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Post by Tbone81 on Oct 10, 2019 11:37:37 GMT -6
Seems to me that everyone has been reading into the OP's thread and applying their own biases to it...which is actually all well and good, that's kinda the whole point of a forum. But @sloweye yes I think you're absolutely correct. From what I've seen, the big pro mixers don't give a fuck what should or shouldn't be done. They twist knobs till it sounds good and then go on with their lives.
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 10, 2019 14:17:36 GMT -6
While filters are certainly designed to be problem solvers, there are no rules here. They can also be creative tools, so if using them on a whole mix gets it closer to the vibe you're chasing, and it does so more efficiently and similarly to addressing each individual track, then the science doesn't matter. Now and then it makes a mix sound more "right" to me. Often times, it's worse, just like any of the other 5,000 decisions we make on a mix. I used to 2nd guess stuff like that to a point where it would cripple me. The second I start thinking about how a 12db/8va filter is affecting things above the center frequency, I get buried in the minutia. Doesn't stop me from doing just that though. haha. Just the other day I turned 3k up all the way on a 550 and was like "wait, that can't be right." If it sounds good, I made the right choice. If it serves it's intended purpose of solving a problem, then that's great too. That, to me, is the beauty of these tools at our disposal. I just can't get behind the idea that we shouldn't do something because some people own speakers that range from blue whale to dog whistle, and on the flip side, because other playback systems sound like the inside of a trashcan. I'm more like "You shouldn't use filters routinely, as a matter of course." If there isn't something in a tracks that really needs filtering out you shouldn't use a gratuitous filter on it.
There's a lot of stuff that some people do as a matter of course on "modern" (or perhaps I should say "recent") mixes that bugs me. Sometimes it's a cumulative thing, sometimes a specific mix decision.
I also don't really hold with the idea of second-guessing what the end user's playback system will be. That's a downward spiral. "Oh, the end user will probably have a severely bandwidth limited playback, so I'll deliver a bandwidth limited mix", that sort of thing. So you deliver a bandwidth limited mix and people go "Why do I need better playbackl? These earbuds are good enough for my music." And one thing feeds off the other and vice-versa.
I believe that you should always mix for a good playback sysem. If an end user wants to listen on junk that's THEIR problem.
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 10, 2019 14:24:31 GMT -6
Seems to me that everyone has been reading into the OP's thread and applying their own biases to it...which is actually all well and good, that's kinda the whole point of a forum. But @sloweye yes I think you're absolutely correct. From what I've seen, the big pro mixers don't give a fuck what should or shouldn't be done. They twist knobs till it sounds good and then go on with their lives. Yeah. But some of those "big pro mixers" also routinely deliver stuff that I find unlistenable. And a lot of them, if their interviews are to be believed, also use "mass production" settings on everything. I'm a lot more interested in the practices of "big pro mixers" from the days when records sounded good. To me.
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Post by Ward on Oct 10, 2019 15:59:50 GMT -6
Absolutely. Use filters if/when appropriate, on a case by case basis based on what you hear. The OP in this thread implies that they're used as a matter of course, by default. Similar info is commonly seen on forums. That is one of the problems with forums; specific techniques get repeatedly mentioned to the point where they become accepted as gospel. They're not. No EQ setting should ever be considered a default. That's not using your ears, it's just lazy. The OP wishes he had never started this thread based on the GS type replies . . . but anyhoo . . .
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Post by Tbone81 on Oct 10, 2019 16:04:26 GMT -6
Seems to me that everyone has been reading into the OP's thread and applying their own biases to it...which is actually all well and good, that's kinda the whole point of a forum. But @sloweye yes I think you're absolutely correct. From what I've seen, the big pro mixers don't give a fuck what should or shouldn't be done. They twist knobs till it sounds good and then go on with their lives. Yeah. But some of those "big pro mixers" also routinely deliver stuff that I find unlistenable. And a lot of them, if their interviews are to be believed, also use "mass production" settings on everything. I'm a lot more interested in the practices of "big pro mixers" from the days when records sounded good. To me. Fair enough. I think we'd both agree that a lot of "candid" interviews with big names guys are actually well disguised commercials, promoting their waves plugins, or whatever. And I don't really begrudge anyone that. I mean you really have to take things with a grain of salt. Like a REALLY large grain of salt, Himalayan even.
