Samson VR88 - Manual (Page 11)

9
VR88 Applications
Strings
When recording a solo string instrument like a violin, place the VR88 one to three feet
from the instrument. When recording a string section, try to position one or more
VR88’s several feet from the players. If the size of the room permits, raise the micro-
phones three or four feet above the section and position them at a 45-degree angle,
facing down.
Drums
The VR88 is an excellent overhead microphone to record drums. For stereo overheads,
use two VR88’s approximately four feet above the kit. You can set the spread depend-
ing on how large the kit is, however, generally you position one over the hi-hat and the
other over the floor tom.
Recording Sounds With High SPL
The VR88 can handle very high SPL’s however blasts of wind can be very damaging to
the microphone’s ribbon. Therefore, you need to be certain that the microphone is not
receiving harmful blasts of air. Kick drum, electric guitar and bass amplifiers are all ex-
amples of common sound sources that can produce blasts of air that can be damaging
to your VR88. A simply way to check if there is too much wind blast, is to position your
hand where you want to place the mic, if you can feel the air blast, don’t place the mi-
crophone there. Another way to protect the ribbon from air blast is to ensure that the
microphone is positioned at a slight angle, either vertical or horizontal. It is important
that the microphone element does not take a direct blast of air, so a little bit of tilt will
help prevent harm to the ribbon.
Guitar amp
On guitar amplifiers, the VR88 will capture the nuance of the performance along
with some serious low frequency response. The round bottom end is well suited for
reproducing the warm tone of a jazz guitarist’s hollow body and also for delivering
the serious chunk desired by today’s
modern, drop down guitarists. As with
other high SLP sounds, you’ll want to
position the microphone at an angle
off-axis to the sound source. Position
the microphone two to ten inches
from the speaker and angle the mi-
crophone 7 to 15 degrees off-axis. The
side view shows a vertical positioning
technique. Figure 3.
Figure 3.