Fishman Aura acoustic guitar processor

David Polich · Post by **David Polich** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 9:49 am

I picked up a Fishman Aura yesterday and tried it out with my Taylor 110E acoustic steel string.

I'm truly amazed at this product. It really does sound like your guitar is mic'd, and mic'd well - the first time I've ever heard a pickup-equipped acoustic sound like that through a box. It uses some sort of convolution technology whereby your guitar's pickup sound is fed through an impulse response (Fishman calls them "images"). Fishman has hundreds of recorded images at their website - all manner of acoustic guitars recorded with different mics and positions. I downloaded the Taylor 510 image and transferred it to the Aura via MIDI, and damn, it really sounded like my Taylor 110 had become a 510 and had a Neumann U87 in front of it.

The Aura won't turn your 70 dollar Fender into a vintage Martin worth thousands. It's designed to make your guitar sound like it is being mic'd.
That said, if your guitar is a "good" one or an expensive high-end model, you can get a larger variety of sounds with the different downloadable images from the website.

The Aura has separate bass, mid and treble controls for the pickup ("your" signal) and the "Image" (the "convolution" sound) as well as separate phase switches for the pickup and image sounds, a compressor for the pickup section and both line level out and XLR out.

Two small considerations - with input level set to high there is a bit of hiss, and the Aura is mono, not stereo. My Taylor 110E has a simple passive under-the-bridge pickup which doesn't output a lot of level. In a mix I really didn't notice the hiss, but I put a gate with a long release on the track and that cleaned it up. Rooms can have their own noise anyway, which is picked up my microphones.

At any rate, if you're looking for a direct recording solution for acoustic guitar, I highly recommend checking out the Aura. It lives up to the claims made by the manufacturer.

markwayne · Post by **markwayne** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 12:19 pm

Yeah, I'll second that. My new Martin dread came with the Aura system built-in and while I still prefer to mic acoustic guitars in stereo when possible, I've used the Aura at a local studio where they don't have a suitable room for recording guitar and got very good results and I've used it extensively live where it has all but replaced my old-faithful Godin.

The Aura system is very impressive. It seems to add a little air and gentle compression which helps to get rid of most of that under-saddle quack.

Wayne

rcannonp · Post by **rcannonp** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 7:21 pm

I've been pulling my hair out trying to record acoustic guitars in my last two apartments, so I picked up an Aura. It's pretty sweet. I can leave it set up right by my computer(a really loud G4) and play away. I also ended up getting a pickup put in my Ramirez R4 so that I can use it with the Aura.

I was going to post something about it, but I figured that I would get beat down for using an acoustic guitar "modeler." It's good to know there are others out there.

David Polich · Post by **David Polich** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 9:25 pm

Ah yes, the "processor police". Have to watch out for them..

The videos at Fishman's Aura website explain in further detail what the process is inside of Aura. It's actually a form of transform technology - taking the waveform produced by the source and "imposing" the characteristics of another waveform (in this case, the studio recording of a guitar) onto the source waveform. Having been involved in some sampling for various keyboard manufacturers over the years, I'm familiar with some of the aspects of using transforms and it is no small feat to create algorithms that do it effectively. When Fishman says it took them five years to develop the tech I believe them.

If you don't have a high end studio with a great room, a megabuck console and esoteric mic preamps and thousands of dollars worth of microphones (and a great engineer) I'd say it's hard to beat the Aura for recording acoustic guitars. And as you mentioned, it's awesome to eliminate the concerns of computer noise and the hassle of mic placement.

Macinbowl · Post by **Macinbowl** » Mon Aug 21, 2006 6:17 am

I've seen that a couple of time on stage (as a live engineer) and always been amazed by it! Accoustic and/or folk music can really take a notch with this "toy" in a live situation. I don't own one but really appreciate mixing it.

Mat

jmoore · Post by **jmoore** » Mon Aug 21, 2006 9:48 am

Wow, for some reason I find myself hating this thread. I wasn't aware of it, but I think that I might be a card carrying member of the aforementioned "processor police". That being said, the reviews that I'm reading from you folks are really making me rethink my stance. To the best of your knowledge, are there any types of pickups that are recommended for use with the aura? I've got a Taylor with the Natural I (or was it the Natural II), and I've got another Taylor with the LR Baggs Element Active. Any thoughts?

-jordan

David Polich · Post by **David Polich** » Mon Aug 21, 2006 6:30 pm

Taylor puts pretty good pickups in all their guitars. Even the lowest cost models.

Check out all the videos at the Fishman Aura website, they really explain how it is not so much a matter of the pickup as it is matching the "Images" to your guitar. For example, I tried the Martin and Takamine images with my Taylor 110E and the sound was kind of nosy and honking. The best Aura image for me was the "Taylor Big Baby" image, because that is the closest to my 110E.

Even Taylor images other than the Big Baby didn't work as well - I tried the 615e image which is a close-miked image and it wasn't as good. So I suggest you download all the Taylor images and keep loading in ones until you find the best match. It's that simple.

In trying out different images, use headphones and turn them up loud enough so you hear the Aura and as little of your guitar as possible. If you do it without headphones, your ears can be fooled by the fact that you're still hearing the guitar in your room.

