I don't feel using a bit of choir is cheating at all. It helps with maintaining the facade that the audience is in tune while in reality they are often all over the place. Those are also the channels that makes crowd sound a bit fuller in the lower frequencies. It's a pretty common trick because it works really, really well. Great video!
You are extremely professional. Would love to visit your church and see your setup. Thanks for the videos, they are by far some of the bestI have seen on these topics.
Nicely presented, Stephen. Thanks for sharing this. Although I don't record in the same environment, I do incorporate similar techniques for corporate presentations in group settings. Audio is vital to the professionalism of the final product, even if the client doesn't know to accomplish it. Biggest uphill battle is letting them know that without proper forethought and planning, bad audio can ruin an otherwise great video. Keep up the good content.
I was just talking about crowd mic TODAY in church (youtube is listening hahaha). We're struggling in our lives because it's lacking crowd and ambience, it's too dry. I just send an auxiliary (mono) and there is nobody to mix it during service, I just put a preset and once in a while do some checking. But I'll do a test next service with what we got. THANKS!
Thank you sir.I am having trouble choosing mics for my church. If pulling long mic cables(30-50meter) will I not loose signal? I want to go wireless, will still get the same outcome?If so, what wireless mic will work better?
This video is really fantastic. Thank you very much for this- helped so much!
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we are now going through pandemic, in my church we are broadcasting our services from a studio... maybe you can give us some advice for best experience posible in than particular situation... thankyou very much a very good channel!
Thanks for making this video. Do you find hiss is an issue at all? I used a single Behringer C2 to do this for the first time recently. I turned up the gain until the orange light on the desk's (X32) meter was just touching the orange light. When mixing it later on my computer at home I found there was a lot of hiss on the channel. (We were planning to buy more of these mics because they're cheap and we have some for our drums already - we saw some value in having a number of reasonable quality but inexpensive mics all the same model.)
Setting time delays based off the rear omni mic as 0? Found that for me, on the Wing, time aligning from the Audience mics as 0, I was able to mix in the audience for some sermons where the word was more interactive. Or for performances like symphonic orchestra’s, string instrumental’s, using the audience mic adds the “immersive” aspect to the stream where it’s no longer just a bunch of instruments, it’s also the harmony of the music in the room with its acoustics. Hope this helps someone try somn new and creative! Or perhaps I get taught a lesson as to why that’s not a good practice.
Great video! I have one question though: what if you have a congregation where there’s a lot of screaming (in the spirit) and you don’t want to have that in the mix? Is it then good to abandon the whole concept of ambient mic? Or is there a way around that?
question for you, how do route two Crowd mic channels for Live streaming Audio output diverted from the Front of house Speakers, sent onto a single monitor without passing through the front of the house?
Depends on your mixer, but it sounds like your trying to create an aux feed for your live stream? In that case usually you can either un-assign those channels from your main output, or use a pre-fader send for your aux.
Would a delay need to be set on each set of crowd mics to match the farthest pair next to the sound booth? Or are you just taking in the raw sound to emulate as if somebody is standing in that particular spot in the room?
Thanks for the suggestion with micing. Trying to take some of your advise as part of building the live stream audio (don't really have/need a seperate FOH mix). One question I do have is with how you mic your organ - do you find that the approach of micing it similar to micing a crowd vs. micing the organ separate from the congregational microphones works better?
Awesome video!! Quick question. I have a small room with a small band, 1 PA speaker and about 30 people in the audience. Could I just use a choir mic to mic the audience? And which one would you suggest?
Sure, I'd still use at least two mics and pan them hard left and right. My first choice would be the rode NT5. If you are looking for something more inconspicuous, something like the Audio-Technica U853R works pretty well: amzn.to/2XdFVcw
This is a common question, and some people swear by time aligning the mics. I don't time align my crowd mics. The way they are used, the amount of "delay" that they have from the actual sources on stage is roughly equivalent to the amount of Predelay you would apply to a reverb effect. The way I'm using them eg. "close micing" the crowd, minimizing the PA, etc. I don't find that great a benefit to time aligning them. You would need to delay all your stage inputs to the crowd mics if you are time aligning, which when trying to keep my audio sync'd with video could start to cause issues. I'd say try it both ways, listen and see if you think it's worth the extra delay you are adding to your audio signal.
