March 10, 2025 • 34 mins
We’re back with Derek Bargaehr, co-founder and chief designer at Vanguard Microphones, for Part 2 of our deep dive into the world of boutique microphone design.
In this episode, Derek opens up about what really drives sound quality — from component selection to the subtle tweaks that can make or break a mic’s character. We also get into the realities of manufacturing in today’s world, and why Vanguard is so passionate about keeping the ‘human touch’ in their mics.
If you love gear talk and want to know what separates the good mics from the great ones, don’t miss this.
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And if you're in the market for a new Mic or killer pair of headphones, check out Austrian Audio. They've got a great range of top-shelf gear..
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
And welcome to another pro audio suite.
(00:01):
Thanks to try booth.
Don't forget the code to try pip 200.
That will get you $200 of your try boothand Austrian audio
making passion heard Ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Let's go.
Welcome. Hi. Hi. Hi.
Hello, everyone.
Audience. Audio.
(00:21):
These guys are professional and motivated.
Please text the real stars.
George with a founder of Source elements,Robert Marshall, international audio
engineer Robin Roberts.
And global voice Andrew Peters.
Thanks to tribal Austrian audio, lighting,passionate elements,
George the tech wisdom and robo and APIsinternational demos.
Find out more about us.
Check the Pro Audio Sweetcorn.
(00:43):
Line up later. Here we go. Now.
Good. Me?
You. Now.
Yeah, now.
(01:11):
is it that ribbon?
Mike seemed to react better to each.
I don't have an answer for youthere. I'd have to think about it.
I don't have one at the top of my headthat would satisfy you.
I've never thought about that before,
and I'd have to really sitand think about the science of it all.
I'd have to think about it.
I think it's because there's less EQ INGand less like a ribbon. Mike
is sort of like a ribbon to a transformer,like Mike transformer ribbon.
(01:36):
And there you go.
There's farless electronics going on there.
I will say this. Two for ribbons.
Condenser mikes tend to be like,
you know, we see those smooth EQ curveson the manufacturer website.
Those are all horse crap.
Some of them are actually,I know of one company early on that
just literally hand drew them,just pulled them out of their ass
(01:56):
and said,this is what I'm Mike sounds like.
No, I.
Won't say their name.
But it is it.
Yeah, it was a really ridiculous thing.
And I'm like, come on, guys.
But a lot of those are smoothedby an octave or a third of an octave,
and that makes themeven less useful in an octave.
But if you go look at the frequencyresponses on Audio Test Kitchen,
where they do a 10th of an octave,
(02:18):
and then you go compare itto the manufacturer
where they're doing a third of an octave.
They're much pickier than you'd think.
And I think at particularlywith K 67 style capsules,
which tend to be peakyin the sibilance area.
That means that we call itnot taking a cue, because when you boost
that, you're boosting these peaksthat are obnoxious to begin with.
(02:40):
That's my first guess.
I can't give you a scientificanswer to it, though.
I've never really thought about it.But that's just like me.
That's that's the closest thing to anexplanation I've gotten compared to just.
It seems like you can EQ a ribbonmic and get much more pleasing results.
And yeah.
But God forbid your voiceover guysuse ribbon mics,
because George would be sendinga lot of them off for repair.
(03:02):
Yeah, yeah.
And and there's, there's noiseissues and gain issues, but, it.
Seems like she has, like.
Like you can warp a ribbon micto do what you want as long as you're
willing to deal withsome of the noise issues
of all the gainand things you're doing to it.
But with a with a condenser mic,you're much better off,
like kind of leaving it aloneand saying, let's switch the mic out.
Let's try to, yeah, adjust the position.
(03:23):
As George pointed out.Exactly the position.
Or the, the, the polar pattern doeschange the Q of the mic,
not just the low frequencies,but the midnight highs as well.
People don't appreciate that.
Yeah, I really love experimentingwith not just landing on cardioid,
because that's the naturaltendency is to like cardio.
But I like I like figure eight.Yeah. Please experiment.
Like if you're in a small space
(03:44):
and you would normally not thinka figure eight makes sense, try it out.
You might be shocked sometimes.
However, if you're like meand you have a weak low frequency,
You know, you get better practicing.Your voice. Yeah, yeah.
But with Scott Rumbleto get his to sound like it wasn't like
it wasn't a thunder in the microphone,we had to go to wide cardioid.
Yeah. Yeah.
Because because all the way out the Omniyou don't have really any proximity
(04:07):
in the proximity. Yeah.So in wide cardioid you're lessening it.
Yeah. Right. Yeah.
But but another thing I do but.
Also with the finger ityou can place it better
and you can play the nulls in the room.You can. Yeah.
That's kind of.
When you're mentioning certain capsulescan have sibilant spikes in them.
You know the first thingeverybody is saying is can you do this.
Can you do this.
And I don't reach for a de-esser first.
(04:28):
I always reach for, you know, a filter, a parametric two,
so I can zoom in on that spike
and just notch it out a little bit,and then it's just beautiful after that.
Yeah.
So seven kilohertz, where my brother chipped my tooth when I was seven kilohertz.
Yeah.
No, I wish I was kidding, but I'm not.
Yeah. Yeah.
(04:50):
It's funny.
You know, we talk about to figure outI remember
I was experimentingusing figure eight as well.
And I thought it sounded fantastic.
Until one day I actually went to cardioidand then realized how much bottom
end there was. Infinity.
Yeah. Yeah.
Well, and you've got that heavy voice too,so that figure eight was just,
I mean, especially if you're riding it upclose. Yeah.
(05:10):
I was going to say the figure eight letsyou be further away
because it's going to reach outmore and so. Right.
Oh, and for the audiencedon't judge my mics on how they sound
when they're pointing to the left of mein a drywall box.
Go listen to them in your studiobefore you make a judgment.
Get it? Get upnice and close on the forest.
Come on. You got to get up nice and close.
This is Derek Berger with VanguardAudio Labs.
I don't know why I had to go sexy,but I did my finger right on this.
(05:33):
PR bit from, SNL.
Am I doing thewhat is the classic illustration?
Okay. Yeah.
The k you like this. Isthis is K. You will. See.
We will be playing. Yeah.
A fifth Symphony.
No. Yeah, yeah.
Rob. Oh,you've been dying to ask me a question.
We keep stepping on your toes.
(05:54):
And it's gone.
And it's gone out of my head.
Now it's it's going to beif you, It was completely.
It was a completely personal one.
But if let's take Andrew, for example,if you had to pick the perfect
mike out of your rangeto suit you, Andrew, where would you go?
It's going to be a questionI was going to ask as well.
Oh, geez. I mean,
I have a hard time saying not the V 13.
(06:17):
And here's why.
It's the polar patterns with the roll offand the pad make it
pretty versatile on voices.
It's it's flattering enough.
The only downside tothat is it's a tube mic
so that you have toif you're taking it places,
you gotta set up the power supplyand blah, blah.
It's one more thing that can go wrongwhen voiceover auditions.
I mean, I've been in the roomwhen they're like,
(06:38):
oh yeah, we got the female.
We got to put this out in 30swe got to do the read
and go and run itinto, Twisted Wave and send it out.
So that's one more thing.
If you've, you know,if you have to turn on the to,
the power supplyand wait for it to heat up or God forbid,
you can't figure outwhy your Mike's not working
is because the power supply cablecame out of the wall.
Don't ask me how many micsI've been trying to take apart
(06:59):
after I after I built them,and it's not working.
And the problem was an IEC cable
that came loose out of the wall socketor something like that.
You know,I'd say the V 13 would be a good
I mean, I'd love to say the V 14 just,you know, I'd love for you to give
me five grand, but,
that's a that's an American five grand.
I'm not sorry, Ganges.
Next question is, what sort of discountare you going to give me?
(07:20):
So just be careful what you. Sorry.
Andrew, what's difference in $5,000?
That's what I said. Australian pesos.
I'll take.
I'll take it over. Canadian 5000. Right.
I'll give you a tip, mate.
If you want to make a sale,just give Andrew a tip.
So I just give Andrew a hint of a bargain.
And you've probably made the sale.
(07:41):
He just can't help himself.
I know this is this magical cable tiethat comes with the microphone.
Yeah, yeah.
What about AP is bad? Yes. Bad.Yeah. Okay.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, picking mics for voicesis tricky.
But I think that, a really good one
I heard and I don't rememberwhich engineer said it.
As if you're making a sauce.
