Live recording in the Great Outdoors

[Kenneth Swauger]

Hello,
My wife and I spent a chilly weekend at a cabin in the Catoctin Mountains and I brought along the SP7 for some nature recordings.
Ken

[steveinaz]

Cool idea Ken. Did they come out as hoped?

[Kenneth Swauger]

Hello,
Yes, they turned out really well. The first recording was made at dawn and there were lots of birds chirping and a woodpecker knocking on a hollow log down in the valley to the left of the cabin. It was a great sound, very resonant and clear as a bell. The second day it rained and I was able to record the sound of rain hitting the roof and railing, very steady rain falling with a few crows cawing in the distance. It was really neat playing it back when we got home, my wife said it gave her chills to hear it.
Ken

[engtaz]

post a mp3. It would be nice to hear.

Thanks

[Kenneth Swauger]

Hello,
I'm sorry I don't have a way to do that, I don't have much digital gear. Mostly analogue.
Ken

[RuSsMaN]

Good answer Ken.

Man, I want that Stellavox.

[madmax]

Hello,
I'm sorry I don't have a way to do that, I don't have much digital gear. Mostly analogue.
Ken


You should get with polk paul and pick up some of that high falutin' digital stuff. :D
madmax

[Kenneth Swauger]

Hey Russ,
I hope I didn't come across the wrong way, I'd be happy provide anything to anybody, if I could. I just don't have any digital recording capability. A friend of mine makes some excellent sounding recordings using his laptop and a pair of really high end mics. I just like seeing those 10" reels turning round and round, seems more approachable. The microphone I was using was a Sony ECM737 which is a single stereo condenser mic with two separation settings, 90 and 120 degree. I used the 120 degree setting and it seemed to sound fine. I should have tried some 90 degree recordings and compared the results. I also have two Sony ECM 21 mics which are a poor man's high end mic. Microphones are kind of like phono cartridges, there's the "good-for-the-money" mic, like the Sony, and then the high end mics are ten times the price. I have to make a 3.5mm to DIN connector to use them. I was using a pair of Grado "open ear" style headphones which are the wrong type. I kept hearing the feed from the mic and the "real world" and I couldn't tell the difference. Of course that's what headphones are supposed to do, but it would be better to have a cupping style headphone with more isolation and still keep the fidelity.
Take care, Ken

[Kenneth Swauger]

Hey Madmax,
In fact, inside the cabin we had a really cool arrangement, Al has loaned me an iPod nano. My wife played DJ (she said she always wanted to be a radio DJ) she had downloaded some really excellent music, Clapton, Cream, Howlin' Wolf, Brue Cockburn, Muddy Waters etc from our CDs. Then I borrowed a miDock Studio and we set the iPod to shuffle. It was really good, sounded very nice and very easy to setup and take down.
Take care, Ken

[RuSsMaN]

Didn't come across wrong to me Ken, not in the least!

[jakelm]

Very nice Ken. I am so tempted to do that at the beach. But you know electronics and salty air dont mix too well.

[riglehart]

If you have a computer with a sound card, download Goldwave.

www.goldwave.com

I've been dubbing some old irreplaceable tapes to CD using this and it is pretty easy. Just get one of those RCA-mini plug converters and feed the 2 channel into your sound card and hit "record" in goldwave. There's tons of options. I downloaded it and had it working in about 20 mintues.

You can use it free in a full function evaluation mode for quite a while before they want their 50 bucks. I'm probably going to pay for it.

[madmax]

I have often thought of making recordings like that of the rain, thunderstorms, summer nights etc. Snow would be especially interesting. :D

[Kenneth Swauger]

How about the sound of one hand clapping?

[TroyD]

Btw, what's your HOME addy again?

I have something I want to, ah, MAIL you. Yeah, that's it, MAIL to you. ;)

Yes, the miDock is a tres cool item.

BDT