![]() You can damage the diaphragms if you subject them to too much sound pressure levels (SPL). They’re also chosen mainly for vocals and instruments like acoustic guitar, violin, and anything that doesn’t produce a signal that’s too loud and has subtleties that need to be captured. That’s why you wan’t a perfect acoustic environment, because they’ll record unwanted noises too. The reason they’re chosen is because they’re extremely sensitive and can pick up a ton of detail other types can’t. ![]() Each shines in a different application, which I’ll mention below.Ĭondenser mics are typically chosen for studio recording when you’re in a controlled environment with no noise and great acoustics, meaning sound won’t be bouncing around off of the walls and back into the mics. It’s obvious what the difference is based on their name. There are two sub-types of condenser mics, which are large diaphragm condenser mics and small diaphragm condenser mics. Use When: in the studio with low noise, recording vocals, recording guitar and other high frequency instruments, needing to capture subtle details, the sound source isn’t extremely loud. Let’s look at each individually so you can understand why they exist and when to choose them. There are three main types to remember: condenser, dynamic, and ribbon. If you remember anything from this article, this is what you want to remember. Some people break them down further and there’s always edge cases. There are others you’ll encounter, such as lapel mics (like TV hosts wear clipped to their jackets), but for the most part the above types are the ones you’ll hear about. It’s still useful to mention some other types that fit in these main categories but have such unique applications that we discuss them as being separate. Those three categories, based on the type of diaphragm used, cover the broad range encompassing all of the other sub-categories. The most important categories of mics to think about and remember are the following three: And they’re all just sub-types of the main three with different pickup patterns, so you won’t get confused at all. If you know these three mic types, then you know enough to make the right decisions for your needs.īeyond that, I’ll show you some other microphone types that you may hear about or see, but possibly never encounter a need to actually use them yourself. I’ll explain how each one performs below. The main difference is in their diaphragms, which is the mechanism that reacts to sound and converts it to an electrical signal that can then be sent out of a speaker or recorded onto magnetic tape or a computer’s memory.ĭue to the variation in the construction of the diaphragms, each of these three main types has different levels of sensitivity as well as tonal characteristics. These are the main choices used in most recording and broadcasting scenarios. In most cases most people will only ever deal with three types of microphones.
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