My first post at j.hall's new digs. Glad y'all are here. Good luck lighting a fire under indie rawk or whatever it is- I'm pretty far underground, totally invisible to radar, but I think we'll have to add an electric guitar if we're to really fit the bill here. Man, it's lonely when you just really don't fit in any box at all. One prime value is to create a band sound without mic'ed drums that is a whole sound in itself, and complete to the venue, not created at the soundboard. Getting into one-mic approaches for a whole ensemble live- keys, leslies, vibes, drums, vox, all mixed acoustically to the one mic. My thing may be a lot more hi-fi than most of this stuff here, but...
Anyway.
I'm a big connesiour (sp? I know that ain't right) of bleed- such amazing things can happen. I really like to have bleed be in phase- all mics up work together in phase. Or put it in phase with an IBP/ Just a couple/few mics. Everything live in one room.
I really love to let you hear the way 2 or 3 mics interact with their images and bleed pictures- it can have a dimensional clarity that gets lost as more mics open up. I'm sure beaucoup bleed from all kindsa mics is a thing of joy in itself, but striving for definition and punch and dimension, I like the approachable contrasts of just a couple/few.
What I do is, when I put up a mic, I try to put it up so the bleed it picks up is a beautiful sonic image in it's own right. When that nice bleed image interacts with the main mic image of the same instruments on the other mic, ah joy! That's the key, the bleed images have to be good in their own right. For my thing. YMMV if you are into lo-fi stuff.
I find that without bleed everything is appallingly sterile. I hear that a LOT. The way the various sounds interact in the room together live is just way bigger and lusher and healthier than anything canned you can apply after the fact. But you have to sacrifice total control! Yeah right, total control that won't allow you to ever achieve the size and color and energy of it all happening live in the room together, and all the combined sounds bouncing off the walls and getting it on gloriously in the air.
Bleed, but not just any bleed. Great bleed. Mics with great off-axis response pick up beautiful bleed pictures to my fussy puriste taste. Your idea of a beautiful bleed picture may be different- find ones you like and discover bliss.
I find that 8-10 feet or more of distance between mics makes for glorious dimensional bleed. For the singing acoustic guitarist, the mics are too close to be really glorious, but get them in phase with mic placement or IBP, even if you're using a null to reduce the bleed to microscopic proportions, and things get fat and present and good. If the singing acoustic guitarist is good enough use one mic and a room mic for just for the bleed, and you may find bliss.