Well, we were just setting up some mikes way back by the sound booth for the audience and that’s the ones I was concerned about. We put a couple up on the light bar right above the stage, a pair of AT8035 shotguns that we had around there. Yessir, I was just going to bus everything in the mix to two busses, pan them hard and send them to LR with the required delay, and then to the embedder. But to be honest, I really like the way yours sound not being timed. I was wondering why you didn’t mention it. Praise God, that’s just something I don’t have to worry about. If everything pans out, you just blessed my socks off. We’re gonna give it a shot this Sunday my brother. Appreciate you.
Thanks for such clear explanations and illustrations. I will apply this. Also pls do you have some links to mic stands or clamps to hook up such mics from ceiling? Cuz I am already figuring I almost have no alternative location that won't have interference, other than ceiling in my sanctuary. Thanks
It really will be dependent on the mic you choose, as that will determine the sizing of the clamp. Or, a lot of hanging/choir type mics already come with an angled elbow to aim them.
One question. People at my church are concerned about crowd mics picking up private conversations. Do you turn off these mics when the people are not singing or how do you handle that? Is this a concern at your church?...Thanks
Yes, we only use the crowd mics when the congregation is singing, and slightly turned down for the sermon for crowd reaction. They are also far enough from people that it's not likely to pick out individual conversations.
Very informative. I like the content. You got my sub. Can you recommend best mic for recording live band while I'm moving around the area? I'm using a canonm50 and sonya6000.i want to get the best audio possible. Thanks.
You can. I don't. Problem I've found is while the sound coming from the PA may need to be aligned with the room mics, the crowd sound I'm using them to pick up don't and you end up with crowd sound happening before your stage sound. I've found its better to work to minimize the PA in your crowd mics compared to the crowd sound and the small (and it's usually very small) echo from the PA sounds natural.
Awesome video thank you.. what I'm actually after right now since we don't stream our service is ambient mics to fill out what the musicians are getting in their IEM monitor mixes. ..and appearance is a big concern that coupled with a worship Pastor who doesn't think ambient mics have any value...:-) but I'll probably try a single mic at the side of the stage and several feet back from the lip but also possibly test one up in our sound booth which is an elevated booth in the back wall pointing down towards the congregation and not up to the ceiling where the pa front of house speakers are
I do a lot of speaking. When I am in a fair-sized room, I use a lavalier or headset mic. But without having the audience mic'd, you don't get the sense of their reaction (laughter, applause). Is there a recommendation as to what mics I should use? Is there any way to minimize my vocal on the crowd mic, so when I mix, I don't get a clash from my audio recorder. Thanks - I really like how adept you are.
Probably what you need are shotgun mics. Place them so that they avoid the PA as much as possible and point at the crowd. Then I'd place several of them around the room - so that any individual mic doesn't have to be turned up so loud, but just hears a few people in front of that mic, when you combine all the mics together they will sound like a large crowd.
My husband records our worship/preaching on Sundays for our churches UA-cam channel. Just uses a Sony Fdr-Ax33. He spent a decent amount of money that we didn’t really have on this camera. But the the quality of the video and audio are still really rough esp audio. With out spending $1000 do you have any tips at all. On microphones/lights? Someone told DSLR camera would be better the video camera but we don’t know anything🤦🏼♀️😂
Hi, can you send me a link to your live stream in a message on my facebook page? I'll be able to give you better specific advice, especially what will have the biggest impact if I can see an example of your video.
I'm trying to decide between having 2 NT5s for our audience mics like you or having 2 shotgun mics (2 NTG2s) instead. You mention several times that you would prefer shotgun mics but they don't work in your church, but you haven't explained why. Why did you have to opt-out of shotgun mics, what were the reasons that led you to choose NT5s instead?
Good question. When I did the side by side comparison in the location I had to deal with, the NT5 sounded more natural then the shotgun. I would approach using shotguns for this application by putting multiples of them across the front of the stage to pick up multiple zones, and I just can't do that aesthetically.
@@BallastMedia Thank you very much for getting back to me on this. So you always opt for shotgun microphones in the front of stage if you are able to set them up aesthetically. I know it depends, but do you generally prefer to hang the shotgun mic from the ceiling pointing down at the crowd instead of from the stage?
Pls do you add any quantity of the crowd mic audio back to the main house mix or you only use it for the livestream? Also do you apply gates on the crowd mic audio when sending it through for the livestream in order to reduce any noise? Cuz I am wondering if the gates threshold will still be able to pick up the crowd in this case unless they really scream
a great video I will definitely stat using it. but one question I have is. do you send out the crowd voice to the Main speakers? or you just send it out to the live Video? and how do you do that...... I know I said I have one question but it end up with 3 .... would you please help me out to understand it? Thank you and God bless.
