CAN I MAKE A CHEAP MICROPHONE SOUND GOOD?

[@luancav]

Great video! But I really want a "VOCAL" version of this. I think 90% of people who use cheap mics is to record vocals. That would be very interesting!

[@jelissasoto3611]

can't be done. especially not in a thick drake, parrtynextdoor, gunna, or pop type of mix... you might be close but you gonna sound like Wake not drake.

[@realhamzabarami]

@@jelissasoto3611 i reached and surpassed drake with a good room vibe and a bit of mixing all that with a bm800

[@pavmx703]

@@realhamzabarami Lmao. Good one.

[@maedaeburning]

@@jelissasoto3611 da faq. get creative m8

[@jaydy71]

Maybe Zingyou should do the matching EQ trick using pink noise with a few famous mics and release the Pro-Q settings (or even release their own plugin with those EQ settings), lol :)

[@mark_fox_music]

The coolest thing about this video isnt even the experiment with cheap versus expensive microphone. The coolest thing is your immense knowledge and explanations of the tools you use. Thank you! I have learned more in this video that I never even considered about musicality in microphone construction than any of the books or articles I've read. Excellent!

[@beeuhlazz]

Give us more content on creative decisions like you did at the end of the video

[@alexkay6995]

this this this

[@edgararens44]

"I will try to let it shine in a way that is shines the best, I'm not trying to make it something it doesn't want to be." Love it!

[@sameldin2022]

What I like about you that you don't mix by your ears only.. You mix by your heart too.. Greeting from Australia..

[@MrSnowmobilefreak]

Hey man, I've watched many of your videos now. This one by far is my favorite. I really appreciated you taking the time to show how you would use the sound to its natural advantage at the end. You should make more mixing videos like that. Always good content. Finally committed to subscribing

[@ProducedbyAleex]

I just came across the video just now. I want to let you know that I watch basically all of your videos, but the last 3 minutes of this video when you went through the creative process of mixing that piano is the best 3 minutes of your KZbin I've ever watched. More of this please!

[@zonasound]

The best microphone is the one w a great artists performing in front of it and a talented engineer like yourself can make any mic work.

[@matsewunderlich]

create a "anti cheap" Plug in :) Great session - nice video!

[@mrdanjames]

It's called Soothe and it already exists

[@michaelwirth6843]

No its called Intensity (by ZynaptiQ) and it also exists. It has been tested by this guy, but that time he really didn't understand the plugin and made a peculiar test.

[@kastudioHU]

Following you for a while now - it's refreshing to see you approach everything with ease, while putting yourself into the process 100%. Keep it up, you are awesome.

[@davidegiaroli4120]

If I'm not wrong, the piano part in Jamiroquai's "Virtual Insanity" was recorded a Yamaha 'home' digital piano. They tried different acoustic grands and then figured out that the digital one better fitted the song. This to say that the "better sounding" one it's not always the best sound for your song.

[@AboveEmAllProduction]

wow the u47 is... its wider and fuller. great suggestion at the end of using what you have, to work along with it - instead of working against it/ trying to "fix" it.

[@cerebralaudio5587]

This was a great video. I liked the whole idea of running through the process of working with a recording to get a desirable result. (Especially when the starting recording was not optimal.) There are a lot of people that are working with the materials they have at hand -- focusing more on the process is beneficial for that kind of situation. (Okay, this comment is really badly worded...hope the point gets across...)

[@TheMirolab]

I'd bet if you do a Match-EQ against a matched pair of microphones, you might still get those spaced peaks in the EQ, just because 2 capsules that are a few inches apart will indeed have some comb filtering between them, and that could fool the Match-EQ function.

[@MsLanderX]

You could also modify the cheap chinise mic using some of the pimped alice PCBs on E-Bay, and a TSB2555B Jli capsule. Result it's really impressive!

[@NKWTI]

The answer is yes. I've got a nice preamp, I have a wind screen from an sm7b over an mxl 2001, and good micing technique (mic is directed like a drum bone, shooting to the left with the center of the diaphragm turned/slanted slightly up, looking past my forehead, on my mixer I reduce the mids ever so slightly...damn, this sounds buttery smooth and no essyness. Technique is where it's at, and this is one of my favorite mics to use...and I have mics of all different price ranges..and I STILL like this MXL 2001, it's smooth and can be tweaked just right. Has a nice full sound. It's all about practice and experience from over the years.

[@magiusicgician4102]

Wytse, this was foremost one of the best videos in my opinion. Thanks a lot for taking your time and sweat for such good quality! I'm sure and hope you reach far with this, your passion.