(08:02):
Take a mic that sounds likethe opposite of that sauce.
If you had a really bright sauce,
put a put a darker ribbon on it,or put a U 67 or V 13 if you've got it.
If you've got a source of nasallylike mine, you do not want a mic
that has those nasally, like, you know, 500 to 1000, 1.5 like.
Those, you know, you.
Know, that's really funny about thatthough, because, you know,
the whole thing about the UAD seven,everybody, you 87
(08:24):
gotta have a you 87 voice over you 87.
In Australiawe have a nasally tone to our.
Our exhale your accent.
Yeah.
So you put a U87 on someone in Australia.
It emphasizes the nasal.
Well, maybe that's what you want.
If you're saying,you know Crocodile Dundee.
That's right.
That's if you do it,if you're hamming it up, you know.
(08:45):
Yeah, yeah yeah. Know.
But Mike, this is a mike. Yeah.
Do you make any small diaphragm mikesor is it all I do?
Actually, there's one back here.
I don't have it hooked up.It was hooked up to the Evo eight.
Oh, I thought, but now it's not.
Oh, no.
This is a small diaphragm with a largediaphragm attachment called the lolly.
Okay, so.
This takes herethis. Oh, it's a different preamp.
(09:05):
Well, listen. Do me a favor.
Buddy. Do me a favor.
Let's place him on hold music onthe episode here and go to here like that.
Can you plug that sucker in real quick?Because I'd love to hear.
Duh duh duh.
Duh duh duh duh duh duh duh.
Duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh.
You guys are probablygonna get a pop here.
There we go.
(09:30):
Be careful.
It's it's a popping bass that we have.
That's what. It is.
Bum bum bum bum bum.
Yeah. Oh,
it could be.
Obviously, this has to get added a lot
because it will get slammed.
Yeah, I'll change it for some lift.
(09:51):
Music.
There we go.
He's back. Here we. Go.
Now. I'm back in my. Yeah.
It's kind of these take a little whileto charge up because of the circuit.
It's a charge.
The design.
There we go. It's got more heat to it.
You can back the gain,I think down just a bit. Okay. Yeah.
I'm sorry, I just bumped them.
That's pretty nice. I'mgood at this. There you go. Yeah.
(10:12):
So this is, Let me do this.
Which one's blue? This is.
And what's the other one you have?
You have the actual small diaphragmpointing straight at you, and then the
the drop. So there's a large diaphragmI'm talking into right now.
And it has a lot of proximity effect.
Actually this is an cardioid.
But it also switches to omniif you so desire.
And then the other onethat I'm going to turn up right here,
(10:33):
and it's probably going to bea little quieter,
just because of the smaller diaphragm.
This is an this is the SDC.
So it comes a four capsule standard.
It comes with an omni
hyper cardioid, cardioid and wide cardioidthat all you just screw on and take off.
I wish I had left the case outto show you guys.
But I did not think that far aheadbecause that sounds like me, doesn't it?
This is just the
(10:53):
cardioid, on there, but,yeah, we just came out with the Gen two.
The college into is not out yet.
Unfortunately, we had a break in in 2021
where they stole like250 units of metal work for the Wally.
And I have yet to recover from that.
What do they do with.
That dude is that I think they broke this.
They smashed and grabbed.
They grabbed everythingthey could off the shelf.
So they grabbed like 200 shock mounts.
(11:15):
You know, they grabbed a bunch of stuffthat wasn't finished
and then tried to sell it on Mercarithat didn't go well for them.
Oh, yeah. Let's hurry.
You know, I have to.
Offer up the light, you know, that sort of thing.
But yeah, they were selling them
and then people would buy a micfor like 75 bucks and be like,
they emailed me like, hey,I bought this mic used.
It's not working. Like,what's the serial number?
(11:35):
Because it wasn't a complete a microphone.
That's why.
Because we do we do, you know,we do a R assembly in the States.
So like those mics may not have had PCBsor maybe it didn't have certain components
in them or, you know, all sorts of thingswhere the mics weren't completed yet.
They only stole like five completedmicrophones.
But anyways,the Lolli Gen two is not out yet,
but the V1 Gen two isand it comes with the four.
(11:57):
And we also did them in black actually,
because that was the most requestedfeature.
People are like,I want to use this on stage.
We had a national orchestrain Europe saying,
I want to buy 60 of these, but we can'thave them because they're too shiny.
And these are all televised.
Oh, that's.
So we made.
So much the tape is for, oh, like.
The whole taping the entire mic.
No more residence on that. My body.
(12:19):
Yeah. But,
But, yeah, this is a
this is a small diaphragms,that I'm talking into now.
This is, this is a cardioid capsule.
I think we do have filtersand pads on the, on the small diaphragm.
No, no.
Not to get too nerdy.
If you put a screw in pad,you have to have active electronics.
And that,and that's going to mess with the signal.
(12:41):
And if you, do a pad switch,I looked for a while
to try and find a pad switchthat did not affect the signal negatively,
and I did not find one for this microphonebecause it's so small
and you have to put a slideswitch in there.
And the contacts just were not good enougheither in the high Z section for that.
By the way,you're in the high impedance section.
So you're the very yeah.
(13:01):
You're getting the negative feedback.
Yeah. Yeah. Well for the artists.
Well we're talking about itbecause you know
we've got Andrew over hereon small diaphragm
and yeah obviously sounds pretty good.
And you know for 16 small diaphragm.
So how does an artist decideif they need really
truly need a large diaphragm capsulemic versus a medium or small diaphragm.
The large that will be lower noisetypically.
(13:23):
That's one thing. Yes, that is true.
However, I will say thisI tell people and I'm a mic guy.
It is in my interestto sell you more microphone.
So when I say this, it is important thatyou understand that it's me saying it.
A lot of the times the best mic
for the job is the one you already have,and you don't know it yet.
(13:43):
There are exceptions to that.
Like let's say you have,you only have a 41 six or a 416, right?
49 you are suddenlyyou have to do an audiobook,
and that means that you have to sitlike this for hours at a time and not move
a single centimeter, because if you do,everything's going to go to hell.
And apologiesif there were plosives on that.
Small diaphragmscan be more susceptible to plosives,
(14:05):
especially when they're designed well,like this, where the diaphragm breathes
because it is one millimeterfrom that grill cloth there.
And that means that there is nowherefor that air to go but into the diaphragm.
So they have plosives much easier.
I'm not sure if you've experienced thatwith your, with your OCA there.
But with the CC eight.
This one. Yeah.
(14:26):
That'swhy I'm saying you're got to be very.
That's why I've got the.
Small diaphragm condensersgenerally like with a large diaphragm,
when you think about, you know, this mic
that I was using earlier,I'm just going to unplug it real quick.
You know, think about how much distancethere is between the grill here
and the, the capsule.
That's probably, conservatively,three quarters of an inch.
Maybe an inch.
Yeah.
And then the,Well, this is a millimeter.
(14:49):
What's. Yeah.
What's the rule?
The, the root square.
Like. Like the root mean square.
Yeah.
I mean, you go, like, twiceas far away as four times less signal.
Yeah. So again, Robert,you just have to geek out, don't you?
I do love. Nothing wrong with that.
I'm with Robert on this one.
But really the bottom line is,so with a 416 reading
a narration one, the sound is going tomaybe not be what you're looking for.
(15:12):
The tonal qualities of a four, 16or 41 six.
Apologies, Robert.
But two just the factthat you have to sit in the same spot
every time and not move an inch
while you're reading copyand turning pages and whatever.
Yeah.
Whereas if you get a mic that can do this,let me just turn this over here
and I can look at a white
(15:32):
or I could or a wide cardioidwhere I can get a little further around it
and I can move.
And it doesn't affectthe audio quality as much,
because I'll tell you right now,I'm listening to an audiobook,
and there are timeswhere you hear in between sentences
where they've clearly cut something in
after the fact, like,oh, we need to reread this
because you before a word or whatever.
And it's, it's.
It's jarring. Takes meout of the audiobook totally.
(15:52):
You know,and that's like I'm an audio guy.
So I would notice that.
But even my wife goes, that was weird.What's going on?
Yeah, yeah.
It like it takes her out of it.
And she's not she it's as far from audio,but she doesn't want to do it.
My it's like ADR for audiobooks.
Yeah, exactly.
So it's I think that,I think that it's really important
(16:13):
to think about like ultimately mixerpaint brushes, right?