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Post by trakworxmastering on Oct 10, 2019 16:11:26 GMT -6
Absolutely. Use filters if/when appropriate, on a case by case basis based on what you hear. The OP in this thread implies that they're used as a matter of course, by default. Similar info is commonly seen on forums. That is one of the problems with forums; specific techniques get repeatedly mentioned to the point where they become accepted as gospel. They're not. No EQ setting should ever be considered a default. That's not using your ears, it's just lazy. The OP wishes he had never started this thread based on the GS type replies . . . but anyhoo . . . Well, If I find myself agreeing with you too often, I'll start to worry. But seriously, this thread seems very polite compared to what GS gets like, no?
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Post by christopher on Oct 10, 2019 16:29:46 GMT -6
Where does everyone cut them off these days? For me it's 30hz and 16.1K generally When the clock says its time to wrap up, I print.. take a quick peek at the strectrum and maybe 10 seconds back and forth against a reference. Then if its not in-line with references, I'll start the high pass filter at 30.. move up until it chops enough garbage away so it won't blow up the car speakers. If I go too much, thats ok.. theres a bass knob in the car:) For the highs, this is the worst when there's too much.. so yeah I might low pass... 16kHz is also my go-to spot for least audible, then work toward 12k, again checking references. If there's time set aside for upper/lower extremities, I'll massage each area with shelving and bells only, but often I'm in a rush. I'll sometimes take an hour this way just going through the lows to try and get it in the perfect zone, but its really hard to do. And the payoff is often not perfect. It really sucks when you go to the car and 30Hz is knocking, or theres so much painful highs that you can't turn it up. So filters are ok. I don't use sharp filters, I use gradual ones, which can be countered with EQ later if need be. Not that its ideal.
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 10, 2019 19:50:37 GMT -6
Absolutely. Use filters if/when appropriate, on a case by case basis based on what you hear. The OP in this thread implies that they're used as a matter of course, by default. Similar info is commonly seen on forums. That is one of the problems with forums; specific techniques get repeatedly mentioned to the point where they become accepted as gospel. They're not. No EQ setting should ever be considered a default. That's not using your ears, it's just lazy. The OP wishes he had never started this thread based on the GS type replies . . . but anyhoo . . . ??
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 10, 2019 19:53:32 GMT -6
Yeah. But some of those "big pro mixers" also routinely deliver stuff that I find unlistenable. And a lot of them, if their interviews are to be believed, also use "mass production" settings on everything. I'm a lot more interested in the practices of "big pro mixers" from the days when records sounded good. To me. Fair enough. I think we'd both agree that a lot of "candid" interviews with big names guys are actually well disguised commercials, promoting their waves plugins, or whatever. And I don't really begrudge anyone that. I mean you really have to take things with a grain of salt. Like a REALLY large grain of salt, Himalayan even. Fist sized crystals of Halite (rock salt).
Yes, I had a rock collection that won me a blue ribbon in my HS science fair....
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 10, 2019 20:36:14 GMT -6
Where does everyone cut them off these days? For me it's 30hz and 16.1K generally When the clock says its time to wrap up, I print.. take a quick peek at the strectrum and maybe 10 seconds back and forth against a reference. Then if its not in-line with references, I'll start the high pass filter at 30.. move up until it chops enough garbage away so it won't blow up the car speakers. If I go too much, thats ok.. theres a bass knob in the car:) For the highs, this is the worst when there's too much.. so yeah I might low pass... 16kHz is also my go-to spot for least audible, then work toward 12k, again checking references. If there's time set aside for upper/lower extremities, I'll massage each area with shelving and bells only, but often I'm in a rush. I'll sometimes take an hour this way just going through the lows to try and get it in the perfect zone, but its really hard to do. And the payoff is often not perfect. It really sucks when you go to the car and 30Hz is knocking, or theres so much painful highs that you can't turn it up. So filters are ok. I don't use sharp filters, I use gradual ones, which can be countered with EQ later if need be. Not that its ideal. I never pay attention to "the clock" except for dinner. I NEVER take a "peek at the spectrum". Ears, not eyes. Maybe if there's a really serious problem, but if that occurs, I'll just redo the track.*
16k? Seriously? If above that doesn't matter, then why do many well respected EQs have "air bands"?
If you have "painful 'highs'", that isn't above 16k, that's high mids.
I check everything in the car (stock Toyota sound system.). So far I've NEVER had a problem that wasn't utterly obvious on my monitors.
IMO, if you don't do STUPID things in your mix, and you recording isn't a location recording with environmental problems, you shouldn't need to HPF.
* - on my first album there were problems with "blooming" on the bass. Bob pretty much fixed that in mastering. After that album I fired the bass player who would not take direction regarding the stupid active EQ in his damn bass. FWIW, I hate active basses unless the player has lots of studio experience and knows what not to do.