Crowd mics are only sent to the video feed, NOT in the house. We accomplish this by splitting all of our channels to a 2nd mixer that mixes the video feed. A simpler way to start doing this is to use an AUX output to feed your video. Then you can send different levels to your video mix then what is sent to the house. I talk about using an aux feed here: ua-cam.com/video/SBpx3cBn5U0/v-deo.html
Great videos! We just started livestreaminng, we have one x32. Have you found it a challenge to find an eq setting for a singer that works for floor wedges, house, and livestream? When adjusting the wedge mix I'm wondering if I should just use one eq for the bus and eq to the room for the channel eq Thanks!
Great stuff here - Just curious, do you use any saturation or distortion to open up the sound of your crowd mics? I mix a church service in post for radio broadcast, and have found that to be a very useful tool. I'm also curious what other plug-ins you are using? PS - using the choir mics isn't cheating. ;)
Haven't tried any saturation on crowd mics, I'll try that out sometime. On crowd mics, what I show in the video is mainly what has stuck, I've tried other things, but always come back to this. I do like to use TrueVerb sometimes to set it in a "space."
Hi, I am going to record a soundtrack in a church. But I have only one recording microphone. I will play the song that I made, trough the church speakers and set up the microphone somewhere. I have no experience with this. Do you have any tips for me? I have no budget :) maybe I can get a few more mics, but I only have an interface with 2 inputs. Kind Regards, Yvo
Are you playing through a sound system? It might be better to record what's coming through the mixer in to your 2 channel interface. But then use 2 aux outputs to create your stereo recording mix so you can feed your one "crowd" mic as well.
Try to minimize it, then embrace it. By that I mean, do what you can to reduce bleed (sound from one instrument getting in to another's input) Move things around, move mics, etc. Distance is the best thing you can do to reduce bleed on a stage. Then after you've done what you can, you've got to live with what you have and mix it.
Do you think it’ll help to start by using the built in mics from the Zoom H1N or H4N? I play congas for a salsa band at a club in Atlanta, and I want to start taking footage of myself. I’m thinking about running an RCA/Aux from the mixer straight into my phone with a TRS to TRRS adaptor so that the footage that I get onstage has the audio from the mixer without any loud distortion from being so close to the percussion. And to get some of the room, I was thinking about placing a zoom recorder in an elevated area to the front of the stage. What are your thoughts?
For live streaming I have a high pass and low pass filter on my master bus to remove some of the extreme high and low frequencies. (Roughly around 30hz and 16khz). Then I may or may not depending on the situation have as slight 2db boost around 200hz to give a bit better low end to mobile devices.
The only way turning up gain would damage a system, is if it's actually being used through the speakers and you get feedback or something that would cause a loud sound that might damage the speakers. If you are only using the channel for a broadcast/livestream feed, the only thing that will happen if you turn the gain up too high is that it will distort which sounds bad, but really isn't going to damage anything. For crowd mics, turn up the gain as much as you need - you may want to run a compressor on the channel to keep it under control if a sudden loud sound does occur, like a clap or something, but this isn't going to necessarily damage anything, just jump out of the mix.
Very good videos, thanks! Between Rode NTG2 and Rode M5 MP what can I choose? I wish to record audience room / aplausse and put togetter with my mix on youtube. I wish to put them on stage, left and right, in front of audience. I have a band and our events are indoor (200-500 people). Sorry for english.
Do you mean 1x NTG2 or 2x M5? Then for sure I'd go with 2 mics. But, if you can afford two of the NTG2, that would probably be the better solution. I still haven't had a chance to try out the M5, but I'm sure that either of those mics will do ok. If you have more PA sound or a louder stage, go with the shotgun mics (NTG2).
@@BallastMedia Thank you for the information. I am going to try a similar setup this weekend at my Church with a matched set of condenser microphones. Do you think adding this to my musician's in-ear monitors will help them feel like they are in the room? They say they feel isolated while wearing them.
You can if you want. I used to. It kind of depends how you are using your mics. Currently I'm not. Since I'm mostly using them to pick up a slice of the congregation and not hear the whole room, if I delayed the stage to be time aligned with the FOH mics, the congregation would be singing ahead of the stage in time. I've found the room mics being behind slightly - used in this manor as an "effect" - acts like a pre-delay on a reverb and ends up sounding more natural to my ear. (That being said there are those out there who disagree with me and insist you must time align your room mics. ;-P )
Got it so it. So I have two options. Either in front of the congregation on our stage or on the center of our back wall where the sound control room is located. On the stage it would probably be hard to put it on the middle so at one side of the stage would be my other option. Our church is rectangular with really high ceilings. The back wall is around 50 feet from the stage. The max width of our sanctuary is around 30 feet
I have a video on Grand Piano mics: ua-cam.com/video/Jpz7-8palS0/v-deo.html Any of those mics are a really good choice. It is a hard instrument to mic live on a stage.
