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Tips & EQ's to make
better Recordings and Mixing
Most of the recordings done today are in Home/Project Studios on Computers mainly. The Sound & quality of these recordings can be Enhanced and make them sound Good & Comparable to today's Industry and Commercial Radio Standards.If you are doing Home/Project studio recordings yourself these are a few Simple Basic snippets, that might assist you to get Better Tracks/Recordings. There are some great books that go into details, & give you a better understanding of the recording process. When you are start recording, you have a few things that will go into the Recording Process which you can pay attention to if you are a Beginner / Semi pro engineer. These snippets will assist you to make better recordings/tracking, which will later become like second nature to you. RULE #1= Listen, Listen & Listen to what you are Tracking/Recording. Train yourself to Listen to the tonal quality of the vocal/instrument/spoken word etc. (Some close their eyes while listening, this removes any distraction from what the eyes are seeing and focuses the brain to listen.) Pay attention to these SIMPLE things when you are Tracking and you will have Better Cleaner Recorded Tracks. The Quality of Equipment is important, If you are recording onto a computer/ hard disc recording, Clean & Defrag it if needed before you start the Recording process. Don't EQ or Add any Effects, Reverbs, Compression, Flangers, Phase shifters while Recording/Tracking, THIS IS DONE IN THE MIXING PROCESS. (Once you have a certain amount of reverb, compression, effect on a recorded track you cannot take it out in the mix) A Good arrangement will help but it is the VOCALs that's is going to be key to a successful track. Make sure your vocal does justice to your song. Choose a good Recording & Monitoring space, and there are many different kinds of Microphones, Dynamic, Condenser, Ribbon, Tubes. Use A GOOD MICROPHONE For Vocal Tracking. Use a POP filter in front of the mic, Listen to background noise, Listen for POP'S & S's. Listen to the Vocal track and every other Track In Solo after its recorded to ensure that it is clean. Also Listen and hear that you have captured the essence of the Vocal/Preformance, If you are happy move on, if not "FIX IT NOW" Not later in the mix. You will have a lot to do in the mixing process as you will see below. Use a Gate on vocals to remove the breaths or playback spills from the earphones into the mic when you're tracking, like this you will have clean vocal track/s. Use a gate on the instrument tracks if you are recording live Instruments. Eg., When recording guitars, that are going thru an amp with microphones on the speakers can sometimes give a low hum, feedback, depending on the adjustments of the amp. These can be removed by using a gate. Try to get the tracks as clean as possible (Unless you want the noise there like feedback.) The old pedal effect have to be gated, as they give out a humming noise if the guitar player is not playing and will start playing later. Close the track if you are recording the band live, you can pop in the track hit the record button just before the guitars come in. Also use gates when tracking Live drums like this there won't be that much of a bleed from one track to another like from the kick or snare to the high hat track if you gate each microphone that's on the drum tracks. (If you don't hear the drum tracks sounding Good, Check the placements of the microphones, Eg., Snare, are you using a Sm. 57 on the top only or using 2 microphones on top & bottom. Where the microphones are placed will effect the sound, try moving them until you get as close to the sound you want without using any Eq. You can Eq each drum track later as you will see below, you can however use the EQ on the tracks that are returning from tape/harddisc for listening thru the monitoring feed. This will give you an idea how the drums/tracks will sound when you will eq them in the mix. The Cleaner You Record the Better it Will Sound.
