Buying vintage mics to make pairs you can't "match"

NOT crazy talk!!!!  I'm 1000% with you Ward.  I pretty much hate M/S mic-ing techniques.  Always sounds weird to me.

I don't know about Ward, but I REALLY like (I was going to say love but....) Blumlein.  A LOT!

Still hate MS.  And yeah, I know how to do it.  . The old fashioned way.

Doug - with respect - MS and Blumlein are not the same.

Technically, does not MS require a cardiod or hyper pattern for the M mic?  To quote UA - "The "Mid" microphone is set up facing the center of the sound source. Typically, this mic would be a cardioid or hypercardioid pattern (although some variations of the technique use an omni or figure-8 pattern)."   So I guess we are both right, but I've never seen a fig 8 mic used for the mid position in my time....

Also, in normal use, the M mic in MS is pointed (more of less) towards the source.  UA states "facing the center of the sound source".  With S mic of course being 90 degrees.  When I'm mic-ing blumlein, there is no mic pointing directly at the source - they are pointing "outside" (for lack of a better term) the source.  45 degrees to the L and 45 degrees to the R of the source.

Also generally (for me at least) Blumlein gets used more at a distance.  It's a larger picture of the room for me.  I see people using MS in more close mic'd situations as a general rule.  (Perhaps that's why I don't like it.)

You may call this nit-picking technicalities, but IME, it's a world of difference to my ears.  When I'm mic-ing in Blumlein, both mics have equal gain.  When mic-ing MS - bringing up the side mic levels even close to unity and I don't like it at all.  To each their own!  Cheers,

Haha!!  And that's exactly why I use it.  As I said....different strokes.  

I could always tell the story of rep who spent 1/2 an hour explaining all the work that went into matching multiple pattern LDCs in matched pairs but when asked the simple question of what pattern do they use or weigh highest in the whole deal.
He could not understand that that might matter.

We are still sharing the brain.

Mommy and Daddy are fighting!

What is this . . . the covid thread? LOL

Certainly feel free to clarify or correct me; but am I right in assuming that those of the camp that find MS and Blumlein to be very different are ones that are mainly concerned with the principle*? Blumlein is something that's panned accordingly (L/R) by default, and the image is there, whereas Mid-Side relies on the cancellation (and addition) of two microphones in their respective polarity (I swear, 5 years ago I could probably word this better).

Obviously, there are differences that come from the fundamentals, like on-axis points being completely different from blumlein and mid-side, but wouldn't the very nature of the approach be the biggest difference between MS and Blumlein?

I'm of the opinion they've never tried MS with dual figure 8's, and have not analyzed the results.   That is the only apples to apples comparison, and was the question I raised.  

There are situational advantages to each approach.

Yes, the largest difference is the on-axis points, which define peak treble content.  

Blumlein can be close to the source, with those points capturing something on-axis from the sources edges, or far and only capturing diffuse on-axis sound.  Blumlein does unpredictable things (usually bad) when panned other than hard L/R, you hear it in the top end first, it's really meant to stay hard L/R.  

Turn the same matched 8's you just used for Blumlein 45º so one is M and one is S.  Now you have a dead-center on-axis M source and a S source who's relativity to 'on-axis' is dependent on the source and distance.   If someone decides to change width later, the center on-axis capture is unaffected, and high frequency content going out away from 0º more minimally than Blumlein.

For the same source, you're going to put the mics in the same place, either approach.  Leave them hard panned in the same well placed acoustics, they're gonna be most similar.  Yes the on-axis points will make a difference, the more well controlled the polar pattern of the mics, the more alike the two will be.   Multi-pattern LDC's will do the most beamy unpredictable things with their relatively sloppy patterns, SDC's like Sennheiser MKH30, Neumann KM120, Schoeps MK8 (and more linear ribbons) do a much better job.   If placement isn't great, slightly off-center in aim, too far back, etc etc etc, MS lets you improve it in ways that Blumlein cannot.   

There's guaranteed to be many instances of Blumlein recordings that have been put through MS processing in post to affect some of the same changes, less destructively than panning.  

Then there's dual MS where a dual output mic for M will let you pick the M pattern later, or create a whole world of virtual front/rear patterns for specific purposes.