Hi Jacob,
Thanks for your very full, interesting, and helpful reply! I greatly appreciate it! Brad From: Jacob Johnson [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Wednesday, March 14, 2018 3:31 PM To: William Walton <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [LUTE] recording lute on a Zoom H1n [f95103f96353870788f0e452b28f8a2759281519.png?u01086] Hi Brad, I don't have direct experience with the H1n, but I have the Zoom H1 and H4n Pro. I think they're both great products, especially for the price point. If you'd like to hear how the recording quality is, every single one of the demo recordings I have up on my site ( [1]www.johnsonguitarstudio.com ) were recorded with the H1 or the H4n Pro. Once in a while I'll record with both units, plus an external condenser pair-- that way I get 3 different stereo images to choose from or mix as I see fit. When it comes to the hardward itself I believe the onboard microphones are actually the same between H1, H1n, and H4n, so they should all sound about the same. The only major differences between the H1 and the H4n are the built in microphone preamps and the 1/4 inch/XLR jacks for external mic/pickup inputs. The H4n's mic preamps also have a lower noise floor, but in most cases that's not too much of a big deal. I usually set up my Zooms on a tripod, about 8-12 inches away from the instrument. If I'm using the H4n, I may set the mics at 90 or 120 degrees depending on how much off axis rejection I'll need. As for the device settings, I record in 96k/24bit WAV with the lo cut and auto leveler turned off. Then I set the levels so I'm getting most of my peaks somewhere between -12 to -6 on the meter. On the H1, I almost always end up with the mic gain around 60, but the H4n's preamps allow me to record at a lower gain level (usually somewhere around 45-50) with a similar result. My Zoom H1 came with Wavelab LE 7-- I think they are still packaging Wavelab with their field recorders. These days it's probably a much newer version of the DAW, but the interface and functionality should be about the same. These are the settings I usually use in Wavelab: as I mentioned my copy's a few years old, but in Wavelab 7 there are some effects plugins in the master section on the left side of the screen. In the drop down menu, under VST-3, I use the Steinberg: Roomworks SE (reverb) and the Studio EQ effect plugins. I put the EQ in the first slot, then the reverb in the second. I'm not sure that it really matters in a completely digital setting, but that's what I was taught to do a looooong time ago so I just do it out of habit. For the EQ, it gives me only 4 channels to deal with but you can place their frequencies yourself. The settings I used in this recording are as follows: band 1: set Freq to 74 hz, +13.0 gain, Q-Factor 1.0 band 2: 328 hz, +8.0 gain, Q-F 1.0 band 3: 1064 hz, -4.4 gain, Q-F 0.5 band 4: 9605 hz, +4.2 gain, Q-F 0.5 and there are two Steinberg: Roomworks SE settings I use, which are exactly the same except for the mix: Pre-Delay 33 Reverb Time 2.66 Diffusion 50 lo 100 hi 10 Mix 13, or 10 if you want a little bit less reverb. I switch between the two reverb settings depending on the particular recording. It's only a barely perceptible difference anyway. Anything over a 15% mix sounds like I'm pretending it was recorded in a cathedral or something, and that's not what I want. I use almost exactly the same settings for my classical guitar recordings, too. It's minimally invasive, and in the case of the EQ I'm just trying to counteract the response curve of the microphones, not to create an idealized timbre. You can either look at the chart in the H1n's manual and adjust the EQ settings accordingly, or you can just as easily tweak these settings by ear until it sounds like your lute. Let me know if any of that is hard to follow on your own copy of the program and I'll see if I can help you out. I look forward to hearing what you come up with! Warmest Regards, Jacob Johnson [uc?export=download&id6_gM3BRE6ZrYVVZZU5QNmJqdDQ&revid6_gM3BRE6 ZraW9nQ2U4SGNwV0tYVWxobnNBVjBsZi9FNHhzPQ] Guitar/Lute [2]www.johnsonguitarstudio.com 469.237.0625. References 1. http://www.johnsonguitarstudio.com/ 2. http://www.johnsonguitarstudio.com/ To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
