VO Microphones Pt. 3 – Condenser Mic Details

“Under the Hood” of a Voiceover Microphone

In Voiceover Microphones Pt. 2, I went over the three most common microphone designs you are likely to encounter: Dynamics, Ribbons, and Condensers. Between those three, the Condenser provides a nice combination of detail and sound quality, which makes it an attractive choice for recording voice.

The sensitivity of Condenser microphones is both a blessing and a curse. On the plus side, they will pick up more subtle nuance in our voice allowing us to capture depth in our performance. However, a sensitive mic will also tend to faithfully find all the flaws in our space – both background sounds/noises and acoustic issues in the space itself. It is a very common result to upgrade your microphone and have things sound initially worse. A more expensive mic suddenly “hears” all the imperfections in your recording area. As I stress in my VO recording classes, getting good sound is an iterative and ongoing process. Anytime you change one thing, it can make other aspects of your sound more obvious.

Just to say it one more time:
A microphone will never sound better than the space it is in

Large Diaphragm Condenser Microphones are Sensitive – that’s their job

A mic with such sensitivity also means two additional things – first you will need to mount the microphone in some sort of a stand. Condensers are not hand held. The other point is what i talked about in the first article – placement and position matter. The position of the microphone in the room, the distance and height from the sound source (in this case, our mouths), and the angle and direction are all variables in the equation of getting the best results from your setup.

A great microphone can sound really bad, if even one of those core variables are off.

It’s why some people fall in love with a certain mic model – it sounded great in their space, when all the particulars lined up in their favor. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course. It’s why people double down on the “…best mic EVAR” claim. But, most decent quality mics can be made to sound good by working on those simple, core variables.

What makes a certain Condenser microphone desirable?

Some of it is contemporary fashion. The sound of crooners from the 1950’s tended to be kind of mellow and warm, so the popular mics from that era tended to have that type of sound. As we shifted to digital recording systems, there was a shift toward brighter sounding mics.

A big part of how condenser mics differ starts with how they capture the sound. As you recall from the previous article, a Condenser microphone capsule uses a capacitor to capture sound. When the wafer-thin diaphragm moves in relation to the solid backing plate, it causes fluctuations in the electrical current which represents the acoustic information.

Condenser Microphone Capsule Design

There are arguably 4 basic capsule designs used in Large Diaphragm Condenser microphones. If you look through the grille of your microphone, the details of that capsule may be visible to you. For example, if your microphone has a visible wire attached to the center, it’s probably based on a Neumann design – either a K-47 or a K-67 if you need the nerd-numbers. These are “center terminated” designs. If you see no visible wire (like the capsule in the photo up top), then it’s likely a version of the AKG CK-12 capsule, which is “edge terminated”. Most of the current condenser capsules are proven designs which tend to work well (assuming the company has quality materials and manufacturing).

Each of them differ in their frequency response. Remember when I said that microphones are filters? This is where that happens. Each different capsule design tends to emphasize different frequencies as it captures the sound. The capsule type is factor #1 in providing a microphone with its characteristic sound. Of course, it’s not the only variable in the end result, but if we begin with the same type of capsule, there is a potential for two different manufacturer’s mics to sound somewhat similar.

Once the sound enters the microphone circuitry through the capsule, there are different components inside which influence the sound. In some cases, the manufacturer uses signal filtering to correct for what the capsule provides. The way the microphone handles amplification also influences the sound. Condenser microphones amplify the signal before sending it out through the cable, either by using a Tube (“Valve” in the UK) or a solid state amplification circuit. Again – this influences the sonic texture of the signal. We might describe that signal as “warm” (sort of mellow and fuller in the lower frequencies) “bright” (where the higher frequencies might be emphasized) or “neutral” (not emphasizing any particular frequency). If the sound quality is less flattering, warm could be “muted”, “muffled”, or “bass-heavy”, bright could be “harsh”, “sharp”, or “jagged”, while neutral might be perceived as lacking presence. 

But overall, a neutral microphone which has good detail will provide audio which can be further shaped by an engineer to have just the desired sonic impact. This is the “Flat Response” which audio engineers tend to like. If this were light, it would have all the colors in the visible spectrum, where a less balanced “filter” would only provide orange, red and yellow. This is why it can be helpful to look at a graph of a microphone’s frequency response. For example, if you have a ton of bass in your voice, it would be counterproductive to get a microphone which adds to that by being biased towards the lower frequencies. It would make the bass more bass-y.

A microphone which adds a lot of “character” or “coloration” to your tone might sound interesting, but it would be similar to using a lot of EQ on your signal. Since the microphone itself is adding that to your audio input signal before it is recorded, that is not something which can be easily removed. Too much extra tone can get in the way of the production workflow.

While it can be useful to offer different colors in our audio palette, it benefits us to have a neutral, detailed option as our “go-to” sound. 

Next, we’ll take a look at why some mics cost so darned much…

Microphone Basics – Microphones Pt. 1 – can be found here.

Types of microphones – Dynamics, Ribbon, & Condenser – Microphones Pt. 2 – can be found here

Condenser microphone capsule designs – how that influences sound quality – Microphones Pt. 3 – can be found here.

What exactly makes a “good” microphone for VO? – Microphones Pt. 4 – can be found here.

Recommended USB Microphones for VO – Microphones Pt. 5 – can be found here.

Recommended XLR Large Diaphragm Condenser Micrphones for VO – Microphones Pt. 6 – can be found here.

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