I am using two shure choir mics to mic the crowd. My problem is that these AR mics make the mix sound distant and hollow. These mics introduce comb filtering. What can I do to avoid this comb filtering while capturing the singing of the crowd?
There really is no such thing as a "long range" mic. Different mics have different pick-up patterns, something like a shotgun mic can be considered more "directional" by rejecting some sound from the sides, but even that is very frequency dependent. Any mic is omni-directional at low frequencies. My point in the video is, yes some mics are better suited for the task, but any mic will sound better than nothing.
Ah man that sounds sweet. Ive just gotten into recording for our online church as we are currently in lockdown and I'm constantly disappointed with what I produce. I haven't gotten into room mics yet. I thought about getting a couple of large condenser mics like the Rode NT1 or Nt1A or the M5 matched pair. We have a much smaller church building that holds up to 80 people, the room is very reverbie. Your video has been helpful. Thanks. If you're interested here's my recording and mixing of our acoustic set ua-cam.com/video/fGya0FOnSc4/v-deo.html
Wow...really well done. As a 40-year veteran of production, it's nice to realize the things I don't know, then learn about them. Thanks for this!
Thanks, glad you found it useful!
Awesome videos mate ❤ Keep it coming. You are a blessing to us 🙏
Thanks, this certainly helped me create an awesome ambience sound at my venue
I don't feel using a bit of choir is cheating at all.
It helps with maintaining the facade that the audience is in tune while in reality they are often all over the place. Those are also the channels that makes crowd sound a bit fuller in the lower frequencies.
It's a pretty common trick because it works really, really well.
Great video!
This video is exactly what I was looking for, Stephen! THANK YOU!!!
You are extremely professional. Would love to visit your church and see your setup. Thanks for the videos, they are by far some of the bestI have seen on these topics.
Your quote about good audio is what i have been saying for at least a decade!!!! Great vid!!!!
Great video! This is very helpful!
Great job, the sm 58 it's my hero ever
Nicely presented, Stephen. Thanks for sharing this. Although I don't record in the same environment, I do incorporate similar techniques for corporate presentations in group settings. Audio is vital to the professionalism of the final product, even if the client doesn't know to accomplish it. Biggest uphill battle is letting them know that without proper forethought and planning, bad audio can ruin an otherwise great video. Keep up the good content.
Your content is really good man! Thank you for all you're dong :)
Great presentation, I love the detail explanation to all your video
I could give multiple likes to your work
Yes!!!!!!! It's here!! Thank you. I'll use this and work on my school's theater recording setup with the information.
Cade Allen Awesome!
Great video, thank you so much!
The AR channels sound awesome (though the choir @8:53 look like they feel miserable?)
Thanks for good advices.
I was just talking about crowd mic TODAY in church (youtube is listening hahaha). We're struggling in our lives because it's lacking crowd and ambience, it's too dry. I just send an auxiliary (mono) and there is nobody to mix it during service, I just put a preset and once in a while do some checking. But I'll do a test next service with what we got. THANKS!
Thank you sir.I am having trouble choosing mics for my church. If pulling long mic cables(30-50meter) will I not loose signal? I want to go wireless, will still get the same outcome?If so, what wireless mic will work better?
Great vid. Thanks for sharing your setup.
THANKS SO MUCH! will try this in my next concert gig.
Nice content from East Africa we say Asante sana. Meaning thank you and be blessed and your knowledge on audio is amazing.
This video is really fantastic. Thank you very much for this- helped so much!
we are now going through pandemic, in my church we are broadcasting our services from a studio... maybe you can give us some advice for best experience posible in than particular situation... thankyou very much a very good channel!
Thanks for making this video. Do you find hiss is an issue at all? I used a single Behringer C2 to do this for the first time recently. I turned up the gain until the orange light on the desk's (X32) meter was just touching the orange light. When mixing it later on my computer at home I found there was a lot of hiss on the channel. (We were planning to buy more of these mics because they're cheap and we have some for our drums already - we saw some value in having a number of reasonable quality but inexpensive mics all the same model.)
Thank you for sharing the video.. It helps a lot...
