Andy_Westcott

Hi - I'm interested in sound, it's as simple as that. One of my interests is trying to capture natural sounds that are unusual or difficult to record, and have constructed the necessary equipment to do this.

The heart of this consists of a home-made mic preamp with balanced inputs feeding a complementary pair for the first stage. This results in a device exhibiting very close to the theoretical minimum noise floor, and the result when used with decent dynamic microphones is quite surprising.

Trying to select a suitable microphone was tedious, but I settled on a pair of Electro-voice RE27 N/D broadcast quality mics which had both high output and a reasonably flat and extended frequency response. I did try electret units but although the frequency response was better, the noise figure was a lot higher and therefore unsuitable for what I was trying to achieve.

Having once been involved in engineering, these days I walk dogs for a living. Hey - it pays the bills and stops me getting fat!!