Adding An External Mic Preamp To A Voice-Over Equipment Chain

so what does adding an external hardware preamp to your voice over equipment chain what does that add um what does it sound like what are the sound differences are you getting a a different sound from the sound that you're getting from the preamps in your audio interface what else does it offer adding a hardware preamp are there other features and is all that worth it is it worth the investment I'm Lenny B voice over audio engineer and that's what we're going to find out in this video when you record your voice there's a lot of things that have to happen to get your voice to sound good to the person listening I mean let's look at the chain right you have your voice goes into a microphone the room can play a part in What that sounds like then you've got your audio interface and you've got the preamps and the interface and the analog to digital converter that happens in the interface then you've got your Daw in your Daw you do some processing that changes the sound of your recording there's the mastering process to raise up the loudness level of your audio and then there's the exporting you have to do from your DAW and you do some data impression to change the type of lossless file into like let's say an MP3 file it's data compression then there's the platform that you're going to post or send your audio to could be something like Netflix it could be YouTube it could be a freelance site for voiceover or one of the platforms then you've got loudness standards what do they require the loudness to be and you have to do some limiting to get it to the correct loudness standards for the platform because if you don't sit your audio to their standards they'll set it for you if your file is accepted and that could change the sound of your audio then there's playback what kind of a system is it going to be played back on is it the earbuds is it a set of headphones are they high quality headphones are they not high quality headphones are they speakers are they big speakers is it a car system and after all that then it finally gets to the listener's ears that's a lot there's a lot of things there that can change your audio and a lot of things that can go wrong and in all of that some people still decide to use an external preamp app and there's reasons for it and that's what we're going to talk about in this video and before we get too much further I do want to say that if you're going to add an external preamp into your equipment chain and all these things that you have to do to get your audio to sound good you have to be using an audio interface that includes dedicated line level inputs allowing you to bypass the interface preamps because if you've got an external preamp and you're going into the preamps of your audio interface you're not really hearing the true sound of the additional external hardware preamp that you're adding because it's it's being funneled through the audio interface and that's going to have an effect on the sound so to really show you and feature the sound and the difference that an external preamp can make I'm going to use an audio interface that has dedicated line level inputs that means we're not going to be hearing the audio also going through the audio interface preamps an audio interface like this one this is the audience id4 of also very common with voice over equipment they're really broken up into two different parts most USB audio interfaces it's got preamps on one side where you've got one or more clean uh preamps they don't color the sound it's a real natural kind of a sound that's one half of an audio interface the other half really is the analog to digital digital to analog converter and what that does is it changes via USB to your computer that changes the analog audio information into a digital format which is something your computer can understand and that's where you edit it on and how do you know if your interface has dedicated line level preamps now you can use your interface like this with an external preamp but let's say for instance the 2i2 you can go into a Scarlet 2i2 but you're not going to be able to really truly pass the internal preamps and one of the clues to this is that if you look at the back of the unit you see it has no inputs it has no line level inputs the 2i2 that we're looking at here at the back of the unit you can see there's only the right and left outputs now if you compare that to the type of interface that has line level inputs you'll look at the back and you can see them there's the line level input on the 4i4 I believe that's the first in the line of the Scarlet series for focusrite that offers line level inputs and today we're going to use for this test I'm going to use the Apollo X6 which has several dedicated line level inputs and that's usually the difference in price of a more expensive audio interface it has things like line level inputs but this is truly bypassing the internal mic preamplifiers in your audio interface now let's answer this question why would you even use an additional external preamp for voiceover why even get one well there's several reasons some external preamps can offer several things like higher gain better audio quality lower noise lower Distortion more detail in your recording some give tone options and it can actually shape the sound of your recording and also some can offer an ultra clean sound and some offer saturation options which is a little bit of very light Distortion to give you a thickness to your sound now I want to look at the external preamp from cranbourne audio this is the Camden ec1 microphone preamp to illustrate the difference in this video then there's a lot of great microphone preamps out there in my opinion this pre is a good choice for voice over because the build quality is really good it's an it's affordable compared to some other mic pres with similar features and stats which we're going to get into now now the Camden ec1 by cranbourne Audio does have higher