Take time to Record it right and you will save hours of studio time
later trying to
fix tracks to sound good. The extra 10/20 minutes to Fix the
track or Rerecord the track can save you hours of headaches later trying to "FIX IT IN
THE MIX"
If you need to Eq an instrument in the Recording phase, Do it saparingly you can always Re Eq in the mix. Listen to the Tonal Quality of the sound on the track without effects, and ensure that its clean, if you are recording from a module/organ, try not to Eq while tracking, Most of the sampled sounds in modules/organs already have Eqs. Again you can Re Eq in the mix to place the instrument sound to its proper EQ, Level, Pan & Effects in the mix comparable to the other instruments to work in conjunction with all the other tracks and have a great mix. Mixing is an ART and it takes time, yet there are a few things that you can do to enhance your mixes to sound better. It can also be said that mixing is similar to cooking, every Person/Engineer/Studio will mix the track differently as per their own expertise and specific knowledge & Equipment. Yet there are a few simple basics that you can do to make your mixes sound better. Here are a few snippets of things to assist you to better understand the mixing process & hopefully make better and cleaner mixes. There are 11 things that go into a mix Melody, Lyrics, Performance, Concept, Song Structure, Harmony, Instrumentation, Arrangement, Rhythm, Quality of Equipment & the MIX . You have to pay attention to these 11 things to make a good Mix, Each of them is Important. There are 4 Pyramids that make the Square Tools of Dynamics Volume, Effects, Panning & Eqs. Each has Movement, Patterns & Individuals. You can create Musical & Emotional dynamics by placing each instrument at different volume levels in the mix. Simply making a sound louder or softer effects how it is perceived. However, you create a much more intense dynamic when all of the volume controls create a pattern based on their collective placement. For example, if all of the volumes are set evenly, so that there is very little variations between the loudest & softest sounds, the mix will be quite different from one with a wide variation in volume levels. When you change the volume levels during a mix, it creates a level of dynamic that is often so strong that it draws the listener attention away from the song. Which could be cool if appropriate for the style of music and song. Range of Apparent Volume Levels With Typical Instrument in Each Level (With 1 being the Loudest & Closest to you, and 6 being the Lowest & Furtherest level)
Distance Vs Delay times It is helpful to understand the relationship between delay time and distance. Sound travels at approximately 1130 feet per second, around 770 miles per hour, which is extremely slow compared to the speed of sound in wires - 186,000 miles per second, the speed of light. Therefore its is easy to hear a delay between the time a sound occurs and the time it takes for a sound to travel even a few feet to a wall and back. You can also easily hear delay when you put 2 microphones at 2 different distances from one sound. In fact changing the distances between 2 microphones is exactly like changing the delay time on a digital delay. The following chart illustrates how different distances relate to delay time. Of course, if you are calculating a delay time based on a distance between a sound source and a wall, the distance must be doubled (To & from the wall.) Distance Vs Delay Time
Frequency Ranges/Equalizers The first step in learning to use an equalizer is to become familiar with each of the frequencies by name. When you learn the names of the frequencies you can begin to remember what boosting or cutting each frequency dose to each instrument. In order to make all the frequencies easy to remember, they can be divided into 6 ranges. (there is no commonly accepted framework for dividing the frequencies into ranges) Every book seems to divide them a little bit differently Hi Highs > 8000 Hertz. This is where you find the Cymbals & Higher Harmonics of sounds, Boosting this range a little on certain instruments can make the recording sound like a higher quality recording, But to much can make it irritating. Highs > 5000-8000 Hz. This range, the one boosted when you turn up the treble controls on the stereo, is commonly boosted in mastering to make things sound Brighter & more present. Midranges > 800-5000 We are extremely hyper sensitive to this frequency. Boosting a frequency 1 dB in this range is like boosting 3 dB on any other range. This is where most of our language is centered, it is critical to be careful when cutting or boosting any frequencies here. This is double true on VOCALS because we are also hypersensitive to what Vocals are supposed to sound like. OOHZONE > 200- 800. When Frequencies are boosted to much in this range, they sound muddy, unclear and can even cause fatigue when not evened out. Bass > 40-200. This is the approximate range boosted when you turn up the bass tone control on a stereo. Low Bass > 40 & Below. Called the