Knowledge Wednesday By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

This week's Knowledge Wednesday tip is to always remember that small cuts with an EQ make a big difference to the sound of the source and the overall mix.

Small cuts with an EQ remove problem frequencies and make space for important fundamental frequencies of other instruments that you want to prioritise in your mix.

Check in next week for more Knowledge Wednesday tips!

If you are looking for editing, mixing or mastering services, head over to www.jwaudioproductions.co.uk and get in touch via the contact page, I would love to hear about your next project!

Knowledge Wednesday By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

This week's Knowledge Wednesday tip is to cut frequencies on your drum overheads before boosting.

Drum overheads can present a large amount of harsh frequencies and also create an excessive build up in the mid-range depending on mic placement, drum tuning etc, so it is a good idea to start EQ'ing by cutting in these problem areas to smooth out the overhead sounds to set you on your way to achieving a great drum mix.

Check in next Wednesday for more great tips!

If you require editing, mixing or mastering services, head over to www.jwaudioproductions.co.uk and get in touch about your project via the contact page.

Knowledge Wednesday By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

This week's Knowledge Wednesday tip is to EQ your effects such as reverb and delay.

Some reverb and delay plugins have EQ options built in, but if you are using one that doesn't then you can load up a separate EQ plugin. 

The best starting point with EQ'ing reverb and delay is to apply and high pass and Low pass filter to remove some of unnecessary frequencies. Removing high end frequencies on reverb and delay is a good way to give the effect a more 'analog' feel, essentially just making the sound warmer rather than sounding unnatural.

Cleaning up the low end is also important if you are trying to create space in the mix because any 'boomy' or overly resonant frequencies in a signal will easily be accentuated by reverb and delay. A high pass filter can help with this and even a notch filter to remove particular problem frequencies.

Try EQ'ing your effects, there are no limits!

If you are looking for editing, mixing or mastering services, please head over to www.jwaudioproductions.co.uk and get in touch about your project via the contact page.

Knowledge Wednesday By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

This week's Knowledge Wednesday is a quick tip on a couple of keys frequency bands to be aware of on distorted electric guitar.

400Hz - 500Hz 

2KHz - 3KHz 

The above frequency bands are areas that i'm known for cutting in and sometimes boosting, but i want you to listen for yourself. Create a fairly wide bandwidth (Q) a boost in these areas and listen to the difference both boosted and cut. Let your ears be the judge.

Please keep in mind that guitar EQ varies massively depending on the guitar, the pickups, the amp and the microphone.

The obvious thing to do is spend time achieving the sound you want at the recording stage however if you find yourself mixing guitars that have already been committed to, then the areas above are a couple to focus on.

Mix Templates By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

Using mix templates is something i use in the production of my music as well as other clients and in this post, i want to explain the benefits of doing this and hopefully give you a strategy to implement into your own productions.

Keep in mind that in order to utilise a mix template, you firstly need to put the time into creating one.

I firstly start with the drums and depending on whether they are acoustically played and recorded or programmed and sampled, i like to have my channels already set up so that the the kick-in goes to channel 1, the kick-out goes to channel 2, the snare top goes to channel 3 and so on. I also create a drum buss and a parallel drum buss ready for compression and blending. As well as this, I apply console emulation across all the channels and leave them engaged all the time. I like to insert some of my go-to plugins such as the Fab Filter Pro-Q2 EQ, Waves CLA-76, Fab Filter Pro-C2 Compressor, Slate Digital Virtual Tape Machine and Slate Digital Virtual Buss Compressors onto specific channels and busses to prep them for tweaking. I'd to mention that on certain instruments, i have presets saved within the plugins that i like engage to get me into the ball-park of the sound i'm listening for.

I then move onto the bass guitar, keeping it quite simple i create an amp channel and a DI channel, as well as a couple of auxiliary channels for different types of saturation and distortion, should i wish to use them. Similarly to the drums, i like to insert console emulation and a basic EQ and Compressor to get me started. Once I've done this, i create a bass buss so that i can monitor and control the level on one fader.

Next i focus on the guitars and these are very simple for me, i use console emulation and a basic EQ that has a high pass and low pass filter applied to remove some of the unnecessary frequencies. I then create a guitar buss which i apply some gentle tape saturation to. Sometimes, i will use 2 or 3 different busses if i have a lot of rhythms, leads and clean sounds present in the mix to give me greater control.

For vocals, i load up some console emulation, a De-Esser, compressor and a basic EQ with a high pass filter engaged to remove the unwanted low end. Depending on the song, i usually start off with an 1176 style compressor or sometimes i like run parallel compression or even series compression utilising an 1176 and an LA2A style compressor.

Finally, i create a couple of auxiliary channels with reverb and delay effects engaged so that they are there for vocals, guitars or drums to be sent to as and when i get to the state in the mix where i'm wanting to apply effects.

