definitely use the amp/mic, unless you are after a specific 'dry' tone (i have done it in the past, but it is very obvious that the electric guitar is plugged in directly). i guess it depends on what type of music you are playing. anything bluesy or rocky will definitely need the amp. you may get away with an amp sim, but i haven't found one i have liked enough to use for real. as for the other questions, again, it depends on the sound you want. as a basic guide, get the sound you want from the amp and guitar first. without a good sound here it is pointless continuing. once you have that, then the gain for the pre and ardour should both be set as high as possible without clipping. leave a little bit of headroom, as most people will play slightly louder when recording than when checking levels. eq is something you will get many different opinions on. generally (unless i'm going for something specific) i like to use eq as little as possible, just taking out parts of the sound that are clashing with the rest of the mix (like lowering the bass range to remove rumble when you are mainly playing in a higher register etc) or boosting *slightly* parts of the sound i want to emphasise (this is very easy to overdo, so be careful - otherwise you will get an artificial headache sounding song). hope this helps. you will probably need to be more precise as to what sound you want for anyone to be much more detailed. porl 2009/4/7 Grammostola Rosea <rosea.grammostola(a)gmail.com>om>:

Hi, On Tuesday 07 April 2009 12:46:55 Grammostola Rosea wrote: Unless you want the dry sound directly from the guitar (you should try that at least once!), I would record through the amp. Depending on the room there are basicly two positions for the mic: 1) Directly in front of the amp, perpendicular to the speaker, centered and then turned to aim at the border area of the calotte. Do your own experiements here to see how the sound changes (probably easier when someone else is playing, or record dry first, feed it into the amp and listen to the rerecorded signal to hear the effects). Here you will have almost no signal from the room (which is why this placement is also used on stage) but it will sound un- natural at first because the virtual ear is at a different position the your natural ears when playing. 2) If the room is nice (and/or dry), you can also place the mic where your head would be standing in front of the amp. Or at least place the mic a meter away from the amp. This gives more of the over-all sound of the amp but requires an otherwise silent room. Some people also use #2 in not-dry rooms like the bathroom for effect. Play the guitar/amp as loud as you want (and can with respect to the neighbors). Have the preamp volume as high as possible without clipping (if you have, add a limiter before the a-d-converter) and control the mix-level in ardour. But this is actually true for all sources.. The lowpass only removes noise. Depending on the mix you should EQ the guitar, search for the characteristic frequencies (depends on the guitar and style, not on the key of the song:) and boost them to give your guitar presence without muddying everything else. Mostly a bit of compression is a must. For rythm-guitar I would use rather heavy compression to give it a constant level (also for acoustic rythm), for lead more dynamics are allowed to distinguish between solo-while-singing and solo. But that can also be done in the mix thanks to automation. The swh-plugins for compression (anyone ever used something else then the SC4?) and EQ, fons also has a nice 4-band EQ. Everything that modifies the signal should go pre-fader (like EQ, compression, chorus/phaser/etc, delay if used for the style (like a timed triplet delay) ), because you don't want the fader influence on the amount of EQing. Post-fader should be the sends to the "global" effects, like using one or two global ambiences (delay, reverb) via busses. Because you want the signal in the reflections to be influenced by the main-volume of the channel. One last important rule of thumb: If it sounds right, its right. Another one: Do your own experiements. Have fun, Arnold