Maybe I misunderstood but I was shocked that the SM58 sounded so good. I watched this with my iPhone 8 without headphones though.
Setting time delays based off the rear omni mic as 0?
Found that for me, on the Wing, time aligning from the Audience mics as 0, I was able to mix in the audience for some sermons where the word was more interactive. Or for performances like symphonic orchestra’s, string instrumental’s, using the audience mic adds the “immersive” aspect to the stream where it’s no longer just a bunch of instruments, it’s also the harmony of the music in the room with its acoustics.
Hope this helps someone try somn new and creative! Or perhaps I get taught a lesson as to why that’s not a good practice.
If I only have 2 mics, where is the best position to catch the room ambience?
Another very helpful video.
Some time ago I got good results with 2 MXL103 at the stage aimed at audience.
Thanks again
You really know your craft, subscribed!
Thanks, appreciate it.
Thank for the video! Helpt a lot to improve our situation (current using one old omnidirectional mic).
Berjan Schroer Glad it was helpful!
Thank you very much, great professional video and information provided.
Brother do you time align the AR mics 1: 1st among themselves. Then 2: the whole AR mic bus with the main clean mix? for coherency??
Thank you, helpful.
Thanks for the content and knowdlege.
what is the churches live channel so I can watch the service?
Thanks for your videos its nice job you are doing. I got help for live streaming from your videos
Great video! I have one question though: what if you have a congregation where there’s a lot of screaming (in the spirit) and you don’t want to have that in the mix? Is it then good to abandon the whole concept of ambient mic? Or is there a way around that?
question for you, how do route two Crowd mic channels for Live streaming Audio output diverted from the Front of house Speakers, sent onto a single monitor without passing through the front of the house?
Depends on your mixer, but it sounds like your trying to create an aux feed for your live stream? In that case usually you can either un-assign those channels from your main output, or use a pre-fader send for your aux.
Would a delay need to be set on each set of crowd mics to match the farthest pair next to the sound booth? Or are you just taking in the raw sound to emulate as if somebody is standing in that particular spot in the room?
Thanks for the suggestion with micing. Trying to take some of your advise as part of building the live stream audio (don't really have/need a seperate FOH mix).
One question I do have is with how you mic your organ - do you find that the approach of micing it similar to micing a crowd vs. micing the organ separate from the congregational microphones works better?
Awesome video!! Quick question. I have a small room with a small band, 1 PA speaker and about 30 people in the audience. Could I just use a choir mic to mic the audience? And which one would you suggest?
Sure, I'd still use at least two mics and pan them hard left and right. My first choice would be the rode NT5. If you are looking for something more inconspicuous, something like the Audio-Technica U853R works pretty well: amzn.to/2XdFVcw
Great crowd sound! Do you find that your AR level has to change during the non-worship segments like, the sermon or announcements?
Yes, we usually bring it down a bit during non-worship segments.
Well done my Brother. May I ask how you are addressing time alignment on your audience mics?
This is a common question, and some people swear by time aligning the mics. I don't time align my crowd mics. The way they are used, the amount of "delay" that they have from the actual sources on stage is roughly equivalent to the amount of Predelay you would apply to a reverb effect. The way I'm using them eg. "close micing" the crowd, minimizing the PA, etc. I don't find that great a benefit to time aligning them. You would need to delay all your stage inputs to the crowd mics if you are time aligning, which when trying to keep my audio sync'd with video could start to cause issues. I'd say try it both ways, listen and see if you think it's worth the extra delay you are adding to your audio signal.
Well, we were just setting up some mikes way back by the sound booth for the audience and that’s the ones I was concerned about. We put a couple up on the light bar right above the stage, a pair of AT8035 shotguns that we had around there. Yessir, I was just going to bus everything in the mix to two busses, pan them hard and send them to LR with the required delay, and then to the embedder. But to be honest, I really like the way yours sound not being timed. I was wondering why you didn’t mention it. Praise God, that’s just something I don’t have to worry about. If everything pans out, you just blessed my socks off.
We’re gonna give it a shot this Sunday my brother. Appreciate you.
Thanks for such clear explanations and illustrations. I will apply this. Also pls do you have some links to mic stands or clamps to hook up such mics from ceiling? Cuz I am already figuring I almost have no alternative location that won't have interference, other than ceiling in my sanctuary. Thanks
It really will be dependent on the mic you choose, as that will determine the sizing of the clamp. Or, a lot of hanging/choir type mics already come with an angled elbow to aim them.
Thanks
I wish some church members get motivation to work on the sound and visual again its all on me to do everything even live stream! 😞
I feel you man.
