Fun with a new mic: Rode M3

Nice sound - I've got a stereo pair of Rode M5 pencil condensers - superb for acoustic guitar.
Try and work on this, some lead guitar or vox

So nice .......
hope u happy with Rode  M3

it made me happy

some lyrics maybe next time ....creating a song for this songwriting site


I've given this 70% ..... would've got loads more with a lyric

lyric fish

very nice recording tonally, good progressions. I like it.

Any tricks to improve on the production itself - to get a cleaner sound that springs to life?

your doing good, that's a nice clean crisp guitar sound.  just keep experimenting. The one thing I've found out  about music is.  If the song is great, you can have crappier production.  If the song is crap, all the production in the world can't save it.  If you like to write songs, imho that is what you should focus 98% of you energy  on.  Learn recording and mixing strategies as you go..

I echo toasted goats reply about focusing on the music and not the production.

Any how what you have captured here is a true likeness to your guitar - nothing wrong with that.
However, it's important that you are happy with the sound.  So what is it that you don't like or want to improve?
Mic positioning can effect many things in the sound, therefore you can more or less get the tonal and ambiance you want from the positioning of the mic.  The other factor is the room you are recording in.  If you want a natural quality ambiance you could record it in a wooden church for example giving you a warm rich ambiance. It's a lot of trouble to get a recording like that, so like most of us we record it as dry as possible and add our favorite reverb plug-in.

You mentioned a clearer sound - to me that is more highs, less bass.  The best place to start with the mic positioning experimentation is pointing at the 12th fret, this normally gives a good balanced sound.  There are loads of YouTube vids on the subject.  Personally that's where I point my mic.  The other important factor is mic distance, the further away the more highs and natural ambiance you record and vice versa.  It truly is an art getting it exactly how you want it to sound, but once you have found it, it's there for good assuming the guitar,  mic and room are the same.  One other thing is to make sure you clean your strings or change them regularly.

Above all Practice things on your guitar that will help you improve, practicing things you know already will have a limited improvement on your maximum ability.

Hey I've got one of those, cheap and cheerful! What's not to like.
Nice guitar playing and tone on top
Happy days