Ambisonic Recording Experiment

[inspire]

During my recording session in Matsalu, I managed to conduct an interesting experiment. I placed two stereo microphones facing each other and performed a spatial recording with these two stereo microphones.

I will soon share some exciting results from this experiment in this thread, but for now, I am adding a photo. The stand was on a bridge over the river, where a car came to fetch water. The sound of the pump was captured with two different stereo microphones.

https://on.soundcloud.com/Bjs4hr7vDYyWtoG58

[The Immoral Mr Teas]

Are you sure this is an ambisonic experiment? Ambisonics is M-S, with two or more 'S' axis, and the M being as omnidirectional as needed (or possible). From the look of the photo, you're just playing with phase.

 

Jez

[inspire]

Not sure, but:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambisonics
In my experiment mix with 1) ORTF stereo mic and 2) stereo mic VP88. So 360 degrees is covered! I have both microphones separately recorded as well (if needed).

In the second photo I show that I went to the tower to try the same thing. Unfortunately, the effect did not come as good as in the bridge where the machine took water with the pump (casual event). There was a little too strong wind in the tower!

[The Immoral Mr Teas]

"with 1) ORTF stereo mic and 2) stereo mic VP88. So 360 degrees is covered"

 

Not ambisonic then - it IS 'surround sound' assuming you route the mics to a suitable playback (L - R - Ls - Rs for instance). But if you're mixing signals together I have no idea where the experiment is going ... (certainly not an ambisonic playback).

 

J

[inspire]

When it comes to full-spherical, 360-degree audio recording, this recording technique is called ambisonic recording. I have also added these two separate stereo recordings now:

https://on.soundcloud.com/zPB7F9hghmiAER4DA

There is:
3 - 4 ORTF (Schoeps MSTC 74)
5 - 6 stereo mic VP88

In this case, yes, it is surround sound if you can direct these separately into four speakers 🙂

[cjh]

Had the chance to think outside the box on a recent shoot, built this crazy rig for it.  

 

 

[inspire]

cjh, excellent! Is that the Rode NT-SF1 you have there?
How satisfied are you with this microphone in general and with this recording method? Do you usually produce the final result in stereo or rather with four separate channels? Just out of curiosity, what are your plans moving forward?
I’ve listened to the 3D Condenser Recording with the Sennheiser Ambeo VR Mic, which is a very interesting alternative!

The Soyuz 013 Ambisonic is also a very intriguing microphone, but it’s quite expensive.

[cjh]

12 hours ago, inspire said:

cjh, excellent! Is that the Rode NT-SF1 you have there?
How satisfied are you with this microphone in general and with this recording method? Do you usually produce the final result in stereo or rather with four separate channels? Just out of curiosity, what are your plans moving forward?
I’ve listened to the 3D Condenser Recording with the Sennheiser Ambeo VR Mic, which is a very interesting alternative!

The Soyuz 013 Ambisonic is also a very intriguing microphone, but it’s quite expensive.

Yes it’s the Rode. I didn’t know much about them but luckily know some solid post mixers who do. They said bang for buck the Rode was really good and you’d he hard pressed to tell the difference between that and a more expensive ambi. I also liked that it had a reasonably good suspension and wind gag as part of the kit. Set and forget TC locked recording with large dynamic range was also a requirement so needed a 32 bit rec that was small enough for the turntable rig. It all worked really well. We did use it to rec some very quiet atmos (ext Forrest night) and it wasn’t so good for that, bit to much self noise. I think that was rec based more than from the mic.  

[inspire]

Forrest night - just the thing IMHO to record with such a ambisonic mic. Very cool! Thanks for your thoughts.

And Rode NT-SF1 Sensitivity: 30 mV @ 94 dB SPL (1 kHz) - it should be great! 🙂