Using "gradual filters" and then compensating for them with EQ is pissing into the wind and also causes huge phase problems. Why would you want to filter if you need to attempt to "correct your filtering" with EQ? That makes no sense.
Better to not filter
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 10, 2019 20:43:31 GMT -6
Absolutely. Use filters if/when appropriate, on a case by case basis based on what you hear. The OP in this thread implies that they're used as a matter of course, by default. Similar info is commonly seen on forums. That is one of the problems with forums; specific techniques get repeatedly mentioned to the point where they become accepted as gospel. They're not. No EQ setting should ever be considered a default. That's not using your ears, it's just lazy. The OP wishes he had never started this thread based on the GS type replies . . . but anyhoo . . . "GS type replies"? I don't think so.
Maybe you mean "replies that don't agree with bad practice"?
If everybody agreed with anything posted there would be no point to the forum.
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 10, 2019 20:44:55 GMT -6
Where does everyone cut them off these days? For me it's 30hz and 16.1K generally "Everyone" doesn't.
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Post by gouge on Oct 10, 2019 21:47:06 GMT -6
ok then
on my mixes itb nill lpf or hpf.
otb 40hz hpf nil lpf
individual channels are a different story
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Post by Ward on Oct 11, 2019 0:44:22 GMT -6
Where does everyone cut them off these days? For me it's 30hz and 16.1K generally "Everyone" doesn't. Stop being a dick.
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Post by trakworxmastering on Oct 11, 2019 15:13:48 GMT -6
Now who's posting "GS type replies"? FWIW, on GS that comment would get you an infraction...
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Post by EmRR on Oct 11, 2019 15:18:42 GMT -6
If you toss in a hand grenade it might push the bandwidth out wider....then you'll have to reset the knobs.....if you can find them...once they cool down.....
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 11, 2019 15:24:11 GMT -6
I have no intention of being a dick. I just don't agree with the current common belief that everyone should HPF and LPF the crap out of everything - it's not the way I was trained. I was trained that the less you mess with the signal in terms of processing the better. As has been pointed out, when you apply any sort of EQ or filtering it has deleterious side effects such as screwing with phase, effects on frequency response outside the stated band of the filter, etc.
Yes, it's a very "old school;" way of looking at things. As it happens I came up pretty much on the cusp of the transition between the older ("purist", if you will) approach toward audio and the "modern" attitude that if the knob is there it "needs" to be used. For a long time I leaned towards the "modern" approach. Then, a few years ago, I started noticing that the "modern" way often (not "always", there is no always) causes as many problems as it solves. They're just different problems.
It cracks me up when people talk about how some people these days talk about "how great those old records were" but won't employ the techniques and attitudes that were employed to make them.
Just because a knob is there doesn't mean it should be used. If you have rumble on a track from traffic, HVAC noise, passing trains or nearby airports, wind noise from a field recording, etc, by all means, use the HPF. But if none of that kind of stuff is present you should keep the signal path as clean and simple as possible. And if you need the HPF you should set it according to the type and frequency of the noise you're dealing with, not always using a particular frequency because "it's what you do."
When I was coming up, that was part of "The Basics". With the demise of the old studio system and on the job mentoring a lot of "The Basics" are becoming or have become lost. I don't regard that as a good thing.
EDIT: Regarding the LPF - back when the standard for digital recording was 44.1/48 it kinda made a certain amount of sense to LPF to avoid the possibility of aliasing. Not all systems had good filtering and many converters didn't employ oversampling which is now the norm. These days there's really no reason that I can see to do it. Some might claim that "most people" can't hear about a certain point (which varies with the person making the argument) but the truth is that some people can. Last time I checked by hearing a few years ago (I'm 69 now) I had useable perception up to aroud 15kHz, give or take a smidge. When I was young (below 35 ) I had useful hearing up around roughly 20k and had the perception of audio (more of a feeling than actually hearing frequencies) above that.
And with a little training most people can discern the difference between a sine wave and a square wave even at the highest audible (for them) frequencies. Which means that one can perceive the effect (as harmonics) of frequencies that are beyond the range where they're audible as fundamentals. Applying an LPF will eliminate that.
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Post by trakworxmastering on Oct 11, 2019 15:38:10 GMT -6
I have no intention of being a dick. I just don't agree with the current common belief that everyone should HPF and LPF the crap out of everything - it's not the way I was trained. I was trained that the less you mess with the signal in terms of processing the better. As has been pointed out, when you apply any sort of EQ or filtering it has deleterious side effects such as screwing with phase, effects on frequency response outside the stated band of the filter, etc.