The very last thing i do (sometimes it's actually first) before i start mixing is create a mix buss and this contains console emulation, gentle tape saturation, compression and a limiter to ensure that no peaks creep through. At this point the limiter is doing nothing but ensuring that nothing clips, i do not use it to increase the level of the song.

Once i've done all this, i save it as a mix template and label it accordingly.  

I like to utilise mix templates with clients projects particularly when they are looking for consistency across an album because it's a way of mapping out the sounds that i may have already achieved in one session and then i want to apply that across the other songs. It doesn't mean the sounds strictly have to be the same, i still adjust the compressors, adjust the EQs and apply higher or lower values of saturation, but the point is that it's giving me the most positive and constructive start to a mix.

I also like to use a variation of mix templates in the production of my own music because it allows me to hear the finished product much quicker and keeps me inspired during the times that i'm writing and tracking parts.

Considering using mix templates going forward with your own work and if you are doing work for other people, you will find that you will save time, improve your work flow and achieve more consistent results.

If you are looking for editing, mixing or mastering, head over to www.jwaudioproductions.co.uk and get in touch via the contact page.

Knowledge Wednesday By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

If your goal is to reduce low frequencies, but not remove them completely, try using a low shelf cut instead of a high pass filter.

Low shelf cuts on an EQ can sound more musical and less drastic than a high pass filter particularly when you are removing a lot of the low frequency content from your audio signal. You can still use a high pass filter before a low shelf cut to get rid of the absolutely unecceassary frequencies such as 40Hz and below on certain instruments. 

Try a low shelf cut on your next mix and listen to how much smoother your audio track can be.

If you require any editing, mixing or mastering services, head over to www.jwaudioproductions.co.uk and get in touch via the contact page.

Snare Drum - Key Frequencies By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

Here are some key frequencies of a snare drum to pay close attention to when mixing. Keep in mind that fundamentals can change depending on the material, dimension and depth of the drum as well as other variants such as the type of head, snares, sticks and range of tuning.

160-250Hz - low end, weight, punch ( the weight of a snare is found in quite a wide spectrum because it depends on the size and material of the drum, as well as the tuning) 

300-400Hz - woodiness (an interesting area that I sometimes boost and other times cut depending on whether it's needed)

500-800Hz - snare ring (dependant on type and tuning of the snare, gently cut here if needed but be careful as this can remove a lot of character from the drum, try using moon gel at the recording stage to reduce unwanted ring) 

1.5-2.5KHz - attack, crack (mid frequency smack and stick definition, another area I gently boost or cut depending on what i'm listening for) 

4-6KHz - snare wires (can be very brittle sounding, but with careful boosting can help the snare cut through) 

7-12KHz - air, brightness (add for extra sweetness but be careful of increasing cymbal bleed if you haven't used a gate)

Use these frequencies as a guide and use your own ears to decide what works best with the source you have recorded. 

If you're in need of editing, mixing or mastering services, head over to www.jwaudioproductions.co.uk and get in touch via the contact page. 

Kick Drum - Key Frequencies By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

Here are some key frequencies of a kick drum to pay close attention to when mixing. Keep in mind that fundamentals can change depending on the material, dimension and depth of the drum as well as other variants such as the type of head, the beater and the range of tuning. 

60-80Hz - low end punch, fundamentals, weight 

100-200Hz - boominess (cut here to increase low end definition and make room for bass guitar 

300-500Hz - boxiness (cut here to reduce the cardboard like sound, common for rock and metal kick drums) 

1-3KHz - attack and snap (boost here to help cut through the mix, particularly guitars) 

4-6KHz - beater, click, definition (boost here for extra beater definition, common on metal kick drums) 

7-8KHz - air (gently boost here if needed for extra air but be careful with bleed, unless you have used a gate)

If you're interested in any editing, mixing or mastering services, head over to www.jwaudioproductions.co.uk and get in touch via the contact page. 

Remember: Mix at low volume levels By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

The importance of balance has been discussed in an earlier post and in this one I want to talk about completing this process whilst working at low volumes.

We all like to hear everything loud, especially the drums and bass, they have fundamental frequencies we want to feel as much as we can hear but in the context of mixing this isn’t the best way to operate as it can prevent you from accurately balancing, EQ’ing and compressing. Listening to a mix too loud is at the very least a distraction and also potentially damaging to your hearing if listening for long periods of time.

It’s important to balance at low volume levels because you are able to accurately balance your track levels and you’ll also find that you have a better sense of depth and width which is particularly useful for panning and adding reverbs.

