit your digital doo-hickey. 

Where are you positioning the kick mic?

[Jason Lucas]

In your case, I would use a small sub-mixer for anything you need to gate and properly process them before they hit your digital doo-hickey. 

Where are you positioning the kick mic?

Alright. I will also probably look at other mics, since I think we have a number of super/hyper cardioid mics and I think some standard cardioids might work better.

As for the kick mic I've experimented with placement a bit. At this moment I have the head of mic just barely inside the sound hole, attempting to get the "body" of the drum, and just a tiny bit of beater. It's working alright for now. Were I to use a two-mic approach I'd have one that captured basically nothing but low end and one that captured almost nothing but beater. That way I could crank the low end mic so that it's really pumping in the sub, and then have just a little bit of the beater mic to give some tone and "snap" to the kick.

[g'bye, Dick Rees]

At this moment I have the head of mic just barely inside the sound hole, attempting to get the "body" of the drum, and just a tiny bit of beater.

Forget that.  If your primary concern is to gate the kick with what you have, you'll want to get the mic close enough to the beater and set the threshold on the gate so that only the kick will be loud enough to open the gate.

What good does it do you to get the body of the drum when you're also getting the rest of the kit?

[Jason Lucas]

Forget that.  If your primary concern is to gate the kick with what you have, you'll want to get the mic close enough to the beater and set the threshold on the gate so that only the kick will be loud enough to open the gate.

What good does it do you to get the body of the drum when you're also getting the rest of the kit?

Actually the kick is the only mic where I don't really have the issue of picking up a ton of the other drums.

[Taylor Phillips]

I've mostly only done drum kits with limited mics and have had some success by placing mics where they look a bit odd on stage.  I had four mics for a whole kit where the crash cymbal was too loud, but I needed more high hat and high tom than what was coming from the stage acoustically, so I moved the mic off to the side and a bit in front so I could point it at the tom and hat and away from the crash.  From the mix position it looked really out of place, but it sounded the way I wanted it.  This may not work with a shield though because of one, space, and two, reflections.

[Jason Lucas]

...This may not work with a shield though because of one, space, and two, reflections.

Yeah, there's only so many places I can put the mics due to the space limitations.

[Frank DeWitt]

Unfortunately you are trying to fix the problem that is caused by another problem that is caused by the the original problem.
The drums are being played to loud.
I attended a seminar on micing drums given by two professional drummers and a professional producer.  The guy sitting at the kit said "If you need a shield, take that money and spend it on lessons for your drummer." The other two agreed.   It may take training, it may take IEMs, but drums can be played at any number of volumes. 

BTW We are a 200 person church in a room that will hold 270  We have a full drum kit with mics and the drums are not so loud that they control the mix.

Frank

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