directional electret mic recommendations?

[travis]

Hi guys,
I'm experimenting with making a guitar with 6 outputs, one for each string. I wound a tiny magnetic pickup, and I have some piezo's on the way, but I just thought tiny mics would be a third option...

I read that piezos output a signal that is closer (brighter) to what the string is really doing than a magnetic pickup's output. Where would an electret fall in that scale?

Are there other types of tiny microphones?

I'm trying to get away from magnetic pickups because they are hard to wind and if I have to wind 6 or 12 (for humbuckers) it'd be pretty hard to make them consistent.

Piezos worry me a little, because if I stress them too much they can probably blow up my expensive audio electronics.


discuss

[Minion]

The problem with mics is they will pick up other sounds than just the sound of the strings which could cause feedback issues especially if the guitar amp is loud.....

Also even with directional capsules each cap will also pick up the sound of the other strings as the strings of a guitar are pretty close together, you also have to worry about phaze cancelations when useing multiple Mics on pretty much the same source...

if you were just going to use one or even two mic capsules then i"d say go for it but with multiple capsules I think you will either run into problems or not see a benefit with haveing 6 capsules that close together......

[travis]

Yeah, I guess you're right.

Sigh.

[Conrad Hoffman]

You can certainly build what you want, but I've no idea if it's a good way to go. Google Knowles microphones for some tiny high performance mics. If you have trouble winding pickups, maybe think about a winding fixture to make the job easy and more consistent. Something like a shaft with a drill chuck on one end, a crank on the other, and a turns counter would be a good start.

[imix500]

Actually, I just did this in a show for onstage acoustic guitars. It's as simple as clipping a small condensor to the sound hole and playing with positions. We used DPA 4061 mics. They are a bit pricey but sound wonderful. The sound was fuller and clearer than any pickup could deliver. I'm told that serious guitar players in Spain and Mexico don't even use pickups.

[travis]

wow, these Knowles mics look cool. Thanks! I'm reluctant to go search out the pricing. I bet they are expensive. Should I bother asking them if any of there mics could be used to mic individual strings on an electric guitar body?

[Conrad Hoffman]

They didn't used to be terribly expensive, but I've no idea today. It never hurts to get the application people on the phone and see what they say.

[morleyman]

what exactly will you be aiming the microphones at? a string in mid air will give you a very small amount of useable tone. what makes the guitar sound the way it does (for a microphone) is the body. but you will get better results finding sweet spots to mic the guitar with one ore two mics than getting one for each string, since there's also no body for each string (although somebody's probably done this already, too). whatever you do, the crosstalk from string to string will be significantly higher than magnetic or piezo pickups.
i can't imagine piezos ruining expensive (or even cheap) preamps, either. i'd go piezo, check out godins, they've done a good job at this.

[dwferg]

A chap I know who makes guitars mentioned to me last week that he was about to start experimenting with optical pickups. He said that there is someone making guitars in Auckland (NZ) commercially using them and that they sound very natural. If of interest to you I will try to find more detail.

[travis]

Optical pickups are interesting to me...
are they DIY-able? I just did a quick search; all I need is a LED and a photo diode? awesome