Messing With Mic Patterns – Tuesday Tech Tip

Playing with pickup patterns may make things sound better

Over the past few months, I’ve been playing a bit with various microphone pickup patterns to evaluate how they can help achieve better overall sound. Yes, it’s a bit tech-nerdy. And, it’s generally best to add this variable after you have addressed reflection issues in your recording space

One of the challenges for voice actors is that we often record in a smaller physical space which can cause issues in terms of acoustics. Sometimes the result can be a little “flat” sounding, or it can emphasize sibilance or certain frequencies (or both). If your microphone has a “figure 8”/”stereo”/“bi-polar” pattern (three names for the same thing), it’s worth experimenting to see if you end up with better overall sound. It’s usually controlled by a switch on the microphone itself.

By engaging the figure-8 switch, you change the microphone’s directional response so that it picks up from the front (where you are speaking from) and it adds a pickup node on the 180 degree side (the “back” of the mic). (Here’s an article with a quick overview on the common microphone pickup patterns) That means that sound coming in from the other side of the mic is picked up equally to what is coming in from the front.

There are two potential benefits to this approach:

1 – This pickup pattern can “open up” the sound a bit – assuming of course that the area behind the mic is well controlled acoustically.
2 – The figure-8 pattern has a much stronger refusal to sounds coming from the sides of the mic. It’s much more similar to a hypercardioid or even a shotgun mic pickup pattern.

If your recordings suddenly sound “echoey” when you try this, it likely means there are new reflections being captured by the mic. You may have to add some more damping material to your space to address that. If it just sounds a little more like you, it might be a nice improvement to your recordings.

Note – As always, hold off making any changes if you are in the middle of any production projects. This will tend to change the tonality of your recordings slightly. You may find that it does not immediately match what you recorded with the other settings.

A new mic: There’s an app for that…

A physical switch on your microphone controlling pickup patterns will generally give you discrete patterns – in other words it will be either cardioid or figure-8. But microphone companies are always coming up with something, and the designers over at Austrian Audio let you infinitely tweak the pickup pattern on their OC818 microphone via an iPhone app. Now, I’m not saying you need to run out and buy this mic, but it is pretty cool. They have a short video demonstrating this. Check it out here.

As with any change to your input – trust your ears! If it sounds wrong, it likely is.

If you aren’t sure? I’d be happy to give a quick listen. Just make a quick recording of the same script with the same vocal energy. Then upload your audio sample for a review.

Or if you want to schedule a quick one-on-one session, please use my calendar to find a time that works for you.

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