Like, if you're Bob Ross,you're not using your, your,
your two inch brush to sign it or,you know, do your tree trunks,
you're not using your, your, your, linerbrush for the happy little clouds.
Right. You've got different brushesfor different things.
And ultimately these are tools
and you have to treat them aswhat is this tool good at?
Now, that being said, you know,if you want an all around Mike,
(16:37):
I would say go with, with eithera large diaphragm or a small diaphragm
that has a wider patternpickup pattern than like A4416 or a 41.
Yeah. Apologies.
Yeah, I, I know that you're goingto get used to saying that.
Why are we saying 41 six?
Because we change the world.
Because wewhen we first started this program,
we had 416that we call it here in Australia.
(16:58):
And you guys call it the what was 2016.
So we decided we'd find some middle groundand create our own name.
So the 4141
and now and now when I freelance,
I walk into the studio and I'll say,is there 41 six around someone?
Now look at me and go, what?
What do you have?
Like the guy on. Three, four, one six.Yeah.
Can you give me the Neumann? You 87.
Yeah.
(17:18):
It's like give away from the console now.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But, Yeah, the Neumann.
Neumann was the guy on Seinfeld.Yeah. I was gonna say.
I mean, yeah.
He turned 67.
So when Neumann on Seinfeld turned 67.
I just.
I missed they missed a really awesome joke on.
(17:39):
Oh, yeah. Yeah,yeah, exactly. Three people. What?
I got that.
All right, so I'm gonna bring it back,and I need them.
I was just going to say just quickly.
Just while we were on. On Derek's point.
Sorry, George,but just while we were on that point
about microphones,
I was going to say, though, there aremicrophones that sort of give you that
sort of quality that you're talking about,that high top end like the 41 six,
(18:00):
like the, the, 90 100, yeah.
The 91 or the okay.
6016 both sort of have that hypeat the top end, but being large capsules
sort of give you that luxury of,as you say, being able to.
Yeah, move around a little bit.
So, you know.
It's funny though, we I was at ScottRumbles the first time I got introduced to
(18:22):
voice over is like a marketfor microphones was Scott Rumble.
I met him at Namand he's like I've been looking
for a new microphone to do narrationon, and I have a 416.
And I was wondering if you had anything.
And he lived not that far from me.
At the time he was in Yorba Linda.I was an upland.
It was an easy drive for me,so I took down two mikes to him
and we sat there for the dayand we played with the V 13,
(18:43):
and I got to listen to Scott Rumbleto Scott Rumble things.
And so he had it running into an Avalon.
What is 70.
737 737 yeah.
767 is a, airline thing.
But, he had it running into the Avalonthat has Nic and stuff like that.
And so we were playing around with it, andhe was like, I love this for narration.
(19:03):
I love the setting you've got for that.
Can we make this sound like a 416just for fun?
So we started playing with the EQ andwe started playing with the polar pattern.
We got really close
and then his agent calls and he's like,hey man, you're reading, what is it?
Valerianand the city of a Thousand Planets,
or it was a scifi movie from back in the day.
It's like you're doing the read for this.
You're on and, like, a minute,and I panic and I grab it for 16.
(19:27):
I'm trying to,because he only has one input
right at that time, and I'm tryingto put everything back together.
He goes,no, no, no, let's just see if they notice.
And they Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's you. Know.
And so he gets on there like, Scotty,you're doing something different today.
You sound really good.And he looks at me and he goes, no,
that's how he does the read Valerian.
You know, you know, doing like sixdifferent takes of it or whatever.
(19:47):
And, you know, five minutes later,he's, he's probably
several thousand dollars richerbecause that's the way it works.
And it's amazing.
And, then like a month later,I'm watching Hulu and that comes on.
I'm like, oh.
Shit, that's my microphone.
That's cool. Yeah, yeah.
That's that's that's the story stuffyou want to put up on your website.
Right. That's an. Yeah, I think I have.
(20:09):
As you Sean.
I'm, I'm,clipping here. Apologies. I, it.
Just reminds meof one of our first episodes,
and we did a shoot outand we were all ready when the 91.
Not the 91 day, but the 91, I believe,was the closest to the 41 six.
And we were just like, how could that be?
There's there's no farther apart as faras construction and design and everything.
(20:34):
But they really did was us.
Yeah. It was that was so bizarre.
We had I think I just broughtall of my mikes out and line them up.
I think that. Sounds likeit's a considerable collection.
But don't start serious over herefor another hour.
Yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah.
So here's my question that I, that I had,
(20:56):
Josephson, I don't know if you're familiarwith with them as a.
Yeah. Yeah.
And I think also the new Sony
and you don't seea lot of mikes to do this,
but they take a large diaphragmand a small diaphragm
and they put them in one,and then they blend them electronically.
And I was wondering,what's your thought on that.
Where are the pitfalls of that?
I imagine there'ssome phase issues at least.
(21:17):
But in theorythere could be phase issues there.
Unless you're up in so closethere's probably in frequency
domain that it doesn't matter. Right.
So like my stereo mic for instance.
Let's say I don't have the stereo micwith me, but you can.
Just step our capsules, right.
Yeah, yeah.
And so our other stereo mikesand there's still face coincident
(21:37):
where it matters in the, in the frequencydomain that humans hear.
Unless you're recording from halfan inch away.
In which case,what are you doing with a stereo mic.
Right. Okay.Half an inch right from your. Yeah.
Because now it's like a distant now.
So it's a factor of the source. Right.
Exactly. Right.So it's a it's a factor of the source dis.
And so I think it's smartin a number of ways.
Obviously you have to think abouthow they're blending it.
(22:01):
Whether they're on separate circuitsthat they're then blending it in
or whether they're just doing itadditively in the high impedance section,
because that can causeI mean, they've thought about this.
They thought about capacitive problemsand things like that.
But all that being said,I don't think it's a bad idea.
I wish I had it here.
I had a prototype at one pointthat I 3D printed that was a 67,
a 47 and a K 12 style capsule.
(22:23):
All in one. Had that. Big bass.
Printed amount and you could in theory,the idea was I was going to put
three circuits in the mic
and have you be able to blendbetween them with a blend pot?
It didn't work outfor a number of reasons.
Not the least of which it looked like apickleball racket when you think about it.
Yeah.
(22:44):
But, but yeah, it was just something I tried
because I was kind of inspired by aby a similar.
I don't remember who does this.
I think it might have been Audio Technicawhere they had four rectangular.
Yeah. It'sAudio Technica has got four for.
Yep. Exactly.
Yeah. And there's, there's advantagesand disadvantages to all that.
You know like all of its balanceultimately.
(23:05):
And and I think the bottom line isis it musical.
Does it serve the artist.
Does it serve what they're doing.
And if you lose sight of that then why?
I mean, you're either in it for the moneyor your ego or what have you.
And I think
I think it's more it's more funto be supporting artists and what they do.
Like I just make paint brushes, you know,ultimately they're fancy, expensive, sexy
looking paint brushes.
(23:25):
So whichwhich one is the Bob Ross spatula?
Like, you know, like.
Oh, the palette knife.
Yeah.
He was he was rather versatilewith the palette knife was.
It's like a carbon mike or something.
Yeah.
I don't,I don't know, I'd have to really I,
if I had to sit downand make a, put a microphone on all of
that seems like a, like a meme that I needto do a Bob Ross microphone project.
(23:48):
But yeah,I'm, I'd have to think about that.
But, yeah,I think that they're tools ultimately.
And like we do obsess over our toolsas, as artists.
And sometimes I think to our detriment,I think we lose the forest
through the trees and and going backto what George said, like, ultimately,
if you got to really turnin a really great voice over performance
(24:08):
on your iPhone mic for this,you know, cartoon character audition,
they can put a better mic in front of you.
They can't, you know,
they can't turn you into a better viewartist necessarily, right?
Yeah. Easily.
You know, so it'sI think I think it's really easy
to do what I didwhen I was in junior high and high school
and focus on the toolsand not the instrument.
(24:30):
Now it put me here, which mayor may not be a good thing to have me
on, depending on the day you ask me,I'll say whether it's a good thing or not.
But ultimately it's it's a tool.
And the art comes first.
And if this tool isn't serving the art,that's when you go buy a new tool.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, or if you've got a lot of money
and you want to supporta boutique manufacturer.
(24:51):
Speaking of new speaking of new tools,before your natural daylight
fades into darkness. And you.
Because you're. I could tellit's getting darker in Europe.
Yeah, it's.