gain better quality a lower noise floor it offers lower Distortion and Ultra Clean sound if you want it it'll give you more detail and there's two really great saturation options really more than that one because it's a variable saturation option you can have now the Camden ec1 also has a monitor section that can come in really handy when you're dealing with voiceover the signal is going to come out of the cranbourne audio Camden ec1 mic preamp into the universal audio Apollo X6 using a dedicated line input and we're bypassing the Apollo's mic preamp this way we can hear the true sound of the ec1 mic preamp and we can hear what it offers now just to give you a little idea of the stats that this thing is working with here I want to compare it to some of the really commonly used preamps that you may be familiar with so we're going to look at the focusrite 2i2 I've included the dbx 286 because that's a preamp that is very popular among broadcasters and podcasters and voice over artists and then we'll compare it with the Camden ec1 and you know you don't really have to know what all these numbers mean I think it'll give you a good reference just to go through this real quick so the amount of gain that the focusrite offers is 56 DB that's for the third generation it's quite a lot and I mean the Focus right just down the line has really good stats the dbx offers 60 DB of gain and compare that to the Camden ec1 which says 68.5 now the dynamic range the focusrite offers is 111 DB a weighted which is measured um with reference to the way human hearing works the dbx has got 105 DB dynamic range and 114.5 for the Camden ec1 and this all really adds up to just giving you a lower noise floor the frequency response which are the frequencies that the preamps can actually work within 20 Hertz to 20 kilohertz for the focus right same for the dbx 20 Hertz to 20 kilohertz and then the Camden ec1 it goes all the way down from one Hertz to a thousand kilohertz which is pretty incredible because that's way below and way above what human hearing can even deal with the amount of noise that you get from these units less than 128 DBU for the focusrite less than 125 for the dbx and less than 131 for the Camden ec1 so you can see just down the line just better numbers every preamp has a very small amount of distortion that gets inserted into the signal chain it's just how they work you've got and it's a minuscule amount point zero zero one two percent for the Focus right .008 percent for the dbx and then less than .00025 for the Camden ec1 it's just a good illustration of the quality of that this preamp can offer you know better stats like this means you can really get lots of gain for example for a dynamic microphone and very little noise now I believe the best way to really illustrate what a high quality external preamp in your voiceover recording chain can offer is to set it up this way I'm going to be speaking on my Neumann tlm-103 microphone it will be connected to the cranborn audio Camden ec1 microphone preamp and we're going to connect that to the universal audio Apollo X6 using the line input bypassing the Apollo preamps then we're going to examine the unprocessed sound then we're going to compare that to the same mic tlm-103 directly into a focusrite 2i2 and examine that unprocessed sound this way you'll hear the difference between the preamp from the focusrite 2i2 which is a really good quality preamp and can absolutely serve you well uh if you're doing voiceover but I want you to hear the exact and precise differences with an external preamp like the Camden ec1 then we'll have the same comparison but we're going to use and examine the processed sound and I think that's important because it's good to compare the final polished sound of a recorded audio with a preamp or an external preamp now if you're familiar with my channel you'll know I discuss all things voice over from EQ and compression and processing and the sound to voice over to microphones and and interfaces and all equipment stuff but even to like marketing techniques or mic techniques or performance all things voice over to try to help you perform better and really be more confident on the mic I think that's really a big part of what I do and I love it but I also do custom processing preset chains for all different voices so um basically uh I'll put together a custom processing chain for a particular person using their mic in their room and if any one of those three things changes the sound of the preset is going to change so it's custom and if you send me a a raw sample of your voice I will send you back a a free example of what your voice could sound like with a custom processing preset it's absolutely free and I love doing it and if you go to my website right at the top there's a red button you could click and it'll show you how to submit your voice and also put the link in the description of this video but what happens is as I receive all these submissions I get to see different setup different voiceover setups with different equipment with different Hardware Incorporated with different types of microphones and often a lot really often a lot of the time I'll be asked is this preamp that I'm using in my system adding or is it detracting from my sound a lot of time the gain staging isn't right I mean there's a lot of things like we said in the beginning of this video there's a lot of things that can go wrong and if you know you don't know what you're doing you can actually detract or hurt the sound so that's really why I wanted to do this video is because I get that question and so often and I want to show you which is what we're going to do now well let's listen to those the difference in sound the difference between adding an external preamp and then just going straight to your audio interface let's hear the difference here's my voice on the Neumann tlm-103 microphone into the focusrite Scarlett's 2i2 internal preamps and this is what it sounds like with no processing now you're