sub bass commonly found in rap booms, The low bass of a kick drum & bass guitars. Pitch - Frequency B8 7902 E4 330 A8 7040 D4 294 G8 6272 C4 262 F8 5588 B3 247 E8 5274 A3 220 D8 4699 G3 196 C8 4186 F3 175 B7 3951 E3 165 A7 3520 D3 147 G7 3136 C3 131 F7 2794 B2 129 E7 2637 A2 110 D7 2349 G2 98 C7 2093 F2 87 B6 1976 E2 82 A6 1760 D2 73 G6 1568 C2 65 F6 1397 B1 62 E6 1319 A1 55 D6 1175 G1 49 C6 1047 F1 44 B5 988 E1 41 A5 880 D1 37 G5 784 C1 33 F5 698 B0 31 E5 659 A0 28 D5 587 G0 25 C5 523 F0 22 B4 494 E0 21 A4 440 D0 18 G4 392 C0 16 F4 349 Using Equalizers There are 5 times when you must equalize a sound in a recording session , First a sound is equalized individually while in solo when recording onto a multitrack. Second, while the entire band is rehearsing or running thru the entire song, you double check the EQ of each sound relative to all other sounds. Then during mixdown each sound can be equalized individually before building the mix. Most Importantly finishing touches are done on the sound's EQ (relative to all the other sounds) when listening to the whole mix at once. Finally, a bit of EQ is occasionally done during the Mastering Process. This is an overall EQ for the entire mix and is not necessary if a good job was done in the first place. Equalizing the entire mix during Mastering There are 2 main types of EQ done during mastering. First, minor repairs can be done if the overall EQ doesn't sound quite right, but if the problem is very bad the entire song must be remixed. It is quite common to adjust the amount of bass or treble slightly. Second, The overall EQ can be adjusted to make the overall Bass, Midrange & Treble more similar from song to song. Again, if the difference is too great, it might require remixing the songs. There is only so much that can be done in mastering with EQ since all the songs are no longer separate on their own tracks. Listen Start by having the EQ on ZERO. which means having it not cutting or boosting any frequencies. The most common mistake made by an inexperienced engineer is to begin turning the EQ knobs before LISTENING. Don't touch the knobs until you know what you want to do. Listen and see if anything is wrong with the sound first, and if it ain't broke, don't fix it. There are 3 main details you should Listen for when EQ'ing. The 3 main things to check are, If the sound is Muddy, has irritating or "Honky" frequencies in the midrange, or is bright enough. If you do nothing else while recording to the multitrack, you should at least take care of each of these 3 aspects which make up of over 75% of all EQ'ing to be done. Cut the Muddiness, Cut the Irritation & Set the Bandwidth. Common Quick General EQ's  Typical EQ's for Typical Instruments
The muddiness of different instruments are in these Hertz, BASS: 40 to 100 = bottom. 100/200= roundness, 200/800=Muddiness, 800/1000 = body on small speakers. 1000/5000=Presence 5000/8000 = HighEnd, 8000/12000= hiss. KICK: 40/100=Bottom. 100/200 Roundness, 200/800 Muddiness 5000/8000High End. 8000/12000 hiss. SNARE: x 100/200 Fullness, 200/800 Muddiness. 5000/8000 presence x TOMS:x 100/200 Fullness, 200/800=Muddiness, 1000/5000 Presence/irritation, 5000/8000 High End. FLOOR TOMS: 40/100= Bottom, 100/200=Fullness, 200/800 Muddiness. 1000/5000=presence HI HAT/CYMBALS: x 200/800 muddiness/Bleed. 1000/5000 irritation, 5000/8000 Clarity,Crispiness 8000/1200=Shimmer/Sizzle. VOICE: 40/100=Rumble, 100/200Fullness, 200/800 Muddiness 1000/5000=Presence/irritation/telephone. 5000/8000=Clarity Crispness,Sibilance6K PIANO:40/100=Bottom, 100/200=Fullness, 200/800=Muddiness 800/1000=Muddiness, 1000/5000=Presence, 5000/8000=Clarity, 8000/1200=Harmonics. ELECTRIC GUITAR: x 100/200=Fullness, Crunch. 200/800=Muddiness,Roundness, 1000/5000=Cut,Shred,Irritation, 5000/8000=Crispiness,Thinness, 8000/12000=Hiss ACOUSTIC GUITAR: x, 100/200= Fullness, 200/800=Muddiness, 5000/8000= Clarity,Crispiness. 8000/12000=Speckle. ORGAN: 40/100=Bottom, 100/200=Fullness, 200/800 Muddiness, 5000/8000= Clarity ,Crispiness. STRINGS: 40/100= Bottom, 100/200=Fullness, 200/800=Muddiness, 1000/5000= Irritation Digital Sound. 5000/8000 Clarity& Crispiness, 8000/12000=Sparkle. Horns: x 100/200=Fullness, 200/800=Muddiness, 800/1000=Roundness, 5000/8000=Clarity & Crispiness. CONGA: 40/100=Boominess, 100/200= Fullness 1000/5000= Irritation, 5000/8000= Clarity, Crispiness Tempo vs Delay Time
There's a lot more, One can create 3D effect mixes by using Volumes, Panning, EQ's & Effects,
There are many more things that you can do to enhance the track & achieve a GREAT MIX by learning the uses of Flangers, Chorus's, Phase Shifters, Reverb's, etc., and can be used to get Rate, Speed, Frequency, Width, Depth, Intensity, Feedback, Even Negative Feedback, and lots more the above is just a small but main portion of things that you can use to get good mixes.
I Highly Recommend that you get the Book "The Art of Mixing, By David Gibson" & would Like to Thank Mr. David Gibson for this great Book. Phone: (516) 837-9367• Email: contact@mastering1.com
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