One question. People at my church are concerned about crowd mics picking up private conversations. Do you turn off these mics when the people are not singing or how do you handle that? Is this a concern at your church?...Thanks
Yes, we only use the crowd mics when the congregation is singing, and slightly turned down for the sermon for crowd reaction. They are also far enough from people that it's not likely to pick out individual conversations.
excellent, as usual - thank you
Now if I could just get my crowd to sing like yours 😅
Very informative. I like the content. You got my sub. Can you recommend best mic for recording live band while I'm moving around the area? I'm using a canonm50 and sonya6000.i want to get the best audio possible. Thanks.
You mean a microphone to record the whole sound in the room? I'd take a look at a good stereo mic, something like the Rode Stereo Mic. amzn.to/2ZNQClO
Great video! Do you have to time delay the FOH mix to match the mics at the sound booth?
You can. I don't. Problem I've found is while the sound coming from the PA may need to be aligned with the room mics, the crowd sound I'm using them to pick up don't and you end up with crowd sound happening before your stage sound. I've found its better to work to minimize the PA in your crowd mics compared to the crowd sound and the small (and it's usually very small) echo from the PA sounds natural.
Awesome video thank you.. what I'm actually after right now since we don't stream our service is ambient mics to fill out what the musicians are getting in their IEM monitor mixes. ..and appearance is a big concern that coupled with a worship Pastor who doesn't think ambient mics have any value...:-) but I'll probably try a single mic at the side of the stage and several feet back from the lip but also possibly test one up in our sound booth which is an elevated booth in the back wall pointing down towards the congregation and not up to the ceiling where the pa front of house speakers are
This is what I use in our musicians IEMs as well and they love it for the room sound.
I do a lot of speaking. When I am in a fair-sized room, I use a lavalier or headset mic. But without having the audience mic'd, you don't get the sense of their reaction (laughter, applause). Is there a recommendation as to what mics I should use? Is there any way to minimize my vocal on the crowd mic, so when I mix, I don't get a clash from my audio recorder. Thanks - I really like how adept you are.
Probably what you need are shotgun mics. Place them so that they avoid the PA as much as possible and point at the crowd. Then I'd place several of them around the room - so that any individual mic doesn't have to be turned up so loud, but just hears a few people in front of that mic, when you combine all the mics together they will sound like a large crowd.
My husband records our worship/preaching on Sundays for our churches UA-cam channel. Just uses a Sony Fdr-Ax33. He spent a decent amount of money that we didn’t really have on this camera. But the the quality of the video and audio are still really rough esp audio. With out spending $1000 do you have any tips at all. On microphones/lights? Someone told DSLR camera would be better the video camera but we don’t know anything🤦🏼♀️😂
Hi, can you send me a link to your live stream in a message on my facebook page? I'll be able to give you better specific advice, especially what will have the biggest impact if I can see an example of your video.
Absolutely! Thank you so much for your time!
This is great! How is it possible that you don't get feedback with so many mics throughout the space though?
Those mics don't get routed to the house sound system. Only the live stream mix.
I'm trying to decide between having 2 NT5s for our audience mics like you or having 2 shotgun mics (2 NTG2s) instead. You mention several times that you would prefer shotgun mics but they don't work in your church, but you haven't explained why. Why did you have to opt-out of shotgun mics, what were the reasons that led you to choose NT5s instead?
Good question. When I did the side by side comparison in the location I had to deal with, the NT5 sounded more natural then the shotgun. I would approach using shotguns for this application by putting multiples of them across the front of the stage to pick up multiple zones, and I just can't do that aesthetically.
@@BallastMedia Thank you very much for getting back to me on this. So you always opt for shotgun microphones in the front of stage if you are able to set them up aesthetically. I know it depends, but do you generally prefer to hang the shotgun mic from the ceiling pointing down at the crowd instead of from the stage?
Pls do you add any quantity of the crowd mic audio back to the main house mix or you only use it for the livestream?
Also do you apply gates on the crowd mic audio when sending it through for the livestream in order to reduce any noise? Cuz I am wondering if the gates threshold will still be able to pick up the crowd in this case unless they really scream
Not to house, only stream. No gates.
Yes Sir, thanks and thanks for all your resources to help churches
a great video I will definitely stat using it. but one question I have is. do you send out the crowd voice to the Main speakers? or you just send it out to the live Video? and how do you do that...... I know I said I have one question but it end up with 3 .... would you please help me out to understand it? Thank you and God bless.