Like I said, this has happened,like. Wow.
And he has to go in a minute.So Joyce, you got to go.
So new mics.
Are there any.
Yeah I mean notthat you haven't had enough to do already.
Yes. I'm coming out with a very limitedquantity of a small diaphragm to mic.
(25:15):
At the request of one of my buddies,I was going to build a pair for him
and I was like, I helped buildlike ten pairs and see if they sell.
Like I talked about, like a new vista.
Yeah. The, not a new vista.
I've actually got them over there.The peanut, the sub miniature tubes.
That. Yeah.
So that's the only way you can do them.
Pretty much in a SDC.
Unless it's a small diaphragmcapsule on a big, fat, big, chunky body.
(25:36):
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I'm doing that.
I've got some other ideasthat may or may not come to daylight.
I, you know, I've developed projects
that never go anywherebecause I'm like, ultimately, this doesn't
do what we need it to do or whatthe artist needs it to do.
So you go back to the drawing board,you try again, or maybe you let that part
(25:57):
cook a little longerand you come back to it.
I've got the V7 is another one.
I'm sure you saw it at Nam a couple times
because we're going to release itand we never did.
It's a nine patternfat mic with the pattern selectable
on the front of the mic,and then it also has swappable capsules,
so you were able to swap outif you want a K 67 or a U 40 or 47.
That's like the Kirby system,right? Kirby.
(26:18):
Yes, yes.
But without dealing with,with the difficulties
that was dealing withTracy Kirby sometimes. So.
Yeah.
And then another company does it nowactually, Luke Audio does a swappable
bayonet system that they that that I, thatI understand is a pretty good one too.
And the blue the blue bottle is comingback with a new name and a new month.
Are theyare they really resurrecting my audio?
(26:39):
A lot. Of microphones. Yeah,I talked to the guy.
Oh, look at that.
They're blue.
Dirtied their name with the frickin Yeti.
Yeah, I talked to the guy.
I talked to the guywho had a mockup of the body,
and he was like,we're starting over. And I'm going to be.
Oh, yeah. Go.
They sold.They sold it to Logitech. Right?
So blue is in blueon. The strength of the USB mics.
And then Logitech said,what do we need this Pro audio stuff for.
(26:59):
Yeah, but they really kind of crappedon that name.
I thought it was sadbecause blue had some wonderful.
Minecraft on the name to the tune of $192million, and sold it to Logitech.
Everybody has a price to.
Yeah, bring on the.
I gotta pay it.
You know, I gottaI gotta pay a quarter of $1 billion
or a fifth of $1 billionfor you to design a USB mic.
(27:22):
That's going to be an Apple Stores.
I'd be like, yeah, okay, okay. I mean,
the genius of blue was it was the Yetithat the Yeti, as bad as it was the.
Yeti in the circle, man. Yeah. Marketing.
Marketing. Gold.
Sorry to bring up those names, but,you know.
It came up.
No, man, no, man.
It like people needed USB.
(27:43):
They designed something
that somebodywas not an audio person at all
that wanted to start a podcast could useget a decent sound and a drywall box.
And oh, this is if you have two people,you put it right here in between them.
And this is figure eight.
And if you have a bunch of people,you put it in omni like they
they dumbed it down for people.
And they also made itdarn near indestructible.
(28:04):
Because that thing,
if you ever picked up a Yetiwith like the cast iron base on it,
that thing could have been a weaponin the board game.
Like it was so much fun.
It's a Yeti bike with. A.
Buddy in the studiowith the Yeti in the kitchen.
That thing would break so heavy.
It was so heavy, so never.
So never a USB mike from Vanguard.
(28:25):
Or probably not, but never say never.
You know, if you have aif you have $192 million, you
all all right? Price?
Just let him know.
Yeah, yeah, yeah,he'll have it made tomorrow.
No, it's some other ideas too.
And it's you know,I think my biggest thing right now
is I've been looking. And George,you know about this.
I've talked to you about this.
Ken died in March, rather unexpectedly.
(28:47):
And we were both are both engineers,you know, and engineers running companies
doesn't go so well.
So I've been lookingfor a new business partner to come in
and run the business side of it,because it's no fun to do accounting
when I could be designing microphones,you know, or it's
no fun to be doing, vendor managementwhen I could be doing microphones.
So, that's been my primary concernfor the last nine years.
(29:11):
Yeah,I was trying to find the right person
to join up with and continue thisso that, you know, ultimately not to not.
This is a call for resumes, but the.
Pro audio suite is goingwhere we've we've got the voice
has poured out and I'm not sure, butwe might need a line of microphones too.
I was. Going to say, once we've made.
A little bit.
About. The ideas for vo vo mics and,
(29:33):
on my list.
Once, once, Michaelsay I'm millions for the possible.
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
They will not be buying in.
Yeah, yeah. I've.
Yeah I thought it
you know if anybody is interestedin partnering on a microphone company
that has the right qualificationsand listens to pro audio suite.
That is a narrow Venn diagram, man. Hey.
Yeah. Venn diagram.
Looks like Madonna's.
(29:54):
Boobs. I'm sorry.
My my mom hasn't got that sort of money,mate.
I'm sorry.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, just,Just all the way out here.
Okay.
So you got it. You've got a baby.
But before we, Before you do, becauseI know you got a hot out before you do.
If I want to buy a Vanguard. Mike.
Come on, give us. Do the sell. This is.
This is your sales hat moment, mate.
So if you like stupid industry,you know, niche audio memes
(30:17):
and also looking at microphones,
follow us on Facebook and Instagramat Vanguard Audio Labs for both of them.
I'm not on X or Twitter becauseit was a tire fire before it became Ax.
And I also to buy the microphones.
We do sell direct in the United Statesas well as have dealers.
So you can go to shop
dot Vanguard Audio labs.comif you want to feed our foster dog.
(30:38):
That's a great way to do it. And
you can also go to Vintage King and ProAudio
star and guitar Center slash musicianstrand, and a number of other retailers.
If you're interested in supporting yourlocal retailer, I don't mind that either.
If you just go to our website and clickFind a Dealer if you're in Australia or,
wherever else these other guys are,then you can go to find a dealer
(31:00):
and we're distributed in 78 countries,I believe.
So wow, wow.You should be able to find us.
Yeah, I think so.
And where are you right now?
I'm in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Philly.
George, George is going to get a walk.
Yeah,me and George have talked about this.
Go birds and all that. New Yorkup next time.
Well yeah visiting that it. Is a palooza.
Also in that area I.
(31:22):
Think he's somewhereI think he's in Virginia. Virginia.
My old room near Virginia Tech actually.
Yeah.
He's he's downAlexandria way, if I'm not mistaken.
But if you do make repairs,I will be contacting you because I have.
Yes, I do lots of make repairs.
I have some 80 sevensthat have mysteriously low gain.
Don't know why.
(31:42):
80 sevens.
Who made those 80 sevens?
Like, like 80. 708.
I thought you said a is isand mean just like derecho.
Yes. 8780. Seven.
Slow game.
That's an easy fix. I canI can help you with that.
Oh, say original 80 sevens. Are I.
Their originals.
Yeah. Okay.
Yeah I, I do three of thosea month and that.
(32:05):
Okay. Capacitors I reckon.
Tantalum capacitors or the fat bias.
Yeah.
The fat, the bias I need bias.
Almost everyone that comes in.
Yeah.
These these these were,these were reworked by by Ben.
Can you say fat bias these days?
Isn't that, like shaming namesake.
Yeah.
I do that. I know that that in in.
(32:26):
Yeah. Here in Australia. Right. Rob.
Oh yeah. Yeah.
So so I mean I know that the a and the earkind of an interchangeable
thing for your accentbut it's the fat field effect transistor.
Okay.
Now tell me now tell me no.
And add 16 hours to the end of it. No.
No no no no
no. And I
(32:47):
and he never sold another microphonein Australia again.
See my much you.
What you would hear from an Aussie is memicrophones fact.
Can you fix it for me?
You said all those hoursthat the British got rid of.
You're like we'll take all of us.
We'll just take all of themand bring them here.
Yeah, it's.
I'm yet to hear someone do a good Aussieaccent who's not an Aussie.
(33:09):
Oh, well, I tell.
You to my manager, Curtis,I'm here on that round.
Australians. And he nails it.I got to say.
Get to send me a filebecause I'd love to hear it.
Yeah, yeah.
I will
Well, that was fun.
Is it over?