Think of it like this…If your mix sounds good at low levels it’s a lot more likely to sound good if not better when it’s turned up. It’s important to realise how easily your ears can be tricked especially when listening at high volume levels and this can be very problematic when using compression. A snare drum or a lead vocal may sound just right when the mix is cranked, so you might not use compression to its full advantage however, you might notice when you turn your mix down, these instruments start to get lost in the mix and aren’t as ‘in your face’ as you first thought. If you focus on achieving ‘punch’ with compression whilst operating at low volumes, you will definitely get a more satisfying result that will translate very well when turned up.

It is also good practice to EQ at low volume levels, but always check your adjustments at higher levels especially with low frequencies as they are much harder to judge when they are quieter.

It’s not wrong to mix at high volume levels but you’ll find that you balance, compress and EQ your tracks more accurately and you will begin to appreciate the quality of your mix if you utilise working at low volume levels. Of course, go between low and high level volumes to check your mix and even just listen to it cranked at the end of a session and just sit back and enjoy your hard work. Take care of your ears for maximum productivity and value being able to mix at low and high volume levels.

If you would like to discuss your project, use the contact page on www.jwaudioproductions.co.uk 

Remember: Create space in the low end By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

Whether you are mixing 10 or 100 audio tracks you will certainly have multiple instruments fighting for their own space and also claiming unnecessary space. For the purpose of this post, i’m going to talk directly about the essential low frequency space.

Generally speaking, all frequencies can be problematic at some point but none more than the low end frequencies. The majority of your audio tracks will have low end content and in the context of a mix with multiple instruments, there simply isn’t room for all of it and you need to prioritise the sounds that you want to occupy that space. To keep things simple, i’ll say the bass guitar and kick drum are most likely going to be chosen to occupy the low end. This means the snare, hi hats, overheads, room mics, rhythm guitars, lead guitars and any other audio tracks need to make way for the kick drum and bass guitar and let them be heard and felt in the way they were intended to be.

The quickest and easiest way to deal with this is by grabbing an EQ, setting a high-pass filter and sweeping all the way up to 100-120Hz. You may not need to be quite this aggressive with all your audio tracks, but for the instruments i’ve mentioned above, you aren’t filtering out any of their important fundamental frequencies, you are allowing the fundamentals of the kick drum and bass guitar to occupy their own space without interference from any other sources.

If you’re a guitar player like me, when you first start mixing you will focus on this instrument first and it is very tempting to keep the low end of your rhythm guitars in a mix because lets face it, we all love the sound and feel that we get from a 4×12 cabinet on stage, but the reality is that in the context of a mix, the low end simply isn’t needed from guitars and they work much better by allowing other instruments their own space. You can look at it as a compromise or sacrifice but i can promise you that it’s a positive move to cut. Try your next mix with two versions, one version with cuts made to the low end to make space for the bass and kick and another version without and see which you like best. I’m very confident you’ll prefer the first version.

One important thing to take into consideration is that when you solo the instruments , they may not sound as good with the low end cut, but listen to the mix as a whole and appreciate the context because your goal should be to get all the sounds working together in balance.

The topic of low frequencies is much larger than the size of this post but i wanted to highlight the importance of creating space in the low end for two of the most common sources, the kick drum and bass guitar.

Why you should keep mixing simple By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

In the mixing world today it’s easy to believe that it’s a complicated process full of secrets and successes that can only be achieved with expensive hardware and software but the fact is – this is totally NOT the case. Don’t get me wrong, i’ve spent a long time having the same belief and thinking “It’s not possible for me to achieve a mix to the standard of Chris Lord Alge, Forrester Savell or Randy Staub without the equipment that they have”, but the reality is that these guys set the standard that they have because they have the experience and have spent a long time honing their craft particularly with the core elements of mixing, balance, EQ and compression.

If you are someone feeling like that right now then this post is for you.

It’s time to take things back to basics, no endless track counts, no complicated channel strips full of plugins that you don’t really need and no infinite amounts of drafts and revisions before you may or may not decide to bounce the track out of your DAW.

Start your next mix with the conscious decision to use 1 compressor and 1 EQ for every track you work on. You ask why? I’m telling you this because i’ve implemented these limitations on myself and i can tell you first hand that it works because you are forced to achieve a result with what you have. By doing this you also remove all the questions going through your head about what plugin you should use, what everybody else is using and what brand has promised you results. It will free up so much of that needed space in your mind enabling you to focus entirely on the one plugin you have available and know that you have to achieve the sound you want with it. I’m not necessarily suggesting that you stick to DAW bundled plugins, but make a decision on a single plugin and stick to it.

As i mentioned in an earlier post, balance is one of the most important things in mixing and this is entirely relevant to the idea of keeping things simple. Start every mix by playing with the faders and pan pots, get the mix to where it sounds best to you and then apply the rest of the core elements, your chosen EQ and compression. If you treat your mix as these 3 core elements then the mixing process will immediately feel easier and more manageable because you are breaking it down into stages which have clear objectives.