Yes, it's a very "old school;" way of looking at things. As it happens I came up pretty much on the cusp of the transition between the older ("purist", if you will) approach toward audio and the "modern" attitude that if the knob is there it "needs" to be used. For a long time I leaned towards the "modern" approach. Then, a few years ago, I started noticing that the "modern" way often (not "always", there is no always) causes as many problems as it solves. They're just different problems.
It cracks me up when people talk about how some people these days talk about "how great those old records were" but won't employ the techniques and attitudes that were employed to make them.
Just because a knob is there doesn't mean it should be used. If you have rumble on a track from traffic, HVAC noise, passing trains or nearby airports, wind noise from a field recording, etc, by all means, use the HPF. But if none of that kind of stuff is present you should keep the signal path as clean and simple as possible. And if you need the HPF you should set it according to the type and frequency of the noise you're dealing with, not always using a particular frequency because "it's what you do."
When I was coming up, that was part of "The Basics". With the demise of the old studio system and on the job mentoring a lot of "The Basics" are becoming or have become lost. I don't regard that as a good thing.
Agreed. I never thought of it in terms of old school vs new school. I think of it more like experienced vs inexperienced. As in - the more experienced I become the less knobs I feel the need to turn. And my results keep improving. Like you I used to think I needed to do so many things all the time, because I could, until one by one I started questioning practices and realized that often times NOT doing a thing is the best course. If it ain't broke, don't fix it! I wasn't mentored, and never interned or second engineered, but still I ended up coming to the same conclusions over time on my own. These days so many people learn engineering by reading forums that some practices just go viral it seems...
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Post by m03 on Oct 11, 2019 15:40:23 GMT -6
I have no intention of being a dick. I just don't agree with the current common belief that everyone should HPF and LPF the crap out of everything - it's not the way I was trained. I was trained that the less you mess with the signal in terms of processing the better. As has been pointed out, when you apply any sort of EQ or filtering it has deleterious side effects such as screwing with phase, effects on frequency response outside the stated band of the filter, etc.
Yes, it's a very "old school;" way of looking at things. As it happens I came up pretty much on the cusp of the transition between the older ("purist", if you will) approach toward audio and the "modern" attitude that if the knob is there it "needs" to be used. For a long time I leaned towards the "modern" approach. Then, a few years ago, I started noticing that the "modern" way often (not "always", there is no always) causes as many problems as it solves. They're just different problems.
It cracks me up when people talk about how some people these days talk about "how great those old records were" but won't employ the techniques and attitudes that were employed to make them.
Just because a knob is there doesn't mean it should be used. If you have rumble on a track from traffic, HVAC noise, passing trains or nearby airports, wind noise from a field recording, etc, by all means, use the HPF. But if none of that kind of stuff is present you should keep the signal path as clean and simple as possible. And if you need the HPF you should set it according to the type and frequency of the noise you're dealing with, not always using a particular frequency because "it's what you do."
When I was coming up, that was part of "The Basics". With the demise of the old studio system and on the job mentoring a lot of "The Basics" are becoming or have become lost. I don't regard that as a good thing.
FWIW, this is a much better post than the one he was responding to, and you'd receive a more reasonable reception starting with the latter vs the former.
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Post by trakworxmastering on Oct 11, 2019 15:56:12 GMT -6
And with a little training most people can discern the difference between a sine wave and a square wave even at the highest audible (for them) frequencies. Which means that one can perceive the effect (as harmonics) of frequencies that are beyond the range where they're audible as fundamentals. Applying a LPF will eliminate that.
Quoted for emphasis! (And I changed HPF to LPF for you as I'm sure that's what you meant)
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Post by Ward on Oct 11, 2019 17:47:44 GMT -6
Now who's posting "GS type replies"? FWIW, on GS that comment would get you an infraction... Good point. I should have said "Stop being a TROLL" which was an accurate description, where someone systematically targets your posts 3 or 4 times in a row, quotes and picks them apart in that particular manner. I accept that people have different points of view and experiences. I'm ok with that. I've only been doing this for 30-odd years. I have a long way to go.
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 11, 2019 21:13:05 GMT -6
Now who's posting "GS type replies"? FWIW, on GS that comment would get you an infraction... Good point. I should have said "Stop being a TROLL" which was an accurate description, where someone systematically targets your posts 3 or 4 times in a row, quotes and picks them apart in that particular manner. I accept that people have different points of view and experiences. I'm ok with that. I've only been doing this for 30-odd years. I have a long way to go. Not targeting YOUR posts. I have great respect for you as a well thought of member of the site.
And I'm not troling you. Pointing out someone's errors is not trolling.