(33:30):
The audio. Sweet.
Thanks to tribal and Austrian audiorecorded using Sonos Connect.
Edited by Andrew Peters and mixed byBhutan Radio Imaging with tech support.
If you wish to check with them, don'tforget to subscribe to the show
and join the conversationon our Facebook group to leave a comment.
Suggest a topic or just say goodbye.
Drop us a note at our website.
(33:51):
Protea suite.com.
And welcome to another pro audio suite.
(00:01):
Thanks to try booth.
Don't forget the code to try pip 200.
That will get you $200 of your try boothand Austrian audio
making passion heard Ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Let's go.
Welcome. Hi. Hi. Hi.
Hello, everyone.
Audience. Audio.
(00:21):
These guys are professional and motivated.
Please text the real stars.
George with a founder of Source elements,Robert Marshall, international audio
engineer Robin Roberts.
And global voice Andrew Peters.
Thanks to tribal Austrian audio, lighting,passionate elements,
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(00:43):
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You. Now.
Yeah, now.
(01:11):
is it that ribbon?
Mike seemed to react better to each.
I don't have an answer for youthere. I'd have to think about it.
I don't have one at the top of my headthat would satisfy you.
I've never thought about that before,
and I'd have to really sitand think about the science of it all.
I'd have to think about it.
I think it's because there's less EQ INGand less like a ribbon. Mike
is sort of like a ribbon to a transformer,like Mike transformer ribbon.
(01:36):
And there you go.
There's farless electronics going on there.
I will say this. Two for ribbons.
Condenser mikes tend to be like,
you know, we see those smooth EQ curveson the manufacturer website.
Those are all horse crap.
Some of them are actually,I know of one company early on that
just literally hand drew them,just pulled them out of their ass
(01:56):
and said,this is what I'm Mike sounds like.
No, I.
Won't say their name.
But it is it.
Yeah, it was a really ridiculous thing.
And I'm like, come on, guys.
But a lot of those are smoothedby an octave or a third of an octave,
and that makes themeven less useful in an octave.
But if you go look at the frequencyresponses on Audio Test Kitchen,
where they do a 10th of an octave,
(02:18):
and then you go compare itto the manufacturer
where they're doing a third of an octave.
They're much pickier than you'd think.
And I think at particularlywith K 67 style capsules,
which tend to be peakyin the sibilance area.
That means that we call itnot taking a cue, because when you boost
that, you're boosting these peaksthat are obnoxious to begin with.
(02:40):
That's my first guess.
I can't give you a scientificanswer to it, though.
I've never really thought about it.But that's just like me.
That's that's the closest thing to anexplanation I've gotten compared to just.
It seems like you can EQ a ribbonmic and get much more pleasing results.
And yeah.
But God forbid your voiceover guysuse ribbon mics,
because George would be sendinga lot of them off for repair.
(03:02):
Yeah, yeah.
And and there's, there's noiseissues and gain issues, but, it.
Seems like she has, like.
Like you can warp a ribbon micto do what you want as long as you're
willing to deal withsome of the noise issues
of all the gainand things you're doing to it.
But with a with a condenser mic,you're much better off,
like kind of leaving it aloneand saying, let's switch the mic out.
Let's try to, yeah, adjust the position.
(03:23):
As George pointed out.Exactly the position.
Or the, the, the polar pattern doeschange the Q of the mic,
not just the low frequencies,but the midnight highs as well.
People don't appreciate that.
Yeah, I really love experimentingwith not just landing on cardioid,
because that's the naturaltendency is to like cardio.
But I like I like figure eight.Yeah. Please experiment.
Like if you're in a small space
(03:44):
and you would normally not thinka figure eight makes sense, try it out.
You might be shocked sometimes.
However, if you're like meand you have a weak low frequency,
You know, you get better practicing.Your voice. Yeah, yeah.
But with Scott Rumbleto get his to sound like it wasn't like
it wasn't a thunder in the microphone,we had to go to wide cardioid.
Yeah. Yeah.
Because because all the way out the Omniyou don't have really any proximity
(04:07):
in the proximity. Yeah.So in wide cardioid you're lessening it.
Yeah. Right. Yeah.
But but another thing I do but.
Also with the finger ityou can place it better
and you can play the nulls in the room.You can. Yeah.
That's kind of.
When you're mentioning certain capsulescan have sibilant spikes in them.
You know the first thingeverybody is saying is can you do this.
Can you do this.
And I don't reach for a de-esser first.
(04:28):
I always reach for, you know, a filter, a parametric two,
so I can zoom in on that spike
and just notch it out a little bit,and then it's just beautiful after that.
Yeah.
So seven kilohertz, where my brother chipped my tooth when I was seven kilohertz.
Yeah.
No, I wish I was kidding, but I'm not.
Yeah. Yeah.
(04:50):
It's funny.
You know, we talk about to figure outI remember
I was experimentingusing figure eight as well.
And I thought it sounded fantastic.
Until one day I actually went to cardioidand then realized how much bottom
end there was. Infinity.
Yeah. Yeah.
Well, and you've got that heavy voice too,so that figure eight was just,
I mean, especially if you're riding it upclose. Yeah.
(05:10):
I was going to say the figure eight letsyou be further away
because it's going to reach outmore and so. Right.
Oh, and for the audiencedon't judge my mics on how they sound
when they're pointing to the left of mein a drywall box.
Go listen to them in your studiobefore you make a judgment.
Get it? Get upnice and close on the forest.
Come on. You got to get up nice and close.
This is Derek Berger with VanguardAudio Labs.
I don't know why I had to go sexy,but I did my finger right on this.
(05:33):
PR bit from, SNL.
Am I doing thewhat is the classic illustration?
Okay. Yeah.
The k you like this. Isthis is K. You will. See.
We will be playing. Yeah.
A fifth Symphony.
No. Yeah, yeah.
Rob. Oh,you've been dying to ask me a question.
We keep stepping on your toes.
(05:54):
And it's gone.
And it's gone out of my head.
Now it's it's going to beif you, It was completely.
It was a completely personal one.
But if let's take Andrew, for example,if you had to pick the perfect
mike out of your rangeto suit you, Andrew, where would you go?
It's going to be a questionI was going to ask as well.
Oh, geez. I mean,
I have a hard time saying not the V 13.
(06:17):
And here's why.
It's the polar patterns with the roll offand the pad make it
pretty versatile on voices.
It's it's flattering enough.
The only downside tothat is it's a tube mic
so that you have toif you're taking it places,
you gotta set up the power supplyand blah, blah.
It's one more thing that can go wrongwhen voiceover auditions.
I mean, I've been in the roomwhen they're like,
(06:38):
oh yeah, we got the female.
We got to put this out in 30swe got to do the read
and go and run itinto, Twisted Wave and send it out.
So that's one more thing.
If you've, you know,if you have to turn on the to,
the power supplyand wait for it to heat up or God forbid,
you can't figure outwhy your Mike's not working
is because the power supply cablecame out of the wall.
Don't ask me how many micsI've been trying to take apart
(06:59):
after I after I built them,and it's not working.
And the problem was an IEC cable
that came loose out of the wall socketor something like that.
You know,I'd say the V 13 would be a good
I mean, I'd love to say the V 14 just,you know, I'd love for you to give
me five grand, but,
that's a that's an American five grand.
I'm not sorry, Ganges.
Next question is, what sort of discountare you going to give me?
(07:20):
So just be careful what you. Sorry.
Andrew, what's difference in $5,000?
That's what I said. Australian pesos.
I'll take.
I'll take it over. Canadian 5000. Right.
I'll give you a tip, mate.
If you want to make a sale,just give Andrew a tip.
So I just give Andrew a hint of a bargain.
And you've probably made the sale.
(07:41):
He just can't help himself.
I know this is this magical cable tiethat comes with the microphone.
Yeah, yeah.
What about AP is bad? Yes. Bad.Yeah. Okay.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, picking mics for voicesis tricky.
But I think that, a really good one
I heard and I don't rememberwhich engineer said it.
As if you're making a sauce.
(08:02):
Take a mic that sounds likethe opposite of that sauce.
If you had a really bright sauce,
put a put a darker ribbon on it,or put a U 67 or V 13 if you've got it.
If you've got a source of nasallylike mine, you do not want a mic
that has those nasally, like, you know, 500 to 1000, 1.5 like.
Those, you know, you.
Know, that's really funny about thatthough, because, you know,
the whole thing about the UAD seven,everybody, you 87
(08:24):
gotta have a you 87 voice over you 87.
