Jump to content

I just got a Allen and Heath Zed10-FX, a Shure sm58 Microphone, and Adobe Audition CS6...What now?


Epikmonk3y

Recommended Posts

  • Members

I want to know how to set to gain on optimum level for my Mic for recording. I want to record Rap Vocals, as well as rock. What should I set the level at also? How come I cant monitor my sound through the headphones? Is it normal to record without hearing your own voice in the microphone? Im such an amateur at this. :/

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Interestingly, I'm writing an article right now intended for people in your position. I consider recording an input and monitoring it like a combination lock -- all the tumblers have to be at the right setting before you can do anything.

If you're trying to hear your mic as it's being processed by Audition, it sounds like what might be tripping you up is that in Audition, you need to enable input monitoring (you also have to make sure that in Audition, you specify the input to which your mic connects). Input monitoring will pick up the mic signal from the input, pass it through the computer, and send it to the output where you can hear.

The biggest problem with this scenario is that the computer will introduce some delay, called "latency." You can adjust the latency in Audition's preferences, but you can't get below some minimum amount. If the latency is too low, you'll hearing popping and crackling in the audio which indicates audio data is flowing in and out of the computer faster than the computer can handle it.

If the latency is objectionable, you can also treat the mixer like a conventional mixer, and just listen to the mic as it goes into a mixer input, along with the computer's output...but this is a whole other subject. :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • CMS Author

That mixer can be a little confusing because it has a non-standard "record" switch on the channels that sends the channel to the "record" bus that goes to the USB port. Your headphones can monitor this record bus, the main mix (which, for simple recording, will be the same signal) or the playback from the computer through the USB port. That's selected by the Record/Aux/Playback buttons just below the headphone volume control.

If those buttons are all out, you should be able to hear your mic through the headphones if you have the channel Level knob, the Main Mix knob, and the Headphones knob turned up.

When you press the Record button on a channel, that sends the signal to the USB port. You can monitor what's being recorded by pressing the Record button under the headphone level button.

What Craig's referring to is how to use your DAW program's mixer to send both what's going to the computer from the A&H mixer as well as a mix of tracks that you've already recorded, back to the headphones through the USB port. Ideally, when you're recording from a mic, you'll want to hear that mic directly from the mixer, not making a round trip through the computer. That's where I stop because you first want to figure out how to hear something. I'll let him explain the DAW monitoring and (hopefully) how to turn it off in the channel you're recording so you don't hear your mic signal in the headphones twice, once from the mixer and, a little later, from the computer.

The manual really isn't all that bad. It explains the controls, but it doesn't have any "how to record" instructions. That's what you're supposed to be born with.  ;)

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...