I've also found that it gives your track more definition if you set the "blend" to "6" on the Aura - that mixes in a little more of the pickup.

The Aura really can't turn your Taylor into a Martin - I tried, for experiment sake, and it didn't work. It isn't modeling, it's more like matching. If you want modeling than one of the Line6 Variax guitars is your option.

rcannonp · Post by **rcannonp** » Mon Aug 21, 2006 6:59 pm

jmoore wrote:Wow, for some reason I find myself hating this thread. I wasn't aware of it, but I think that I might be a card carrying member of the aforementioned "processor police". That being said, the reviews that I'm reading from you folks are really making me rethink my stance. To the best of your knowledge, are there any types of pickups that are recommended for use with the aura? I've got a Taylor with the Natural I (or was it the Natural II), and I've got another Taylor with the LR Baggs Element Active. Any thoughts?

-jordan

I would love to have a closet full of top shelf mics and preamps and great room to use them in, but that's not an option for me. I wouldn't want to cut a solo guitar album with the Aura, but it's the best option I have available. The Aura was designed more for playing live, and it easily kicks the crap out of magnetic soundhole pickups and straight bridge pickups.

If you want to get real precise about it, you can send your guitar to Fishman and they'll make images of it.

monkey man · Post by **monkey man** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 4:39 am

jmoore wrote:"You must unlearn what you have learned"
-Yoda

Hmm... sounds like now might be the time, jmoore...

PS: I believe Don Juan of the "Castaneda Series" said that many times, almost like a mantra, long before George Lucas wrote Star Wars.
It was a central tennet, even a concious excercise.
Having read the Castaneda series a couple of times, I was amazed at the amount of material that seemed almost directly lifted from those books.

markwayne · Post by **markwayne** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 10:25 am

Wow, for some reason I find myself hating this thread. I wasn't aware of it, but I think that I might be a card carrying member of the aforementioned "processor police". That being said, the reviews that I'm reading from you folks are really making me rethink my stance. To the best of your knowledge, are there any types of pickups that are recommended for use with the aura?

Well, don't get me wrong. The Aura is a great live sound tool and is also great for working around a less-than-ideal recording environment. However the sound of the Aura, as good as it is, is still not going to compete with the sound of this guitar (a rosewood/spruce Marin dread) recorded with a nice pair of mics and preamps in a good room.

In fact, the day I received this guitar the first thing I did was to throw up a pair of SM81s and record a couple of tracks along with the direct Aura signal on a third track. The Aura track was impressive and sounded better than most of my other acoustic guitars regardless of recording technique. I would have been happy to use that track in a mix. However, when I brought up the stereo mic tracks they, in spite of being rather carelessly recorded, were . . . well . . . let's just say that suddenly the cost of the guitar seemed like a very trivial matter.

Wayne

Obscure Object · Post by **Obscure Object** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 10:18 am

sorry if I'm hijackin' this thread ... but I have a problem with my acoustic/electric n i'd really appreciate any help. i almost have no experience with acoustic/electric electronics.

I have an Ibanez AEF30 with factory undersaddle pick-up and pre/eq section. it also came with both Low-Z (XLR) and Hi-Z outputs.

Now the pre section had something smoked (literary

) so it's not working anymore. The pick-up is alright however, but ofcourse no signal is passing thru since it's connected to the pre section which is toasted.

question no.1:
Is it possible to connect the pickup directly to the outputs of the guitar? if that's possible then i'm assuming i can get something like the fishman aura ot the LR Baggs Para Acoustic DI n all would be fine. No? Yes?

question no.2:
Ignoring question no.1, what do u suggest I do at all?

continueing on the thread .... the fushman aura looks like a great idea.

David Polich · Post by **David Polich** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 10:51 am

Perhaps a call to a local guitar repairman would be more helpful regarding this.

Obscure Object · Post by **Obscure Object** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 3:25 pm

Thx David. I guess I'll have to do that some time

what kind of pick-up are u using?? passive / active? Is there a pre/eq section in the signal chain before the Aura? ... I'm just trying to figure out if the signal from the pick-up needs to be amplified before going into the Aura??

David Polich · Post by **David Polich** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 10:36 pm

The pick-up in my Taylor 110E is passive/under-the-bridge.

Here's the thing - I don't actually play guitar, I keep the Taylor around for guitar players to use (it always amazes me that so many guitarists don't own a decent steel string acoustic).

But anyway, there are EQ's in the Aura for both the pickup, and the "Aura" section, they are independent EQ's, and you can adjust the balance between the pick up signal and the "Aura" signal.

Obscure Object · Post by **Obscure Object** » Wed Aug 30, 2006 12:04 am

thx David. I'm a guitar player n I still dunno a lot about guitar electronics

.... I was actually suspecious about passive pick-ups delivering any kind of signal to the 1/4" output! ... well i guess they do ... that's good news because i dun have to replace the pre section on my Ibanez ... I'll just leave it as is n buy the Aura or thr LR Baggs DI.

Many guitarists dun have the resources for good guitars

... I wish I could buy a Taylor T5 Thinline ... but obviously I can't