Creating Room Ambience W/ Sampled Drums

Hi folks,

I'm almost done recording a demo CD for a Beatles cover in which the drums were played on a Yamaha TD-7 and further channeled through samples from Platinum Drums and Drumkit from Hell.

As the band will record vocals in a studio, I was thinking of streaming the drum tracks into the room and recording a stereo track using a pair of matched condenser mics. The aI'm is to create ambience taking advantage of the acoustics of the studio, as in "fake" overhead mics. These tracks would be mixed alongside with the original samples.

Has anyone tried this? Any tips? Or does it sound like baloney?

Best regards,

Marcus

Comments

Thanx Guys - Will have an audio snippet in the next days ...

I'll just work hard on the panning and make sure that left goes left...

One question: should I try and process the individual pieces (i.e. eq, comp) prior to recording the fake OH ? Or leave it as is and process them during mixing?

Another thought : In the mix prior to recording the fake OH I should probably place, in regards to volume (from highest to lowest):

Cymbals;
Hi Hat;
Toms / snare
Kick

This (at least to me) would make some sense, as OH mics would probably be more sensitive to cymbals and whatever is closest ...

My worst nightmare would be getting an OH track with a kick drum blasting away...

Best,

M.

Cymbals;
Hi Hat;
Toms / snare
Kick

Actually, I would do the opposite, except watch out for too much kick. I would want to draw out the low end on the room sound to get that boomy, concert hall effect of multi-second decay. I love big, rolling thunder toms. Too much high end might just get annoying if you add in too many reflections. But that's me. Try it both ways.

For lots of fun - pipe it into the bathroom for that live "tile & Porcelain" sound. Yes, I am serious, just make sure you put a sign on the door.

cruisemates wrote:
Actually, I would do the opposite, except watch out for too much kick. I would want to draw out the low end on the room sound to get that boomy, concert hall effect of multi-second decay. I love big, rolling thunder toms. Too much high end might just get annoying if you add in too many reflections. But that's me. Try it both ways.

Pardon me. You are entirely correct. For one second there I imagined myself hearing OH's splattering in the high end. My only concern (which will only be solved by testing) is that I want the drums to sound, even if remotely, Beatles-like. This probably means that, during mixing, I shouldn't [insert favorite effect name here] it to death.

Best,

Marcus

mlessa2002 wrote: My only concern (which will only be solved by testing) is that I want the drums to sound, even if remotely, Beatles-like.

Try a ribbon over a speaker.

Preferably Coles 4038. They were used to record much of Ringo's drum overheads. But any ribbon in general will get you there more or less. Or other mics with EQ, but the ribbon is the easy way.

Speaker as "drum kit".
Coles as OH.

Mono

btw.

the distance and placement between mic and speaker may well be nothing near normal distances associated your usual kit OH's. A speaker is never going to move air like a real drummer...well no normal speaker anyway. As such, placement will most likely be closer than for a typical live kit.