As well as setting these positive limitations, this will allow you to become more familiar with the plugins and really understand how they respond to the audio you are working with. Choose the built in EQ and Compressor in Pro Tools, Logic, Reaper, Cubase or go with a plugin you own such as Fab Filter, Waves or DMG Audio. Make this decision and i guarantee that you will achieve results in your mixes faster than ever before and more importantly, you will gain a better understanding of EQ and Compression without the distraction of the hundreds of plugins out there that sometimes we want just because they look good.

Keep things simple in the beginning with mixing because you will truly learn the value of limitations, the principals of EQ and compression and the importance of balance. These are all factors that you will be able to apply to whatever DAW you are using and therefore, make you more versatile as an engineer if you are ever faced with having to achieve a result within a DAW that you aren’t familiar with.

EQ – A golden rule or just good practice? By: DAWsopenat7 No comments

When mixing, one of core tools we use to shape a sound is EQ.

We all use different plugins for this, some built into our DAW, some online freebies and others purchased from plugin developers such as Fab Filter.

For the purpose of this post, we will be focussing on parametric EQ. Typically having multiple frequency bands, we have control over the frequency, gain and bandwidth (commonly known as Q).

Frequency – Adjusting this control will determine which frequency will be affected by the choices made on the following two controls.

Gain – Adjusting this control will add or subtract gain to the chosen frequency. Remember that without using this control, no other parameters will have an affect.

Bandwidth (Q)– Adjusting this control will determine how wide or narrow the boost or cut to the frequency band is.

If you haven’t used this type of EQ before, the best thing to do is bring up the plugin on an audio track and have a play around. Create a 10dB boost at 100Hz with a narrow bandwidth (see the example below) then sweep up the frequency bands and listen to how the sound of the audio source changes.

Now, to bring this post back to the context of the title. I want to talk about the idea of cutting frequencies with a narrow bandwidth and boosting with a wide bandwidth. I’ll answer the question immediately, I believe narrowly cutting and widely boosting frequencies is just good practice, not a golden rule and I’ll explain why now…

It’s important to look at EQ within the context of what you’re mixing. Are you mixing a snare drum that has an annoying ringing tone? Are you mixing a kick drum that’s lacking some low end thump? Or are you mixing a vocal that needs a little more air adding?

I’ll firstly use the snare as an example. If I have an annoying ringing tone between 500Hz and 700Hz then I usually create a narrow band and boost by about 12-15dB to really accentuate the problem frequency. I sweep around these areas until I hear the ringing most acutely and quite often it will start clipping on the channel I’m working on. Once I’ve found this frequency I will normally cut it by as much as 6-12dB and sometimes more (it’s not about the numbers here, it’s about what your ears are telling you) and I will then bypass the plugin a few times both with the snare solo’d and also within the context of the full mix. The reason for cutting using narrow bandwidths is to ensure the fundamentals and character of the sound are left intact. The important thing to realise here is whether it sounds better with or without the cut, remember to trust your own ears and don’t just cut a frequency because other people say so.

I’ll use the vocal as another example. If I have a vocal that is quite dull and lacking some air, I usually create a 3-4dB boost between 8-12KHz with a wide bandwidth. I then check this solo’d and within the mix and add or reduce gain to taste. The reason for boosting with wide bandwidths is to ensure that the increase in gain is audibly smooth across the frequency band and therefore more pleasing to the ear. In the context of a vocal, imagine boosting a frequency with a narrow bandwidth in an area which happens to be around vocal sibilance and the result would be a dull vocal with accentuated S’s on certain words.

An example of when you might work against the practice of boosting with wide bandwidth is when you’re working with an ambient synth pad and you may want to highlight certain resonances to create a droning sound. Using a narrow bandwidth allows you to zone in on the fundamentals of a sound and choose exactly where you want to boost. You may want to highlight 440Hz which is the musical note of A.

Another example is when mixing a snare drum. One particular area i like to boost is between 170Hz and 200Hz (depending on the drum) to highlight the fundamental which adds a lot of weight to the snare. I prefer to boost using a narrow bandwidth in this frequency band as this is the only part that i want to be accentuated. I will usually boost between 4-6dB. I will often do a mirrored EQ on the bass guitar around the frequency that i have boosted and cut in the same area to allow both instruments to work together without competing for the same area in the spectrum.

The main purpose of this post was to give an insight into why boosting wide and cutting narrow with EQ is just a good practice, not a golden rule. There are always exceptions to a rule and i apply them or go against them on pretty much every mix i do. Remember to trust your ears when mixing and don’t judge a sound based on the visual aspect of an EQ plugin. The important thing to do when making EQ decisions is to ask yourself what you want to achieve and why.