[@RickySweum]

Thanks for this video, well done comparison. It was fun seeing you attempting to match the EQ to the expensive mic...I thought you did a great job.

[@jenshuxley]

please a part 2 from this, i read here many good idea for a better result ;)

[@roddor5301]

That piano work, reminds me "The Dark Side of the Moon"; nice vibe.

[@DanMoreauMusic]

very cool video! I really liked the end when you did an exemple of how you would integrate the piano to the mix! I Know it's an old video, but it would be very interesting to see videos where you show your approach on some situation like you did here!

[@Table-Top]

Thanks, good video. Video request: would love to see you making retro style drums with a "gated" reverb. i.e. taking a retro Linn drum snare/kick sample and making it into a gated reverb one from scratch.

[@alexhormann8931]

Thanks a lot for your effort! I think the comb filter like difference could be the result of comparing not only two different microphones but actually two different microphone positions(!) which definitely cause some phase cancellations. But at the end of the day the most accurate eq match would be by recording a speaker playing a recorded (not randomly generated) pink noise from the exact same microphone resp. membrane position ... if that's possible at all .. and sync these recordings before eq matching. But most interesting would be a match by convolution. I'm pretty sure that would surprise some experts by failing blind comparison tests. Hehe

[@joboiecruiser]

I bought a $4,000.00 tube mic 40 years ago, using it on vocals and Leslie speaker only. About two months ago it started making noise and giving me trouble. Not sure how much it was going to cost me to fix it, I rebuilt the power supply, checked out the mic circuit, but the same problem was happening. So I KZbind every "cheap" mic comp regarding MXL mics. So one month ago I bought a $239.00 MXL tube mic. Replaced the tube in the expensive mic and recorded two tracks simultaniously, with the two mics next to each other. The difference was almost zero. Perhaps because I knew whch channel the expensive mic was in I could tell a slight difference, but no one else could. I would suggest that you move the cheap mic closer to the piano, slightly higher so it can capture the low end. The expensive mic is always going to be more sensitive to the lows, so compensate for that in all your tests. Thanks for all your vids. KZbin, Joe Logsdon & Company.

[@robertulrich3964]

another thing you can add to the list. expensive mics do a little reverb at 150-200hz to create a smooth, warm sound.

[@SonnyGeorgeVlogs]

I feel like a routine studio maintenance video would be really successful. More home studios need to see stuff like that. "Essential Studio Maintenance Practices" or something could be a title.

[@SonnyGeorgeVlogs]

Oh and of course mastering an indie pop track ;)

[@jenshuxley]

@ White Sea Studio , to match a good mic you need more as 1 or 2 EQ, you need a chain like Compressor(attacks), EQ, Compressor(Dynamic after attack for clear sound), EQ... good mics have a really good dynamic and this is really Important. maybe a little bit tube or tape Between Comp. and EQ for more warm. greetings

[@andygrove285]

Great vid - and great demo showing why frequency response (EQ) is only one dimension of what makes a piece of equipment sound like it does. All processing, analogue or digital is in some way subtractive by definition - something is lost by making the signal chain more complex: Start with the best you can get, and go from there. However, some of the greatest performances of all time have been made with 'bad' equipment, so, it's not a simple equation.

[@RealHomeRecording2]

Great job on the EQ match, Wight Seeeeee!

[@edphooey81]

Nice one, love your videos dude! Have you heard of the Slate Digital virtual microphone system? Be interesting to see you do video - test / snake oil on that.

[@Whiteseastudio]

Yes, I heard about it... its a weird thing...

[@OnetrackHongKong]

Should do this test on vocal. I can't fix cheap mic sound on vocal... so im interested to see what u can do!

[@HelamanGile]

So if you match it with a u-47 at a studio then create a preset for it then you have that EQ you can use

[@mvyper]

That cheaply recorded piano sounds like something that should belong in a nostalgic lo fi track. And I'm saying it in the best possible way I can.

[@alexhormann8931]

mvyper Yeah, good point, and with lots of flutter, crackle and noise. The art of trash, a stylistic device. Hehe

[@mvyper]

@@alexhormann8931 yeah, that's why there are lots of plugins out there for emulating tapes and vinyls.

[@adambarker9493]

If you made a collection of Pro-Q presets for the Zingyou BM-8000 to emulate industry standard mics, I would happily pay for it. I picked up 2 Zingyou BM-8000s after your first video about it. I use them as ambient mics for live recordings, it's great to have a set of large diaphragm condensers that I don't have to worry about the audience putting a drink over or an artist kicking over (or off the stage) in the dark. They certainly beat the capsules on a tascam portable for this particular purpose and actually cost less.

