Pop Filters to Reduce Blowing Noise

With a smartphone or tablet, you can become a home recording artist or a one-room musician. Thanks to GarageBand, which is a default app included on the iPhone, the age to start composing and arranging music has lowered and the threshold has been lowered.
Although software has become cheaper, it is still difficult to prepare the equipment for serious recording at home.

You have to buy microphones, cables, stands, and so on.

One thing that is often forgotten is the pop filter used when recording vocals.

At first, I made a homemade pop filter by using an old stocking from my mom and twisting a hanger to see what it would look like.
Tetsu Okazaki-san also talked about a similar past in an interview, so I am sure there are many home recording artists who have had the same experience.
Recently, I have been using a similar cloth pop filter, but I purchased the following product.

STEDMAN / PROSCREEN 101

Recently, you often see this microphone in commercials and other media.
You can also see many people singing with a condenser microphone set up in front of them in YouTube videos.

The cost was zero yen when I was using my mom's stockings and hangers as a substitute. The price is very different from that, so I have been hesitant to buy one for a long time...
The reason why I decided to purchase the product is because I want to reduce pop noise such as “blowing.
The reason I decided to purchase the microphone is because I wanted to reduce pop noises such as blowing noise.

I know that many of you have been experimenting with the distance from the microphone, and I am one of them.
If you get close to the microphone, it will pick up the bass part of your voice, but it will also pick up pop noises and lip noises such as chatter that you don't normally hear. If you record from a distance away from the microphone to avoid noise, you will hear a lot of room noise, and if you don't have a good soundproof room, the quality of the recording will drop dramatically.
There are many “DIY Soundproofing for Your Room!” videos on the Internet, and they get a lot of views, so I guess everyone has a hard time with their recording environment. Of course, I am also one of them...

I record narration as well as vocals, so I try different distances to record, but if I put a little too much effort into it, I get the “blown” effect. When I think, “I finally got it right!” I then check the recording and am disappointed when I find a “hoooo” sound that cannot be corrected....

This was a big problem.
I was skeptical about how much it would change, but when I actually used STEDMAN PROSCREEN 101, the “blowing” greatly reduced!

I have many opportunities to record choruses, and the editing process has become much easier.

If I cut too much, the sound would become a “u” instead of a “h,” so it was a steady process that I felt was more like doing a tear-off painting than actually making music....

After changing to STEDMAN PROSCREEN 101, the blowing didn’t completely disappear, but it’s not as bad as before, and it’s much different. Editing is much easier now that I don't have to remove pieces one by one!

I could have used the basic technique of shifting the position slightly to avoid blowing into the microphone, but that's not easy to do when you're passionate about singing and expression.
I feel that the sound itself is recorded clearly.

I sprayed the top two images with spray at home, and I found that the old pop filter of a certain manufacturer on the right showed airflow through the filter as it was, but the STEDMAN PROSCREEN 101 on the left showed airflow downward.
This means that when you sing, your breath is flowing downward.
I think it’s important to consider the position of the microphone, pop filter, and body in light of this.
Instead of referring to the mouth, I refer to the body because although it is the mouth that produces the breath, it is the torso, head, and face where the sound resonates, and I think it is better to take that into account as well.

The voice is very different depending on what kind of training you have received or are currently receiving.
Those who have not had much training and those who did not have much voice in their upbringing are more likely to have less body resonance, so it will be difficult to pick up the voice unless you get close to the microphone.
If you have a lot of voice training, you tend to sing with more resonance in your head than in your torso, so targeted miking of the face may be important.
If you have had musical or stage vocal training, you tend to be more likely to vocalize with resonance in your chest, so you may want to lower the microphone position a bit to try it out.

Recording technology has made leaps and bounds through the trials and errors of our predecessors before and after World War II, from the pioneer days of songwriting to the present day. It may be necessary to have your own originality and ingenuity in modern home recording as well.
There are many blogs and videos that lecture on this subject, and while referring to them, I think it would be a good idea to experiment with different microphones, pop filters, mouth distance, and body positions to suit your own way of expression and songs.

I think the pop filter is a very important product for bridging your voice to the microphone in this context.
Although the metal pop filter seems a bit expensive, I recommend it because it is very high performance and better than my mom’s stocking.
There are also a variety of cloth products available, so why not consider one that suits your own musical style?

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