Phase?

by Temuag
(Spain)

Question

Hello, I wanted to know a little bit about phase. How can I know if something is in phase or not?

Answer

Phase is a big subject, and a very important thing to keep in mind when you are recording your tracks.

The general thing about phase is that when you are picking up a single sound source with multiple microphones placed at different positions, they pick up the sound source at different times.

When you pick up the same sound source at different positions there is a tendency that some frequencies get either amplified, or completely canceled out.

Example: Two identical sine waves picked up completely out of phase cancel each other out. Result? No sound. But a sound source picked up at the same distance by two different sources will result in double the amplitude.



A few things to keep in mind concerning phase.

• When miking up your snare drum from the top and bottom, flip the phase on the bottom one.



• If you put two microphones on a guitar combo, one on the front and the other inside the back, flip the phase on the back one.

• When recording a drum-kit, make sure your overheads are the same distance from the snare drum.

If you have two microphones picking up the same object, you just have to make sure the signal is increasing when you add the other microphone to the mix. If your sound(guitar, snare, etc) sounds weaker, then flip one of them out of phase and see if your signal gets stronger.

You want to get the most out of your recordings, and by recording things out of phase you are not recording the full range of the instrument you should be.

To learn more about recording audio, make sure you check out the recording page, or if you want to get some inspiration in your mixes, check out the mixing page.