DIY Custom Mic Grip (a little longish)

[Jp Pagan <jpl_pagan@xxxxxxxxx>]

hey all,

  i've got an idea for a cheap, personalized way to
make a great mic-grip. a few weeks or so ago, i had an
idea about fashioning cover plate 'extensions' to make
amplified cupping a bit easier. i'd seen this website
about an invention to help horn players (like french
horn) with one of their hand techniques: 
http://freespace.virgin.net/pip.eastop/html/ease_stop.htm
  anyway... he uses this stuff he calls "Fimo", which
is a play-doh like substance you can bake in your oven
to make it hard. so, i bought some of this stuff but
never got around to messing with the cover extension
idea.
  a few days ago i got an SM-57, which many of you
know can be a bit rough to grip. cramping happens
fast. well, here's my idea. you can use Fimo (which i
found at an artstore, as "Sculpey," here in the U.S.)
to fashion a grip.
  here's what i did:
1.) first wrap the mic in something, like cling wrap,
or take a thin sheet of wax paper and wrap it around
the mic. just make sure it's tight.
2.) take a ball of the stuff (i used half a package at
first, about 1 oz, and flatten it into a square. it
doesn't have to be perfect, but it should be enough of
a sheet that you can wrap it around the mic. 

3.) you'll notice when you grip the stuff (once it's
on the mic) that it conforms to your hand. now you can
move the Sculpey around, taking it away from the areas
you don't need it and mushing into the areas where
you've got potential leaks. if you have your
hand-position pretty well determined, that helps. 
(i, for example, created a slight ridge just behind my
ring finger so that i didn't have to have my pinky
right up against it, which helps me relieve a little
strain.) 
4.) if you bring your other hand to the mic, as you
would if you were playing, you'll notice you can
create a 'fin' to fill in the spot between the heels
of your hands.
5.) for a mic like the SM-57, all you have to do is
slide the clingwrap or wax paper towards the bottom of
the mic. the whole thing should slip right off.
(consequently, once you bake the dough, it should slip
on and off the mic in the same way!)
6.)here's the tricky part. once you pull the dough off
the mic, it has a tendency to want to collapse into
the space where the mic was. you have a couple of
options. if you let the thing sit for a sec before you
slip it off, it should harden some (cause the heat
from your hands won't be keeping it soft). OR, if you
set it up right, you can leave the wax paper tube
inside, and that'll keep it from collapsing.
7.) bake it. 

now you have something like a ceramic guitar slide.
it'll slip on and off your mic (if you make it right,
it'll only slip towards the back, never to the front).
and, additionally, if you make it so it covers the mic
head, it'll keep that from moving. you can switch it
from one mic to another, if you buy a new one, and
it's cheap, so if you break it it's no sweat to make a
new one ;) also, you can mix and match colors, make
swirly patters or whatever, carve your initials in
it.., go nuts ;)
i haven't tried this on a bullet yet, but i think i
could do the same thing, though it'd be pretty thin
around a large empty center, so it'd be fragile when
not around the mic. 
anyway... i hope you all find this helpful.

   cheers,
         --Jp


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