Mic positioning

[SamIAm]

When you mic a cab, where have you found is the best position for the mic?

S'manth x

[Bill Fitzmaurice]

That depends on the speaker. If it has a tweeter and you use it put the mic close to but not directly on the tweeter axis. If not put it close to but not directly on the axis of one of the woofers.

[Downunderwonder]

For live, as close as it will go and still sound good. This means it will pick up relatively more bass and less drums. 

[BigRedX]

If the cab has a front port as far away from this as possible.

[Dan Dare]

You should experiment to find the sweet spot on cabs that have no tweeter. On cone drivers, if you point the mic' directly at the centre of the cone, the sound will be brighter. It's often better to point it more towards the edge of the cone.

 

If you're mic'ing a cab in a live situation, you want to get the mic' as close as you can to minimise spill from other instruments, drums, etc. Using a hypercardioid mic' helps. They pick up in a narrower/tighter arc and are better at rejecting sounds from the sides and back.

 

It's also important to aim the axis of the mic' at what you want to pick up. In other words, ensure that the capsule diaphragm is flat/180 deg. to the sound source.

[SamIAm]

It's a PJB C4, two slot ports and 4x5 inch drivers 😕

S'manth x

[Buddster]

If it's not too loud to damage your hearing, put your head down there and listen. It might even be a foot or 2 away. Put the capsule where it sounds best. Then put damping materials to get rid of any room sounds. 

But that's in a studio. Agree with others to put it close in a live situation. 

[JPJ]

For bass, I always prefer DI into the desk. Mic’ing bass cabs live is a challenge, especially where you have limited space. Recording is a different matter, but I’d still take a DI feed, plus at least one close mic, and one or possibly two a metre or so away from the cab. Then mix the three signals to get your desired recorded sound. 

[Phil Starr]

Hi Smanth, with that cab I'd probably get up fairly close to one of the drivers only, rather than move out further and risk comb filtering between the different drivers. You'' also cut out other sounds like anything from the drums from feeding into the mic in a live situation. Apart from that I'd do it by ear, wearing headphones and listening to the changes as I moved the mic away from the centre of the cone towards the outside a small step at a time to find the sweet spot. Then measure the distance so you can find it again I'd only be mic'ing live if I particularly loved the sound of the cab though and even in the studio I'd be mixing it with a DI feed if I miked up at all. 

There's no right or wrong but its a lot easier to add to a clean feed DI'd from the bass than to remove distortion and eq after the feed.

[Dan Dare]

4 hours ago, Phil Starr said:

with that cab I'd probably get up fairly close to one of the drivers only, rather than move out further and risk comb filtering between the different drivers.

 

Good advice. With multi driver cabs, you should normally mic' one driver only. They should all sound the same, so for the purposes of mic'ing, that's the way to go. It can get a little more complicated - the BF multiple 10" cabs for example, where some drivers are fed a different signal and obviously cab's with tweeters or mid-range drivers. No such issues with the C4. Be aware that with close mic'ing, you are not getting any cabinet sound, but just that of the driver itself.

 

For live work, I'd agree with Phil and others that DI is the way to go.

Edited December 14, 2023 by Dan Dare