If I'm "targeting" anything - which I would debate - It's a pervasive attitude in the current audio community that is spread by people who don't have the experience or deep knowledge of the people I respect - such as Al Schmitt and (when he's not pulling people's legs) Ken Scott.
30 years is good and worthy of respect.
I've got about 20 on you, give or take a couple.
I first set foot in a real studio about 1966, in a small local studio in the back of Carl and Bob's music in Norman, Oklahoma, home of Shorebird Records, which had a few regional hits. 10 years later I helped Dan Alexander build his first studio, Tewksberry Sound Recorders in Richmond CA, in 1976. By 1978 I was working as a personal assistant to Sandy Pearlman, mostly at David Rubinson's Automatt in SF, with a few sessions at Hyde Street.
I learned a lot from Sandy. It took me about 20 or so years to figure out that a lot of the technophilc stuff I learned from Sandy was, no insult intended, wrong. Not going to go into detail here, but sometimes the most valuable lessons are learning what not to do. That did give me the opportunity to learn from some of the ace engineers he hired, notably Glenn Kolotkin and Corky Steziak.
One MAJOR lesson that I learned from working for Sandy, which took a good 20 years or more to sink in, is that often piling more techical attempts to "fix" something just makes things worse. During that 20 or so years I couldn't figure out why applying all those technical "fixes" not only didn't make things better, they made things worse. I remember one particular instance where Sandy was almost literally tearing his hair out because no matter what processors he threw at it, he couldn't get a decent drum sound on one particular song.
So, after a long time chasing the "technical solutions to every problem" viewpoint that I learned from Sandy I ditched all that and now things work better, at least most of the time.
If it ain't broke, don't "fix" it. Use your ears. Don't ever do things just because somebody says "that's the way it's done". And don't be lazy and do things "because that's how I always do it".
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Post by christopher on Oct 11, 2019 22:25:49 GMT -6
I’m glad to see this thread continue because what I wanted to say was: IF I can’t hear it, then I have no idea whether it’s it’s right or wrong. This is 100% due to my monitoring and hearing range. My headphones are not as accurate as I thought, not even close for me to know what’s happening in the sub area. High passing can save me, but I only do rough mixes this way.. Final Mixes are no filters and extra time at the sub and tweeters.
I’m lucky if I hear 16k anymore, but I did hear 19kHz+ when I started. Everyone boosted everything up there, obviously they couldn’t hear what they were doing and it killed me! The pain was horrid.
But I started to notice a trend.. older records I could boost the treble and it wasn’t painful, there was this organic “glow”, and I loved it. Something about the old way sounded much more realistic than the new way, mainly because of the strange top end. Well.. the glow probably wasn’t what I thought it was, it was probably just really well recorded mix balance I think.. more in the 5k-15k range than 19k. And I learned- while I still had my hearing up there- that I didn’t really need the top end dental-drill thing,I could get by with 8k as a top really. BUT the rest of the world wants top.. Lots of live mixing experiments (heh!) so I learned they are ok with 12kHz, and they won’t know the difference, it has all the sizzle and we can all hear it, or at least close to hear it. So it’s not the end of the world if we don’t have the extreme highs.
Final thing: when we have GREAT gear, then yeah it sounds great up top and no need to filter.
When we are using cheap gear, the highs aren not that great at all. Either too bright or strangely smeared in an ugly way.. rolling off helps a lot.
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Post by johneppstein on Oct 12, 2019 12:08:15 GMT -6
Final thing: when we have GREAT gear, then yeah it sounds great up top and no need to filter. When we are using cheap gear, the highs aren not that great at all. Either too bright or strangely smeared in an ugly way.. rolling off helps a lot. HMmmm. Reading that just made me think of something. This is just off the top of my head so take it for what it's worth, but it might explain something.
Intermodulation distortion.
IM is common in a lot of cheaper gear and it generates high frequency artifacts that are not harmonically related to the signal and therefore tend to be rather nasty, even in very small amounts.
Could have something to do with your observation....?
Edit: And this: since a lot of people with uneducated ears often interpret a hyped top as "detail" it could be that some manufacturers of cheap gear might see this HF trash as a selling point to their unsophisticated beginner's market and therefore don't bother chasing down what might be causing the IM.
Just a hypothesis....
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Post by christopher on Oct 12, 2019 12:14:43 GMT -6
^^^ THANK YOU
That is the exact "feeling" I would get. And it is NOT pleasant. And it was in every consumer device, esp when MP3's first started.
(of course nobody else my generation seemed to be bothered by this... well they did stop buying music.. and listening to it altogether)
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