u/_OnTheSpots

Hello friends!

Last week my band played a gig on a very small stage, which is common for us. I have a flute player with an SM57 a few feet behind a fiddle player. When reviewing the multitracks from the evening, the -57 was picking up a lot of fiddle, which I don't want.

Here are the options I've considered:

- I don't think moving the people around is feasible; we're kind of locked into our spots for various logistical reasons.

- I was thinking of switching the -57 for a Beta58, but I feel like the small pickup field at 180 degrees would be a lateral move at best and more of a problem at worst.

- The flute player alternates between several instruments, so I don't think clip-ons or head-jointed solutions are a viable option. I also want the player to have the volume control available from being able to move relative to the mic.

- I was wondering if a clear isolation shield might be helpful, like the kind used for horns?

- Other mics I've seen recommended are the SM81 or the KSM8; that might be a hair out of my/our budget, but I'm not rejecting the idea out of hand.

- I've also seen the SM137 recommended (small-diaphragm condenser), that seems like it would fit my use-case.

I'm not too worried about feedback as all the instruments run direct and we run in-ears on most gigs of this nature.

Thoughts and suggestions welcome! Thank you.

Hello friends! Had my second gig last night with our new XR-18 setup and while it wasn't *bad*, there are some things I would want to improve on.

**Virtual Sound Check**: I think it actually went okay; I don't think I had to make any huge changes once we all got into the room and wired up (we're all running direct and/or have acoustic instruments, so I'm not overly concerned about stage volume affecting the mix after the fact). I didn't do my usual floor-walk *because* of the VSC and I that was a lapse on my part, but I think it was pretty solid overall.

**Compression**: I threw a little bit of compression on our lead singer and one of the instruments because they can spike sometimes and I can't ride the faders while I'm playing, at least not easily. I must have set it wrong though, everyone agreed the instrument was underpowered and the vocals didn't behave the way I wanted them to.

**room sound**: Here's the big one. Like many venues, I don't think this room is optimized: there's one 15" Mackie PA speaker hung from the ceiling in two different locations, and that's our lot. There's two more 15" Mackies that get used as stage monitors, but we're running IEMs so we don't need them. There's a lot of stone and wood throughout the space so there's some natural reverb that's not unpleasant, but I'm not wholly satisfied with the end product. It's plenty LOUD, and I can hear everything, but I feel like there's something else I could be doing. I also know what it is I should be hearing so I wonder if there's some bias there. Some potential solutions I came up with:

- I didn't do any EQ on the main L-R mix, it was all at the channel level; is that something I should consider?

- We have an extra aux out, I was wondering if using one of the extra Mackies as a fill/sub would be a crazy idea, take some stress off the other two mains?

Thoughts welcome, thank you!

I'm the drummer and de-facto sound tech for my band; a four-to-five piece mostly-folk arrangement: electronic percussion, fiddle, acoustic bass and guitar, three vocals, flute/whistles.

I'd gotten an XR-18 a few months ago but we'd been doing gigs where we didn't need it. Last night was the first time I deployed it under field conditions and I could not be happier with how it went.

I was able to get some multitracks of the bulk of our signal sources and was able to do a virtual soundcheck - that was so great, it felt so freeing being able to experiment with EQ and solo instruments and do as much work as I needed without the pressure of "we gotta get going, it's good enough, we'll adjust as we go, c'mon!". I was particularly happy with the vocal EQ; I didn't have to do a whole lot to it, just a little dip in one spot and a tiny boost in another.

We were also all running in-ears and while we've done it a few times before it's never gone this well. I'm the only one with the Mixing Station app but I passed my phone or just took requests for more/up down; I think the person who took the longest to get dialed in was me! It was a small stage so we all went with wired bodypacks; I stepped on my cable once or twice but nothing horrible.

Once we got going and dialed in... it was probably one of our best shows ever. Everyone smiled more, people moved more, there was so much less stress and more fun and literally everything people tout about going in-ear and digital.

I made sure to save the mix so we can use it again next time we play that venue.

I'm so happy with how the night went; I think it was the best first gig with a piece of gear I can remember in a long time. Next step I think will be taking the board tapes and learning the details of how the effects work.

No real point other than the night went really well and I wanted to share. Thanks!

Hello friends. I know the issue of the above units being used as a splitter for IEM systems has been discussed extensively, but my research hasn't giving me the answer on this particular angle.

As far as I can tell, the biggest reason to not use the 4816 for a digital splitter is because of the gain staging. We want front of house to have control at the input level from our instruments. I get this. However, when looking at the ultranet page of my mixing station app, it seems that you can set the tap points for the signal at the input level. Is the issue at that point the fact that it's a digital signal and not actual analog from the actual input?

Usually I would just follow the conventional wisdom of the analog splitter, but I'm also trying to reduce the amount of cables I need to wrestle with. So is my theory correct?

Edit, title should read gain. I was using voice to text and I'm recovering from a cold. Apologies for any confusion.