Recording Acoustic Guitar (My Foolproof Method) - TheRecordingRevolution.com

Here's a simple and foolproof method to record great acoustic guitar tracks in your home or project studio. It's how I record them every single time.

[combrogos]

I prefer to place my microphone at least 24 foot away and around the corner from the house as my guitar playing is so bad...

[SwordOSouls]

1:37
2:39
4:25
If you switch back and forth between the playing you can really hear the difference. Great advice here, i really like the way it sounds

[samdunkksub]

"what a lot of people do wrong is..." *proceeds to do exactly what i was doing*

[Mixthelightintogray]

Song: Facing sound hole, by 6 Inches Away

[eatacay]

To compare:
1:37 - sound hole
2:39 - 12th fret
4:25 - "both"

I would really like to compare them easily. If there were an annotation on each example, leading to the next or first one, that would be great.
Or if there were simple time codes in the description.

In any case, here are some for anyone's convenience. (including mine. lol)

[aaronjonesgospel]

I've been recording for 25 years and I still watch acoustic mic placement videos haha. It's such a dynamic instrument and can be used for so many elements that you can choose different placements each time. I like that you acknowledge that there's no "one" way to do it but this might work for you. Always good stuff Graham!

[curtisjudd]

Thanks Graham, very simple and straightforward and totally makes sense with that mic positioning.

[heyimbishu]

wow, the first two recordings i thought "those sound fine, one is heavy one is light, just choose whichever" then the final recording came along and i was mind blown! Thank you!

[philmccracken]

A technique i find interesting is to aim one microphone at the sound hole and one at the neck, then you can blend both sounds and play with the stereo field all you want.

[johnchase]

Sounds great Graham!The fun thing looking at all the excellent comments is, we can see there are endless ways to create tones and textures, yours is simply one that works well, is easy and is um... Foolproof!

[GaragebandandBeyond]

The first one is exactly how Coldplay records acoustics, that and a ton of Nashville engineers will place a mic right on front of the sound hole for a more bluegrass tone. There's always another mic, but they do point them at the sound hole a lot of times.

[samsmusichub]

This video definitely helped. I can hear the difference with the ear phones I'm using. I've been searching for great new ways to improve my sound. I've been using my PC webcam - and gone are those days. When I come back out of hiding, I want to sound drastically different. Your videos have been helping! -SV

[HectorGallegosmusic]

My friend and I recorded classical acoustic using 2 mics in stereo. BOY! what a difference that made! We love the results.

[lexluthier]

Yep, nice one Graham.
Little tip for those with electro-acoustic guitars (one with a pick-up built in). I have seen some make the mistake of just recording the output from the pick-up, which can be ok for some applications if there's lots more going on in the mix. But, if you want a really big, sonically wide (yet not boomy) sound, and you have a halfway decent condenser mic, position the mike about 2 feet from the sound hole (maybe a little more - you'll need to experiment depending on equipment) but at an angle, i.e. have the mike opposite the belly of the guitar (not the hole or the neck) but pointed at the soundhole. If you get the placement right, most of the boominess will have dissipated by the time the sound hits the mic. Now record that to one channel, and the output from the pick-up to another. You then have a kind of stereo recording - not true stereo, but meh, sort of. Now you can have some real fun while mixing - effects on one channel; clean on the other; wide-pan both for an interesting soundstage; run both clean, and straight down the middle, and you get fat, clear, full-range acoustic sound - no mud, not much string/fret noise, clarity of top end etc etc. If you don't have an electro, but do have two mics, experiment with one over the belly and one over the neck. Not quite as good, but still very versatile in the mix.
One of the nicest sounds I've got (to my battered old ears anyway) was with a little bit of chorus on the pick-up channel (takes some of the 'twang' away that's all too common on acoustic pick-ups) and a smidge of reverb on the mic channel. Then pan each by about 5%. Lush.
Keep on keepin' on bro. You're helping a lot of people out there.

[jamesstonehouse]

I'm a massive fan of the Rode NT2A. Acoustic guitar can sound really beautiful with one

[MaemiNoYume]

so. I have an advice for you. When you talk about distance using the Imperial System, try to remember to show it converted. I had to google "1 foot" to know that it's 30 cm. Okay, I know that googling something is not such a big workout, but if you just show the converted measure, it would also show that you think about your viewers, that you know your viewers aren't all North Americans. ;)
but, I can't forget to thank you! your video is very clarifying.

[rome]

I've had really good results using two mics. I put one angled toward the 12th fret and one down by the bridge. I use one bright mic and one that's a little darker. I make sure they're the same distance away from the guitar so there are no phase issues. Then after I've recorded my part I pan one hard right and one hard left. It really creates a huge sound that's still bright enough to sit in a mix.

[TheSimonarne]

i found the M/S technique this week and i love it for solo acoustic guitar tracks. you position the first mic with a cardoid pickup pattern at the 12th fret and point it towards the sound hole and once you have found a sound you like you put a second mic with a 8 pickup pattern on the top pointing to the sides. then you take the second mic duplicate it in a daw pan them to each side and flip the faze of one of the second mics and add in the first mic till you like the sound. i also grouped them into a stack and added eq to the stack instead of eq to each of the tree tracks

[SceneComparisons]

meanwhile The Boxer from Simon and Garfunkel used 7 mics for the main guitar.
"On my guitar, they had me miked with about seven mics. They had a near mic, a distant mic, a neck mic, a mic on the hole. They even miked my breathing. They miked the guitar in back. And they had an ambient mic overhead."

[Fox]

Recently I recorded an acoustic track using two condenser mics (Rode NT2000) in an A-B configuration with one facing the sound hole and another facing the 10th/12th fret, both about a foot back. I produces such a wide, full yet bright tone when I panned he the tracks hard to opposite sides! The best tone I've achieved!