[@portendinghonor496]

I have one of these(different badge, same mic). Great if used as intended, a broadcast mic. Gotta use it close, and make sure you sing into the right end! The only thing I've found it's terrible on is metal vocals, or I would assume opera or classical female voice, really anything with a wide dynamic range, it's not good for, but at the same time that limited range gives other types of music some natural compression.

[@HolySemtex]

Guys, subscribe to this guy. You might not always agree with him, nor like every video. But he still makes high quality content, cares about his subscribers and has so many interesting videos. I'm a long-time subscriber and never regretted it. Let's get him to 100k, he deserves it!

[@Whiteseastudio]

Thank you sooo much!

[@DankoHidalgo]

If you really want to match the EQ to the most delicate detail, use iZotope's Ozone Match EQ, which doesn't have a limit on bands or detail. I do think the Pro-Q's Match EQ is really good, but it can't really be compared to Ozone's.

[@chiefofsinners5272]

Thank you for sharing this exploration with us.

[@QuintSEnce]

Great piece of information... love the way you turned it into a creative process rather than trying to make it sound like a Steinway recorded in the best studio in the world. That's what sound engineering is all about.

[@anonagain]

Thanks for the video! You need to chip some paint off your console rack modules so they look more like today's plug-ins. ;)

[@Whiteseastudio]

They're tooo well painted

[@bpipper]

To do another version of the A/B comparison you might pan one left, and the comparison right. Just a thought.

[@xaosnox]

First, that piano playing gave me chills! I forget if that was George (sp?) or someone else, but the expression in it is just gorgeous! Please pass along my thanks for that wonderful piece of "love forever". And a grand piano is quite a challenging test. The only thing I could think of that would be harder is an upright bass! It seemed like you were really enjoying that. It was fun to watch you get so into it. You touched on all of my ideas for making those things sound like a U47. I'd actually like to see what Satin could do with it. I've been blown away by that plugin since you reviewed it, but haven't had much chance to work with it much yet because UAD just hit me with an avalanche of coupons and giveaways, so I have a ton of new stuff to learn! But this proves what I've been saying for years: with today's preamp emulations, plugins, etc., you can get something like a RØDE NT1 to sound as good if not better than classic Neumanns because of its super low noise.

[@yes-ft9ze]

I really love your videos and appreciate the quality that goes into them :3

[@biekanez1]

Wytse ik zou het interessant vinden om te zien hoe je een acoustic guitar mixt. Misschien dat je hier een keer een video over wilt maken.😎👍👊

[@djminddrum]

record pink noise and than try to match regards

[@GreyManFaustus]

I'm a subscriber, but I don't watch your videos.

[@dashtesla]

Im also somewhat guilty of that, i'm just not that much into audio gear specially atm due some things going on in my life/personal reasons but i am subbed if i see anything that catches my attention I watch.

[@GreyManFaustus]

@@dashtesla To some extent, probably everybody is. There lives an entire hive of channels in my inbox just for occasional giveaways :D But I was being ironic in this case, because I consider this channel one of the very few actually helpful ones - and most of the time the content is quite entertaining even when I can't care less for the product in question.

[@God-yb2cg]

I'm subscribed to almost 350 channels and I usually only watch 2 videos a day on youtube (except music)

[@F_J_2014]

What Reaper theme do you use in this video? Love what you done with the piano here in the end.

[@EduardoMouraMusic]

Very nice comparison! I wonder what would happen with both recordings if you treated them with Gullfoss.

[@javiersj2036]

Maybe you can record some pink noise with cheap and expensive mics and match de EQ to apply that curve to any other audio? Obviously it won't be the same, but maybe you can get a "better" sound from a cheap mic using thar reference curve.

[@MaartenFranken]

Shame you dont have the mics anymore. I tried something like this, with the MB800 mic, only with hardware in the analog chain, when recording. I tried them on the tube channels of my A&H GS3000 and I was quite happy with the results. Those mics need a bit of warming up and I got it done with an anolog EQ and with tubes it worked even better, they just need a little more harmonic content. I really should try some other hardware and software, sometime soon. I like experimenting with things like this.

[@jamespwolpert]

Would love to get your opinion on UAD hardware and plugins!

[@OneandOthermusic]

Excellent , excellent video and a great revisit to the cheap mic compare ya did earlier. It really shows the versatility,usability an serviceability of what many might call an inferior source material. I appreciate how you decided to see how creative you could get with the piano stem and showed that even with hundreds or even thousands of dollars in contrast (in the hardware) the results can be excellent. Great follow up !!