In Australiawe have a nasally tone to our.
Our exhale your accent.
Yeah.
So you put a U87 on someone in Australia.
It emphasizes the nasal.
Well, maybe that's what you want.
If you're saying,you know Crocodile Dundee.
That's right.
That's if you do it,if you're hamming it up, you know.
(08:45):
Yeah, yeah yeah. Know.
But Mike, this is a mike. Yeah.
Do you make any small diaphragm mikesor is it all I do?
Actually, there's one back here.
I don't have it hooked up.It was hooked up to the Evo eight.
Oh, I thought, but now it's not.
Oh, no.
This is a small diaphragm with a largediaphragm attachment called the lolly.
Okay, so.
This takes herethis. Oh, it's a different preamp.
(09:05):
Well, listen. Do me a favor.
Buddy. Do me a favor.
Let's place him on hold music onthe episode here and go to here like that.
Can you plug that sucker in real quick?Because I'd love to hear.
Duh duh duh.
Duh duh duh duh duh duh duh.
Duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh.
You guys are probablygonna get a pop here.
There we go.
(09:30):
Be careful.
It's it's a popping bass that we have.
That's what. It is.
Bum bum bum bum bum.
Yeah. Oh,
it could be.
Obviously, this has to get added a lot
because it will get slammed.
Yeah, I'll change it for some lift.
(09:51):
Music.
There we go.
He's back. Here we. Go.
Now. I'm back in my. Yeah.
It's kind of these take a little whileto charge up because of the circuit.
It's a charge.
The design.
There we go. It's got more heat to it.
You can back the gain,I think down just a bit. Okay. Yeah.
I'm sorry, I just bumped them.
That's pretty nice. I'mgood at this. There you go. Yeah.
(10:12):
So this is, Let me do this.
Which one's blue? This is.
And what's the other one you have?
You have the actual small diaphragmpointing straight at you, and then the
the drop. So there's a large diaphragmI'm talking into right now.
And it has a lot of proximity effect.
Actually this is an cardioid.
But it also switches to omniif you so desire.
And then the other onethat I'm going to turn up right here,
(10:33):
and it's probably going to bea little quieter,
just because of the smaller diaphragm.
This is an this is the SDC.
So it comes a four capsule standard.
It comes with an omni
hyper cardioid, cardioid and wide cardioidthat all you just screw on and take off.
I wish I had left the case outto show you guys.
But I did not think that far aheadbecause that sounds like me, doesn't it?
This is just the
(10:53):
cardioid, on there, but,yeah, we just came out with the Gen two.
The college into is not out yet.
Unfortunately, we had a break in in 2021
where they stole like250 units of metal work for the Wally.
And I have yet to recover from that.
What do they do with.
That dude is that I think they broke this.
They smashed and grabbed.
They grabbed everythingthey could off the shelf.
So they grabbed like 200 shock mounts.
(11:15):
You know, they grabbed a bunch of stuffthat wasn't finished
and then tried to sell it on Mercarithat didn't go well for them.
Oh, yeah. Let's hurry.
You know, I have to.
Offer up the light, you know, that sort of thing.
But yeah, they were selling them
and then people would buy a micfor like 75 bucks and be like,
they emailed me like, hey,I bought this mic used.
It's not working. Like,what's the serial number?
(11:35):
Because it wasn't a complete a microphone.
That's why.
Because we do we do, you know,we do a R assembly in the States.
So like those mics may not have had PCBsor maybe it didn't have certain components
in them or, you know, all sorts of thingswhere the mics weren't completed yet.
They only stole like five completedmicrophones.
But anyways,the Lolli Gen two is not out yet,
but the V1 Gen two isand it comes with the four.
(11:57):
And we also did them in black actually,
because that was the most requestedfeature.
People are like,I want to use this on stage.
We had a national orchestrain Europe saying,
I want to buy 60 of these, but we can'thave them because they're too shiny.
And these are all televised.
Oh, that's.
So we made.
So much the tape is for, oh, like.
The whole taping the entire mic.
No more residence on that. My body.
(12:19):
Yeah. But,
But, yeah, this is a
this is a small diaphragms,that I'm talking into now.
This is, this is a cardioid capsule.
I think we do have filtersand pads on the, on the small diaphragm.
No, no.
Not to get too nerdy.
If you put a screw in pad,you have to have active electronics.
And that,and that's going to mess with the signal.
(12:41):
And if you, do a pad switch,I looked for a while
to try and find a pad switchthat did not affect the signal negatively,
and I did not find one for this microphonebecause it's so small
and you have to put a slideswitch in there.
And the contacts just were not good enougheither in the high Z section for that.
By the way,you're in the high impedance section.
So you're the very yeah.
(13:01):
You're getting the negative feedback.
Yeah. Yeah. Well for the artists.
Well we're talking about itbecause you know
we've got Andrew over hereon small diaphragm
and yeah obviously sounds pretty good.
And you know for 16 small diaphragm.
So how does an artist decideif they need really
truly need a large diaphragm capsulemic versus a medium or small diaphragm.
The large that will be lower noisetypically.
(13:23):
That's one thing. Yes, that is true.
However, I will say thisI tell people and I'm a mic guy.
It is in my interestto sell you more microphone.
So when I say this, it is important thatyou understand that it's me saying it.
A lot of the times the best mic
for the job is the one you already have,and you don't know it yet.
(13:43):
There are exceptions to that.
Like let's say you have,you only have a 41 six or a 416, right?
49 you are suddenlyyou have to do an audiobook,
and that means that you have to sitlike this for hours at a time and not move
a single centimeter, because if you do,everything's going to go to hell.
And apologiesif there were plosives on that.
Small diaphragmscan be more susceptible to plosives,
(14:05):
especially when they're designed well,like this, where the diaphragm breathes
because it is one millimeterfrom that grill cloth there.
And that means that there is nowherefor that air to go but into the diaphragm.
So they have plosives much easier.
I'm not sure if you've experienced thatwith your, with your OCA there.
But with the CC eight.
This one. Yeah.
(14:26):
That'swhy I'm saying you're got to be very.
That's why I've got the.
Small diaphragm condensersgenerally like with a large diaphragm,
when you think about, you know, this mic
that I was using earlier,I'm just going to unplug it real quick.
You know, think about how much distancethere is between the grill here
and the, the capsule.
That's probably, conservatively,three quarters of an inch.
Maybe an inch.
Yeah.
And then the,Well, this is a millimeter.
(14:49):
What's. Yeah.
What's the rule?
The, the root square.
Like. Like the root mean square.
Yeah.
I mean, you go, like, twiceas far away as four times less signal.
Yeah. So again, Robert,you just have to geek out, don't you?
I do love. Nothing wrong with that.
I'm with Robert on this one.
But really the bottom line is,so with a 416 reading
a narration one, the sound is going tomaybe not be what you're looking for.
(15:12):
The tonal qualities of a four, 16or 41 six.
Apologies, Robert.
But two just the factthat you have to sit in the same spot
every time and not move an inch
while you're reading copyand turning pages and whatever.
Yeah.
Whereas if you get a mic that can do this,let me just turn this over here
and I can look at a white
(15:32):
or I could or a wide cardioidwhere I can get a little further around it
and I can move.
And it doesn't affectthe audio quality as much,
because I'll tell you right now,I'm listening to an audiobook,
and there are timeswhere you hear in between sentences
where they've clearly cut something in
after the fact, like,oh, we need to reread this
because you before a word or whatever.
And it's, it's.
It's jarring. Takes meout of the audiobook totally.
(15:52):
You know,and that's like I'm an audio guy.
So I would notice that.
But even my wife goes, that was weird.What's going on?
Yeah, yeah.
It like it takes her out of it.
And she's not she it's as far from audio,but she doesn't want to do it.
My it's like ADR for audiobooks.
Yeah, exactly.
So it's I think that,I think that it's really important
(16:13):
to think about like ultimately mixerpaint brushes, right?
Like, if you're Bob Ross,you're not using your, your,
your two inch brush to sign it or,you know, do your tree trunks,
you're not using your, your, your, linerbrush for the happy little clouds.
Right. You've got different brushesfor different things.
And ultimately these are tools
and you have to treat them aswhat is this tool good at?
Now, that being said, you know,if you want an all around Mike,
(16:37):
I would say go with, with eithera large diaphragm or a small diaphragm
that has a wider patternpickup pattern than like A4416 or a 41.
