True or False or

[cwsand]

Originally Posted by cwsand

Yep, analog distortion is great - digital clipping? Not so much!

Originally Posted by Sardi

Only if desired.

Well that's true of all recording decisions!!

[cwsand]

Originally Posted by amagras

What is digital clipping?
How do you create it?

Digital distortion - usually not a desirable sound.

[Sugarnutz]

Both are not only false, they're outright lies! No matter the medium or device you record with, basic fundamental recording skills are mandatory.

Overloading an operational amplifier is a recipe for disaster, the most you can do to correct it after the fact is run it through a transformer to round off the square waves you just created and while that may be a desired effect in some circles, it won't be in all of them.

Proximity effect is a result of making a microphone element directional by venting sound to the rear of a diaphragm and canceling the sound from the rear by making it out of phase with the front. The problem is it only works at shorter wavelengths, AKA higher frequencies, lower frequencies are reinforced making them louder. A trick I learned a long time ago is to not use a cardioid microphone to close mic an instrument, use an omnidirectional microphone instead. If the distance between an instrument miked with an omni is about one tenth of that to the nearest other instrument you will not notice any bleed (I didn't say there won't be bleed, i said you won't notice it) and the proximity effect will be nil. One of the best dynamic mics I've ever used on electric guitar was an EV635A, it's an omni, has a frequency response out to 10K, will take a ton of level and you can cram it almost all the way into the grill cloth on an amp with no bleed and no proximity effect. As always YMMV!