Crowd mics are only sent to the video feed, NOT in the house. We accomplish this by splitting all of our channels to a 2nd mixer that mixes the video feed. A simpler way to start doing this is to use an AUX output to feed your video. Then you can send different levels to your video mix then what is sent to the house. I talk about using an aux feed here: ua-cam.com/video/SBpx3cBn5U0/v-deo.html
Good job,
Brother can you upload a video on how to send your daw mix to live stream audio
Check out my newest video, I'm doing a whole series on this topic! ua-cam.com/video/dKVooCnI-_U/v-deo.html
Great Video
Great videos! We just started livestreaminng, we have one x32. Have you found it a challenge to find an eq setting for a singer that works for floor wedges, house, and livestream? When adjusting the wedge mix I'm wondering if I should just use one eq for the bus and eq to the room for the channel eq Thanks!
I'm using an X32 right now. I'm getting to know its ins & outs. Our live stream mix is on a matrix send I might change that soon.
Great stuff here - Just curious, do you use any saturation or distortion to open up the sound of your crowd mics? I mix a church service in post for radio broadcast, and have found that to be a very useful tool. I'm also curious what other plug-ins you are using? PS - using the choir mics isn't cheating. ;)
Haven't tried any saturation on crowd mics, I'll try that out sometime. On crowd mics, what I show in the video is mainly what has stuck, I've tried other things, but always come back to this. I do like to use TrueVerb sometimes to set it in a "space."
Ballast Media - thanks for your response. I’m really enjoying your videos.
Hi, I am going to record a soundtrack in a church. But I have only one recording microphone. I will play the song that I made, trough the church speakers and set up the microphone somewhere. I have no experience with this. Do you have any tips for me? I have no budget :) maybe I can get a few more mics, but I only have an interface with 2 inputs. Kind Regards, Yvo
Are you playing through a sound system? It might be better to record what's coming through the mixer in to your 2 channel interface. But then use 2 aux outputs to create your stereo recording mix so you can feed your one "crowd" mic as well.
I love that rendition of Same Power. Where can I find it?
How do you treat bleeding of sound when you want to mix.
Probably not many people who do this song with a French horn! ha! ua-cam.com/video/hrAz4GQ9jms/v-deo.html
Try to minimize it, then embrace it. By that I mean, do what you can to reduce bleed (sound from one instrument getting in to another's input) Move things around, move mics, etc. Distance is the best thing you can do to reduce bleed on a stage. Then after you've done what you can, you've got to live with what you have and mix it.
hi, can you show how to position the crowd mics. :) thanks
Hey what would you suggest for outside crowd noise , for live broadcasting football games . ?
Shotgun mics would work well for that. If you want it to sound like a large crowd, use several.
Do you think it’ll help to start by using the built in mics from the Zoom H1N or H4N? I play congas for a salsa band at a club in Atlanta, and I want to start taking footage of myself. I’m thinking about running an RCA/Aux from the mixer straight into my phone with a TRS to TRRS adaptor so that the footage that I get onstage has the audio from the mixer without any loud distortion from being so close to the percussion. And to get some of the room, I was thinking about placing a zoom recorder in an elevated area to the front of the stage. What are your thoughts?
It can't hurt, it's a place to start and begin experimenting to find the sound you want.
Hey
I wanted to ask which microphones do you recommend for amplifying a children's choir?
Thank you, Ehud
I think the Rode NT5 is a good choice for mic'ing a choir if you are putting mics on stands.
@@BallastMedia thanks you
thx!
Just what i need to know Thanks
How do you eq the master in a daw? Do you leave it flat or do you have some eq on it?
For live streaming I have a high pass and low pass filter on my master bus to remove some of the extreme high and low frequencies. (Roughly around 30hz and 16khz). Then I may or may not depending on the situation have as slight 2db boost around 200hz to give a bit better low end to mobile devices.
How high can I turn on the gains without causing damage to the system?
The only way turning up gain would damage a system, is if it's actually being used through the speakers and you get feedback or something that would cause a loud sound that might damage the speakers. If you are only using the channel for a broadcast/livestream feed, the only thing that will happen if you turn the gain up too high is that it will distort which sounds bad, but really isn't going to damage anything. For crowd mics, turn up the gain as much as you need - you may want to run a compressor on the channel to keep it under control if a sudden loud sound does occur, like a clap or something, but this isn't going to necessarily damage anything, just jump out of the mix.
@@BallastMedia thank you so very much.
Thank you!
Very good videos, thanks!