Yeah. Apologies.
Yeah, I, I know that you're goingto get used to saying that.
Why are we saying 41 six?
Because we change the world.
Because wewhen we first started this program,
we had 416that we call it here in Australia.
(16:58):
And you guys call it the what was 2016.
So we decided we'd find some middle groundand create our own name.
So the 4141
and now and now when I freelance,
I walk into the studio and I'll say,is there 41 six around someone?
Now look at me and go, what?
What do you have?
Like the guy on. Three, four, one six.Yeah.
Can you give me the Neumann? You 87.
Yeah.
(17:18):
It's like give away from the console now.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But, Yeah, the Neumann.
Neumann was the guy on Seinfeld.Yeah. I was gonna say.
I mean, yeah.
He turned 67.
So when Neumann on Seinfeld turned 67.
I just.
I missed they missed a really awesome joke on.
(17:39):
Oh, yeah. Yeah,yeah, exactly. Three people. What?
I got that.
All right, so I'm gonna bring it back,and I need them.
I was just going to say just quickly.
Just while we were on. On Derek's point.
Sorry, George,but just while we were on that point
about microphones,
I was going to say, though, there aremicrophones that sort of give you that
sort of quality that you're talking about,that high top end like the 41 six,
(18:00):
like the, the, 90 100, yeah.
The 91 or the okay.
6016 both sort of have that hypeat the top end, but being large capsules
sort of give you that luxury of,as you say, being able to.
Yeah, move around a little bit.
So, you know.
It's funny though, we I was at ScottRumbles the first time I got introduced to
(18:22):
voice over is like a marketfor microphones was Scott Rumble.
I met him at Namand he's like I've been looking
for a new microphone to do narrationon, and I have a 416.
And I was wondering if you had anything.
And he lived not that far from me.
At the time he was in Yorba Linda.I was an upland.
It was an easy drive for me,so I took down two mikes to him
and we sat there for the dayand we played with the V 13,
(18:43):
and I got to listen to Scott Rumbleto Scott Rumble things.
And so he had it running into an Avalon.
What is 70.
737 737 yeah.
767 is a, airline thing.
But, he had it running into the Avalonthat has Nic and stuff like that.
And so we were playing around with it, andhe was like, I love this for narration.
(19:03):
I love the setting you've got for that.
Can we make this sound like a 416just for fun?
So we started playing with the EQ andwe started playing with the polar pattern.
We got really close
and then his agent calls and he's like,hey man, you're reading, what is it?
Valerianand the city of a Thousand Planets,
or it was a scifi movie from back in the day.
It's like you're doing the read for this.
You're on and, like, a minute,and I panic and I grab it for 16.
(19:27):
I'm trying to,because he only has one input
right at that time, and I'm tryingto put everything back together.
He goes,no, no, no, let's just see if they notice.
And they Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's you. Know.
And so he gets on there like, Scotty,you're doing something different today.
You sound really good.And he looks at me and he goes, no,
that's how he does the read Valerian.
You know, you know, doing like sixdifferent takes of it or whatever.
(19:47):
And, you know, five minutes later,he's, he's probably
several thousand dollars richerbecause that's the way it works.
And it's amazing.
And, then like a month later,I'm watching Hulu and that comes on.
I'm like, oh.
Shit, that's my microphone.
That's cool. Yeah, yeah.
That's that's that's the story stuffyou want to put up on your website.
Right. That's an. Yeah, I think I have.
(20:09):
As you Sean.
I'm, I'm,clipping here. Apologies. I, it.
Just reminds meof one of our first episodes,
and we did a shoot outand we were all ready when the 91.
Not the 91 day, but the 91, I believe,was the closest to the 41 six.
And we were just like, how could that be?
There's there's no farther apart as faras construction and design and everything.
(20:34):
But they really did was us.
Yeah. It was that was so bizarre.
We had I think I just broughtall of my mikes out and line them up.
I think that. Sounds likeit's a considerable collection.
But don't start serious over herefor another hour.
Yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah.
So here's my question that I, that I had,
(20:56):
Josephson, I don't know if you're familiarwith with them as a.
Yeah. Yeah.
And I think also the new Sony
and you don't seea lot of mikes to do this,
but they take a large diaphragmand a small diaphragm
and they put them in one,and then they blend them electronically.
And I was wondering,what's your thought on that.
Where are the pitfalls of that?
I imagine there'ssome phase issues at least.
(21:17):
But in theorythere could be phase issues there.
Unless you're up in so closethere's probably in frequency
domain that it doesn't matter. Right.
So like my stereo mic for instance.
Let's say I don't have the stereo micwith me, but you can.
Just step our capsules, right.
Yeah, yeah.
And so our other stereo mikesand there's still face coincident
(21:37):
where it matters in the, in the frequencydomain that humans hear.
Unless you're recording from halfan inch away.
In which case,what are you doing with a stereo mic.
Right. Okay.Half an inch right from your. Yeah.
Because now it's like a distant now.
So it's a factor of the source. Right.
Exactly. Right.So it's a it's a factor of the source dis.
And so I think it's smartin a number of ways.
Obviously you have to think abouthow they're blending it.
(22:01):
Whether they're on separate circuitsthat they're then blending it in
or whether they're just doing itadditively in the high impedance section,
because that can causeI mean, they've thought about this.
They thought about capacitive problemsand things like that.
But all that being said,I don't think it's a bad idea.
I wish I had it here.
I had a prototype at one pointthat I 3D printed that was a 67,
a 47 and a K 12 style capsule.
(22:23):
All in one. Had that. Big bass.
Printed amount and you could in theory,the idea was I was going to put
three circuits in the mic
and have you be able to blendbetween them with a blend pot?
It didn't work outfor a number of reasons.
Not the least of which it looked like apickleball racket when you think about it.
Yeah.
(22:44):
But, but yeah, it was just something I tried
because I was kind of inspired by aby a similar.
I don't remember who does this.
I think it might have been Audio Technicawhere they had four rectangular.
Yeah. It'sAudio Technica has got four for.
Yep. Exactly.
Yeah. And there's, there's advantagesand disadvantages to all that.
You know like all of its balanceultimately.
(23:05):
And and I think the bottom line isis it musical.
Does it serve the artist.
Does it serve what they're doing.
And if you lose sight of that then why?
I mean, you're either in it for the moneyor your ego or what have you.
And I think
I think it's more it's more funto be supporting artists and what they do.
Like I just make paint brushes, you know,ultimately they're fancy, expensive, sexy
looking paint brushes.
(23:25):
So whichwhich one is the Bob Ross spatula?
Like, you know, like.
Oh, the palette knife.
Yeah.
He was he was rather versatilewith the palette knife was.
It's like a carbon mike or something.
Yeah.
I don't,I don't know, I'd have to really I,
if I had to sit downand make a, put a microphone on all of
that seems like a, like a meme that I needto do a Bob Ross microphone project.
(23:48):
But yeah,I'm, I'd have to think about that.
But, yeah,I think that they're tools ultimately.
And like we do obsess over our toolsas, as artists.
And sometimes I think to our detriment,I think we lose the forest
through the trees and and going backto what George said, like, ultimately,
if you got to really turnin a really great voice over performance
(24:08):
on your iPhone mic for this,you know, cartoon character audition,
they can put a better mic in front of you.
They can't, you know,
they can't turn you into a better viewartist necessarily, right?
Yeah. Easily.
You know, so it'sI think I think it's really easy
to do what I didwhen I was in junior high and high school
and focus on the toolsand not the instrument.
(24:30):
Now it put me here, which mayor may not be a good thing to have me
on, depending on the day you ask me,I'll say whether it's a good thing or not.
But ultimately it's it's a tool.
And the art comes first.
And if this tool isn't serving the art,that's when you go buy a new tool.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, or if you've got a lot of money
and you want to supporta boutique manufacturer.
(24:51):
Speaking of new speaking of new tools,before your natural daylight
fades into darkness. And you.
Because you're. I could tellit's getting darker in Europe.
Yeah, it's.
Like I said, this has happened,like. Wow.
And he has to go in a minute.So Joyce, you got to go.
So new mics.
Are there any.
Yeah I mean notthat you haven't had enough to do already.
Yes. I'm coming out with a very limitedquantity of a small diaphragm to mic.
(25:15):
At the request of one of my buddies,I was going to build a pair for him
and I was like, I helped buildlike ten pairs and see if they sell.