hearing my voice on the Neumann tlm-103 microphone to the cranbourne audio Camden ec1 preamp going through the direct line input of the Apollo X6 bypassing the Apollo's internal preamp and this is unprocessed here's my voice on the Neumann tlm-103 microphone into the focusrite Scarlett's 2i2's internal preamps and this is what it sounds like with processing here's my voice on the Neumann tlm-103 microphone to the cranbourne audio Camden ec1 preamp going through the direct line input of the Apollo X6 bypassing the Apollo's internal preamp with processing so you may have just listened to that comparison and you're thinking to yourself um Lenny I don't really hear much of a difference that's totally understandable that's okay and I wouldn't actually would expect something like that to an average listener they're not going to hear any difference between a couple different preamps like the two we just compared um I'm going to play those samples again but I think you'll hear a difference if I focus your ears to some specifics and that's what I want you to listen for well you're going to listen to those again but I want you to hear the transients and those are the um the consonants and the staccato parts of my voice it's the consonants and the P's and the t's okay listen listen to those and listen to How strong or soft those transients are listen to the overall shape or tone of this just the voice sound itself and then I want you to listen to the the range of frequencies listen for the ultra lows uh the lows the mids upper mids high frequencies and the ultra high frequencies and let's see if you can hear a difference this time here's my voice on the noise and tlm-103 microphone into the focusrite Scarlett's 2i2's internal preamps and this is what it sounds like with processing and here's my voice on the tlm-103 microphone to the cranbourne audio Camden ec1 preamp going through the direct line input of the Apollo X6 bypassing the Apollo's internal preamp this time with processing here's my voice on the Neumann tlm-103 microphone into the focusrite Scarlets 2i2's internal preamps and this is what it sounds like with no processing here's my voice on the Neumann tlm-103 microphone to the cranbourne audio Camden ec1 preamp going through the direct line input of the Apollo X6 bypassing the Apollo's internal preamp and this is unprocessed alright after that second pass if you hear a few more details that time now that you kind of focused on what to listen to um you know and and here are the questions I'd ask myself if you are going or considering adding a hardware preamp to your voice over equipment chain you know do you need to improve the sound of the preamps that you're already using in your audio interface that's legit you know depending upon what quality interface you have maybe it's time for an upgrade and an external preamp can do that um but then you're just going to make sure that you've got direct line inputs on your interface do you need the extra gain that's one of the questions I'd ask myself you know if you're using a dynamic mic and you're you're finding yourself having to crank up the gain all the way on your interface um you know can the extra gain from an external preamp help do you need the saturation do you want that little extra bite or are you recording instruments and you're also recording music in your studio then saturation may be valuable to you or can plug-ins give you what you need plugins and the quality and the sounds they can and and the the features and the the changes they can make the plugins have come a long way um I also want to throw this in there I think I call it the desktop Factor having some buttons and knobs and the Little Hardware on your desktop is cool there's something cool about that I think that's totally legit you know and somebody comes into your studio and they're like whoa you know what are all these buttons what do you is this a time machine your ability there's there's a coolness factor to it and I think that's totally legit you got to add that into the equation too if you like if you know you just like having that stuff and being able to mess with it and you're into that totally legit the desktop factor is real if you're curious if you are uh just wondering what your voice could sound like with a processing chain a custom processing chain don't be shy please fill out the form uh it's on my website lennyb.com you'll find out how the details on how I need your file you send me a raw file unprocessed of your voice and I will send you back a processed version so you can see what that sounds like it's absolutely free all the details are at lennyb.com I'll put the link uh also in this video lennyb.com is also where you can get some free training courses I've got a brand new uh bio writing course that's absolutely free I've just released a brand new marketing for voice over course which I think is extremely valuable I've put a lot of work into that and it's a pretty substantial it's a pretty substantial training course I've been working on it for over a year and that's finally available and also you know the reason why I do all this stuff is um first of all I I so love all the feedback this channel has grown and it's so cool and I really appreciate you spending the time and and your comments and everything Bring it on I love it and you know my whole goal is to help you just become better at what you love to do which is voice over and I love giving you that confidence and every time I could teach something that I've learned and that's helped me and I can teach somebody how to do it better for their setup and their situation it just it makes me feel fulfilled so I really appreciate all the comments and the follows I'm Lenny B voice over audio engineer let's make your voice sound better all right

Channel: Lenny B

Views: 5,906

Keywords: Voice Over, Voiceover, Microphone, Microphone Preamp, Preamp

Id: FB5LGvky6Rs

Length: 18min 0sec (1080 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 22 2023