Between Rode NTG2 and Rode M5 MP what can I choose? I wish to record audience room / aplausse and put togetter with my mix on youtube. I wish to put them on stage, left and right, in front of audience. I have a band and our events are indoor (200-500 people).
Sorry for english.
Do you mean 1x NTG2 or 2x M5? Then for sure I'd go with 2 mics. But, if you can afford two of the NTG2, that would probably be the better solution. I still haven't had a chance to try out the M5, but I'm sure that either of those mics will do ok. If you have more PA sound or a louder stage, go with the shotgun mics (NTG2).
For your NT5 microphones, are you using the NT45-O omnidirectional capsules on them? Thanks.
No, the cardiod capsule.
@@BallastMedia Thank you for the information. I am going to try a similar setup this weekend at my Church with a matched set of condenser microphones.
Do you think adding this to my musician's in-ear monitors will help them feel like they are in the room? They say they feel isolated while wearing them.
@@231kickback Yes, our musicians love the room mics in their ears.
A quick question... in your daw, do you apply time alignment between your mics given the time delay factor between stage mic and the FOH position?
You can if you want. I used to. It kind of depends how you are using your mics. Currently I'm not. Since I'm mostly using them to pick up a slice of the congregation and not hear the whole room, if I delayed the stage to be time aligned with the FOH mics, the congregation would be singing ahead of the stage in time. I've found the room mics being behind slightly - used in this manor as an "effect" - acts like a pre-delay on a reverb and ends up sounding more natural to my ear. (That being said there are those out there who disagree with me and insist you must time align your room mics. ;-P )
@@BallastMedia thanx man for the quick response and answer been struggling getting the audience to sound great as yours. Will follow your tips...
Thanks for the actual captions for the Deaf :)
If you HAD to go with one mic or a pair of mics....what would you go with? Or start with?
Pair of Rode NT5
Ballast Media, I only have one channel available for this purpose. Which mic do you recommend me?
Depends where you can position it, but probably a shotgun mic or the NT5.
Got it so it. So I have two options. Either in front of the congregation on our stage or on the center of our back wall where the sound control room is located. On the stage it would probably be hard to put it on the middle so at one side of the stage would be my other option. Our church is rectangular with really high ceilings. The back wall is around 50 feet from the stage. The max width of our sanctuary is around 30 feet
does that help, based on that do you recommend a specific mic? Thanks for your help and time Ballast Media. 🙏🏽
Cool! Is it possible to get this multitrack?
Сергей Дужих Get in touch with me on my Facebook page. I can hook you up with something.
What mics is the best to install in a grand piano? We have a condenser mic in our church grand piano installed and it just did not work..
I have a video on Grand Piano mics: ua-cam.com/video/Jpz7-8palS0/v-deo.html Any of those mics are a really good choice. It is a hard instrument to mic live on a stage.
Yeah.. But thanx I'll check it out
I am using two shure choir mics to mic the crowd. My problem is that these AR mics make the mix sound distant and hollow. These mics introduce comb filtering. What can I do to avoid this comb filtering while capturing the singing of the crowd?
My guess is they are two close together. How far apart are the mics?
@@BallastMedia They are 10 feet apart from each other and 6 feet away from the source (people singing)
@@fgrondon how big is the room? That's probably too close.
@@BallastMedia 50 length by 30 width
@@BallastMedia maybe I will just eliminate one or try a phase alignment plugin. what do you think?
About how loud (dB) would you estimate you run your PA?
At the sound booth when we are loud it will measure 90dBA slow. 85-90 is common.
But SM58 is not a long range mic.
There really is no such thing as a "long range" mic. Different mics have different pick-up patterns, something like a shotgun mic can be considered more "directional" by rejecting some sound from the sides, but even that is very frequency dependent. Any mic is omni-directional at low frequencies. My point in the video is, yes some mics are better suited for the task, but any mic will sound better than nothing.
Ah man that sounds sweet. Ive just gotten into recording for our online church as we are currently in lockdown and I'm constantly disappointed with what I produce. I haven't gotten into room mics yet. I thought about getting a couple of large condenser mics like the Rode NT1 or Nt1A or the M5 matched pair. We have a much smaller church building that holds up to 80 people, the room is very reverbie. Your video has been helpful. Thanks. If you're interested here's my recording and mixing of our acoustic set ua-cam.com/video/fGya0FOnSc4/v-deo.html
If it was possible I could invite you to teach church in my country about let us pray for and God will shortly bless you and that need we have
Ooof! The Cringe is palpable folks!
Thank you!