Microphone Pickup Patterns

One of the first sessions was going through different types of microphone patterns using various mics. Some of the microphones that I'm already familiar with include the shotgun and omnidirectional. Usually when recording in mono it intends to be recorded omnidirectional which can then be edited within software to create surround sound and set into a particular speaker.

Shotgun mics mainly excels at picking up sounds in front of it, while rejecting sounds to the sides and rear. Shotguns are designed to have a narrower focus than an average microphone.

Cardioid microphone picks up from the front, while minimal noise is picked up from the rear and only marginal noise is picked up from the sides.

Hypercardioid patterns are similar to cardioid patterns in that the primary sensitivity is in the front of the microphone.

During the session I was able to fully understand the way each pattern worked and which is best to use for a particular task.