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What is the frequency response of microphone?

What is the frequency response of microphone?

Update Time:2020/7/23

Signals are divided into analog and digital, and unless we use MIDI((Musical Instrument Digital Interface)) recording, almost all musical instruments send Analog signals. However, it is no longer a tape recording, but a digital recording century. Mastering the level of converting analog to digital will determine the quality of most recordings. Therefore, some well-known microphones can be sold at a price of up to 3,000 or 4,000 dollars. 

Once again, It reminds that the recording is really expensive ...I mean the importance of the microphone.


A professor likes to describe recording with offensive and defensive warfare. He said that every song recording has four lines of defense to prevent sound damage, and we'd better take strict precautions at the first line of defense. What is the first line? Choosing a suitable microphone.


The parameters are particularly important to us. Today I will introduce three parameters that you have to look at when choosing a microphone: Frequency response, Dynamic/Condenser, Pick-up Pattern

Sometimes we will say that some microphones are "born"  for recording certain musical instruments, or it is the first recommendation when recording a certain instrument, which is to take these characteristics into account.


Today I’m introducing Frequency Response

To understand how it affects sound, you must first know what frequency is. Frequency is the rate at which something occurs or is repeated over a particular period of time. the unit is Hz.

In terms of sound, this frequency generally refers to the sound wave, which is roughly divided into 

  • low frequency (20-80Hz), 
  • high-low frequency (80-500Hz), 
  • intermediate frequency (500-1800Hz), 
  • high-intermediate frequency (1800-5000Hz), 
  • low-intermediate frequency ( 5-9kHz), 
  • high frequency (9kHz-16kHz).


Each frequency band has its own sound characteristics. For example, LF is like the rumble of engine operation, and MF is often used for the human voice. Since everything has its own sound characteristics, we will choose the microphone according to how it can reflect the real sound.


Of course, these can be adjusted in post-production, but remember that the microphone is the first line of defense to pick up sound, and it is better to solve the problem at the beginning than later.


This picture is the frequency response of a microphone.

It basically tells us two things

1. The frequency range that he can record

2. Which part of him is more sensitive or insensitive.

As can be seen from the curve, you can record sounds from about 50Hz to 15000Hz, and then basically the part starting from the low to medium frequency is flat, but the response is more sensitive at the middle-high frequencies (in other words, increased Performance) and then reduce the sensitivity at low and high frequencies.


As you can see from this picture, this microphone is not suitable for recording bass drums because of the poor performance at low frequencies. 


It is also not suitable for stringed instruments, because the high-frequency parts do not perform well. 


So what is this microphone suitable for? Its mid-range to mid-high frequency performance is outstanding, best for recording vocals, while also retaining great reproducibility.