[@patrickalphenaar]

Nice vid thanks! Usually i only work with virtual piano’s “sample based”. The thing annoying me is so many different phase issue’s on different notes which need to be corrected note by note to have natural frequency response, timbre and proper stereo image. You cant really reproduce a excellent Mic by EQ’ing , but like you being creative, you can have a great sounding piano in your mix recorded by a cheaper Mic! Happy mixing and mastering. Cheers.

[@yety9443]

So glad I came across this guy. I can already see I can learn from him!!

[@DanDuskin]

Lovely! Now you need another Altec... and I need it as well :) great video!!!

[@davidgriffin79]

Interesting; as with the previous session with el cheapo mike it's all about the timbre of the music. I think the U47 captures the tonal colours far more accurately. So, I suppose, when mixing, it's easy to subtract what's there than add what isn't.

[@ephraimwarrior6766]

side by side its a more full sound. and wow you know your craft.

[@SonnyGeorgeVlogs]

The cheap ones feel tighter. Must be the lack of tube. Also I feel like the "cheap" high end kind of matches the tone of the piano. Unless I needed the great low end of the U47s, I think I would pick the cheap ones hahaha. Really interesting.

[@faraiwesa-shapiro9018]

faster transient response for cheap one cuz its built in 2018 vs 1930's

[@Vikotnick]

Those wobbly analog eqs would drive nuts. Good god I have OCD

[@weareallbeingwatched4602]

The out to lunch box

[@HelamanGile]

So what you could do is make this a pre-set silver people who have the microphone then go online hey $10 in buy a preset that makes their $10 microphone sound very very good

[@howlerbike]

Voxengo has a plugin called curve EQ that's also in Cubase [ 8 and up ? ] as a stock plugin, which does what the fab filter one used here does. If I wanted premium mics but couldn't afford them I'd rent the ones i wanted for a day, do this exact same thing and save the presets by mic name to overlay that precise offsetting curve on a track [ captured with the comparison mic] that you think calls for such a premium mic. I'm not impressed enough with premium mics to bother, but I've used this plugin and method to get really good simulations of celebrity guitar tone. This is more challenging since there are a lot more variables than mic a vs. mic b

[@TNTales]

I would like a video that compares mics that are cheaper but claim to sound like something a U47 since most of us don't have a U47 to test. Like TechZone's Stellar X2 Vintage that's supposed to be based on the 47

[@roelgarcia]

Love the pianist! Interesting video

[@Astronomater]

Thanks for bringing up the side-panning of the Beatles 2009 remastering. I can't listen to Sgt Pepper's with headphones because of Paul screaming in my right ear the whole time.

[@alexposch2872]

I thinn the Two Mic Types together might give a very Major Sound.... so what gets in my mind is low passing the u 47s just a little bit and high passing the cheap microphones... i might try that tomorrow🤩🤩

[@mineralhillsworkshop5275]

Very interesting. Originally, I thought this video was going to go in a different direction. I have heard that one reason cheap mics don’t sound that good is because of the following. I can’t look it up at the moment so don’t quote me on this but is something along these lines. The condenser part of these cheap mic designs is not compatible with the circuit design. This leads to a harsh sound. Something about how these designs were copied from the european makers. Websites like micparts and others as well as boutique mic manufacturers like Advanced Audio talk about this in more accurate detail and sell capsules that fix this issue, or even new circuits. Would be really cool to see you do a mic mod. Or, have one done for you and test it.

[@dykodesigns]

That's a nice and realxing piano piece. Fit's the weather quite well, it has a sort of daydreaming feel to it. Could you make a video some day on "bit crushing" samples to create a vintage 8 bit sampler type of sound? I.e. What you typically would get out of a fairlight CMI or an amiga computer.

[@ohio_dino]

Ive been watching your content regularly and i dont know how i never hit subscribe untill this video.

[@ohio_dino]

Also i will be joining your patreon soon.

[@ohio_dino]

Im glad you dont shove subscribe to my channel down in every video you make

[@83NCO]

cool video. always appreciate the content. Keep up the great work!

[@maxlembok5616]

This would be cool if you build a better mic than Aston Element, with eq setting package for singing rap and rock adjustment .

[@Rompler_Rocco]

Would love to see a teardown and capsule comparison if you ever get another

[@Astronomater]

yeah, but can you make a u47 sound like a Blue Snowball?