Like I talked about, like a new vista.
Yeah. The, not a new vista.
I've actually got them over there.The peanut, the sub miniature tubes.
That. Yeah.
So that's the only way you can do them.
Pretty much in a SDC.
Unless it's a small diaphragmcapsule on a big, fat, big, chunky body.
(25:36):
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I'm doing that.
I've got some other ideasthat may or may not come to daylight.
I, you know, I've developed projects
that never go anywherebecause I'm like, ultimately, this doesn't
do what we need it to do or whatthe artist needs it to do.
So you go back to the drawing board,you try again, or maybe you let that part
(25:57):
cook a little longerand you come back to it.
I've got the V7 is another one.
I'm sure you saw it at Nam a couple times
because we're going to release itand we never did.
It's a nine patternfat mic with the pattern selectable
on the front of the mic,and then it also has swappable capsules,
so you were able to swap outif you want a K 67 or a U 40 or 47.
That's like the Kirby system,right? Kirby.
(26:18):
Yes, yes.
But without dealing with,with the difficulties
that was dealing withTracy Kirby sometimes. So.
Yeah.
And then another company does it nowactually, Luke Audio does a swappable
bayonet system that they that that I, thatI understand is a pretty good one too.
And the blue the blue bottle is comingback with a new name and a new month.
Are theyare they really resurrecting my audio?
(26:39):
A lot. Of microphones. Yeah,I talked to the guy.
Oh, look at that.
They're blue.
Dirtied their name with the frickin Yeti.
Yeah, I talked to the guy.
I talked to the guywho had a mockup of the body,
and he was like,we're starting over. And I'm going to be.
Oh, yeah. Go.
They sold.They sold it to Logitech. Right?
So blue is in blueon. The strength of the USB mics.
And then Logitech said,what do we need this Pro audio stuff for.
(26:59):
Yeah, but they really kind of crappedon that name.
I thought it was sadbecause blue had some wonderful.
Minecraft on the name to the tune of $192million, and sold it to Logitech.
Everybody has a price to.
Yeah, bring on the.
I gotta pay it.
You know, I gottaI gotta pay a quarter of $1 billion
or a fifth of $1 billionfor you to design a USB mic.
(27:22):
That's going to be an Apple Stores.
I'd be like, yeah, okay, okay. I mean,
the genius of blue was it was the Yetithat the Yeti, as bad as it was the.
Yeti in the circle, man. Yeah. Marketing.
Marketing. Gold.
Sorry to bring up those names, but,you know.
It came up.
No, man, no, man.
It like people needed USB.
(27:43):
They designed something
that somebodywas not an audio person at all
that wanted to start a podcast could useget a decent sound and a drywall box.
And oh, this is if you have two people,you put it right here in between them.
And this is figure eight.
And if you have a bunch of people,you put it in omni like they
they dumbed it down for people.
And they also made itdarn near indestructible.
(28:04):
Because that thing,
if you ever picked up a Yetiwith like the cast iron base on it,
that thing could have been a weaponin the board game.
Like it was so much fun.
It's a Yeti bike with. A.
Buddy in the studiowith the Yeti in the kitchen.
That thing would break so heavy.
It was so heavy, so never.
So never a USB mike from Vanguard.
(28:25):
Or probably not, but never say never.
You know, if you have aif you have $192 million, you
all all right? Price?
Just let him know.
Yeah, yeah, yeah,he'll have it made tomorrow.
No, it's some other ideas too.
And it's you know,I think my biggest thing right now
is I've been looking. And George,you know about this.
I've talked to you about this.
Ken died in March, rather unexpectedly.
(28:47):
And we were both are both engineers,you know, and engineers running companies
doesn't go so well.
So I've been lookingfor a new business partner to come in
and run the business side of it,because it's no fun to do accounting
when I could be designing microphones,you know, or it's
no fun to be doing, vendor managementwhen I could be doing microphones.
So, that's been my primary concernfor the last nine years.
(29:11):
Yeah,I was trying to find the right person
to join up with and continue thisso that, you know, ultimately not to not.
This is a call for resumes, but the.
Pro audio suite is goingwhere we've we've got the voice
has poured out and I'm not sure, butwe might need a line of microphones too.
I was. Going to say, once we've made.
A little bit.
About. The ideas for vo vo mics and,
(29:33):
on my list.
Once, once, Michaelsay I'm millions for the possible.
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
They will not be buying in.
Yeah, yeah. I've.
Yeah I thought it
you know if anybody is interestedin partnering on a microphone company
that has the right qualificationsand listens to pro audio suite.
That is a narrow Venn diagram, man. Hey.
Yeah. Venn diagram.
Looks like Madonna's.
(29:54):
Boobs. I'm sorry.
My my mom hasn't got that sort of money,mate.
I'm sorry.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, just,Just all the way out here.
Okay.
So you got it. You've got a baby.
But before we, Before you do, becauseI know you got a hot out before you do.
If I want to buy a Vanguard. Mike.
Come on, give us. Do the sell. This is.
This is your sales hat moment, mate.
So if you like stupid industry,you know, niche audio memes
(30:17):
and also looking at microphones,
follow us on Facebook and Instagramat Vanguard Audio Labs for both of them.
I'm not on X or Twitter becauseit was a tire fire before it became Ax.
And I also to buy the microphones.
We do sell direct in the United Statesas well as have dealers.
So you can go to shop
dot Vanguard Audio labs.comif you want to feed our foster dog.
(30:38):
That's a great way to do it. And
you can also go to Vintage King and ProAudio
star and guitar Center slash musicianstrand, and a number of other retailers.
If you're interested in supporting yourlocal retailer, I don't mind that either.
If you just go to our website and clickFind a Dealer if you're in Australia or,
wherever else these other guys are,then you can go to find a dealer
(31:00):
and we're distributed in 78 countries,I believe.
So wow, wow.You should be able to find us.
Yeah, I think so.
And where are you right now?
I'm in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Philly.
George, George is going to get a walk.
Yeah,me and George have talked about this.
Go birds and all that. New Yorkup next time.
Well yeah visiting that it. Is a palooza.
Also in that area I.
(31:22):
Think he's somewhereI think he's in Virginia. Virginia.
My old room near Virginia Tech actually.
Yeah.
He's he's downAlexandria way, if I'm not mistaken.
But if you do make repairs,I will be contacting you because I have.
Yes, I do lots of make repairs.
I have some 80 sevensthat have mysteriously low gain.
Don't know why.
(31:42):
80 sevens.
Who made those 80 sevens?
Like, like 80. 708.
I thought you said a is isand mean just like derecho.
Yes. 8780. Seven.
Slow game.
That's an easy fix. I canI can help you with that.
Oh, say original 80 sevens. Are I.
Their originals.
Yeah. Okay.
Yeah I, I do three of thosea month and that.
(32:05):
Okay. Capacitors I reckon.
Tantalum capacitors or the fat bias.
Yeah.
The fat, the bias I need bias.
Almost everyone that comes in.
Yeah.
These these these were,these were reworked by by Ben.
Can you say fat bias these days?
Isn't that, like shaming namesake.
Yeah.
I do that. I know that that in in.
(32:26):
Yeah. Here in Australia. Right. Rob.
Oh yeah. Yeah.
So so I mean I know that the a and the earkind of an interchangeable
thing for your accentbut it's the fat field effect transistor.
Okay.
Now tell me now tell me no.
And add 16 hours to the end of it. No.
No no no no
no. And I
(32:47):
and he never sold another microphonein Australia again.
See my much you.
What you would hear from an Aussie is memicrophones fact.
Can you fix it for me?
You said all those hoursthat the British got rid of.
You're like we'll take all of us.
We'll just take all of themand bring them here.
Yeah, it's.
I'm yet to hear someone do a good Aussieaccent who's not an Aussie.
(33:09):
Oh, well, I tell.
You to my manager, Curtis,I'm here on that round.
Australians. And he nails it.I got to say.
Get to send me a filebecause I'd love to hear it.
Yeah, yeah.
I will
Well, that was fun.
Is it over?
(33:30):
The audio. Sweet.
Thanks to tribal and Austrian audiorecorded using Sonos Connect.
Edited by Andrew Peters and mixed byBhutan Radio Imaging with tech support.
If you wish to check with them, don'tforget to subscribe to the show
and join the conversationon our Facebook group to leave a comment.
Suggest a topic or just say goodbye.
Drop us a note at our website.
(33:51):
Protea suite.com.
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