[@JazzMac36251]

Haven't made it all the way through the video yet, so my apologies if you mention this. Just wanted to say it as I was hearing/thinking about it. But, the thing that's getting me about the cheap mics is there seems to be some kind of internal resonances happening from within the mics themselves. Can't really dial that out with an EQ. I mean, you can...kinda...but not really

[@mwintersteinsmith]

Thanks Wytse for a very interesting and alternative way of hearing an expensive mic vs a cheap mic in a mix. AWESOME 😎

[@feelmorelove]

Man, you're awesome! =) I was surprised to love your channel and your videos! =)) The most I like is your way of thinking! =)))

[@pinkpaprika]

Nice technique. Congrats! Let me know the name of this song. I love the piano sound a lot.

[@RockmannMusic]

Oeksound Soothe will do more to de-cheap the recording from the crap mic than anything you've just tried

[@Jonas-jq5xl]

I love all the interesting ID's you are having!;)

[@SebastianSnoeck]

In my humble experience with a good microphone for the right instrument you have basically just to level and each a little bit but with others it can sound right but you have to eq a lot .....

[@RafaTallicaBR]

Great Video! In the next try to level your voice w/ the playing tracks

[@Etherealtheband]

Doesn't slate sell a cheap mic with a u47 EQ match ?

[@alexbreyer6921]

Well, $500 cheap compared to his $30 cheap.

[@pablostruff425]

Indeed, a damn good quote in the end!

[@krass76]

solid video Wytse! your personal choice and variations at the end were very cool!but one thing you could do to "upgrade" a (cheap/old) mic: send it in for calibration. they will create a profile that tells you how to EQ this mic to neutral, save that as a preset and slap it on every time, then go from there (in a second EQ).That's an immense value-add for not only cheap mics, but also inexperienced mixing "engineers" (tbh most of us viewers really aren't pros) and expensive mics too as just ABing between original and "corrected" sound can inspire in multiple directions.And these calibration services can not only provide an amplitude-over-frequency measurement but also phase-over-frequency!!Imagine correcting your mic for freq and phase, without pre-ringing, with a couple of button clicks! MathAudio does that.Also, didn't Waves have a program that applied certain devices/microphones freq response onto a signal? Q-clone or something, reeally old I think.

[@TigroGumi]

You can get it close with EQ… but what can you get from EQing the U47? Surely it gives you a better starting point… a better starting point that costs £9,333 lol… If you had the studio, skill and money, maybe… being creative is obviously more important… even if I had the money I would be scared to buy it and at the same time I wouldn’t be able to resist to try it myself to see what I really think about it

[@therealdjap]

I thoroughly enjoy your presentations man.

[@inkusaido]

your voice is so compressed it's making me anxious

[@robostallion]

I am so happy you made this.

[@thiagogabriel9345]

great work! What's the Console?

[@TheGarageRecordingSC]

What kind of console are you using? It’s very interesting !! Great video I like your approach to mixing.

[@alexbreyer6921]

It's a Neumann. Very rare because they didn't make them very long. I think he bought the components for this one bit by bit and built it. There was one on Reverb a couple years ago for $18K.

[@TheGarageRecordingSC]

Alex Breyer Wow !! Very cool, thanks for the info Alex.

[@TilakPati]

Hi can you please make a video explaining/demonstrating the studio jargons i.e. warm, cold, sweet, shimmer, hollow, blend, glue and so on.. in engineering terms?

[@DjR3aper]

What about using a expensive mic and budget interface, will it make a huge difference? (okay treated room)

[@lolaurent5606]

L' environment sonore, la capture sont tellement plus importants que le microphone lui-même!

[@waedi73]

The instrument must sound good, the musician must play good and the room must sound good. choose the correct type of microphone, place it correctly and probably you get a good recording, also with the cheapest mic.

i mean this is the idea in the new modeling mics ... so yeah ... the reuse the eq curve you could also convert this into a Impulse response and yeah ...

[@meinwarcrafttagebuch5142]

I like your videos and I watch more ;-)

[@vincev4630]

with my AT2020s, a bit of transient boost and compress like hell. That pretty much gets the sound away from the background noise after compression. I really do envy the 0% whitenoise in vocals when i hear songs but damn, those mics cost a liver or two.

[@TheGurner1]

That's a great philosophical point, 'Make it what it wants to be'. I have an idea of using creative visualisation, to listen to the track, then try to play it back in my head as it's 'Super Self' with fairy dust on, or extra powerful - whatever the mood dictates? Having got an idea of where it wants to go, then I would try to restore what is missing, rather than add something ;-)

[@captainscarletcolclough7810]

.

[@frankjerke]

Hello from Berlin and thanks for your nice Videos. Is it possible with the *white noise frequency response* of a microphone like the Telefunken u47, to make my mic sound similar, even when I dont own the Telefunken U47?

[@audiophocus65]

Great video dude.