EQ help!

S

Sir Alibi

New member
So i was just wondering if any of y'all can help me out with a guide to frequencies in EQ. I'm trying to get a grasp of the tool but I'm having some trouble understanding. For the time being someone advised me to shave off anything below 80 hertz but i don't completely understand. Is the 80 hz in the BASS section? also i was told to eliminate the mid, so how would i go about that? thanks.
 
This is not a mastering issue in the least.

If a post ever belonged in the Newbies section, this is it.
 
Both of those bits of advice are silly. Taking everything below 80hz out of a kick drum will leave you with nothing but a boxy, dead sounding kick.

Even if you could eliminate the 'mid', the midrange is where most of the sound is. So that is simply too vague to mean anything.
 
Don't listen to advice from people that are not even hearing the music you have recorded. Its like saying, "I always steer my car to the left". How the hell do they know what needs to be done to this particular track?

If you don't know what you are doing with eq or how it works. Turn everything off, go and read a book on the subject. Then when you understand a bit more about what it does, turn everything back on and play a song through the eq and experiment with it to learn what it does.

Alan.
 
Try a high pass filter set to about 20kHz... :thumbs up:

Or - what they said, above....

Oh, and.... totally trolling BTW.... or should that be FTW?
 
you need time.

a good place to mix.

good high quality tracks to listen to.

a good high quality parametric EQ with a sweepable range, wide to narrow Q, and a real time frequency analyzer.


take every instrument on it's own merit, SOLO'd, and slowy EQ it from the lowest lows, to the highest highs.


then


put them all together, and see how certain frequencies build up.

then




figure out which instruments really NEED those frequencies, and which do not.



THEN


experiment.



this takes hours and hours and hours.


NOW


WHEN YOU ARE DONE



grab new tracks, and start all over again.


do this to about 100 different songs with multiple tracks.


then come back, and we'll talk.
 
It takes a long time and hundreds of hours of practice to get an ear for where and when to cut, boost, filter, etc and to know how various instruments will sound together. EQing soloed is one of the quickest ways to a bad mix. Many times the right eq for the mix sounds like crap when soloed. It's about overall balance more than anything. But that takes time to develop.
 
I love the carnegie hall frequency chart that came with my book mastering audio by bob katz, it's been a great tool. With this chart you can see exactly what frequency tuned at A=440Hz and where they all are, this is overlooked by most engineers and it annoys me, for example boosting 80Hz will work with Eb very well or possible Bb, you have to take time to train your ears and it takes years, for me it's taken over a decade of practice and dedication.
 
Btyre2013 said:
I love the carnegie hall frequency chart that came with my book mastering audio by bob katz, it's been a great tool. With this chart you can see exactly what frequency tuned at A=440Hz and where they all are, this is overlooked by most engineers and it annoys me, for example boosting 80Hz will work with Eb very well or possible Bb, you have to take time to train your ears and it takes years, for me it's taken over a decade of practice and dedication.
Click to expand...
And you also have to learn that some instruments, mostly stringed instruments, have more power an octave above the fundamental note that is being played. Low E on a guitar is around 82hz, but has more energy at 164hz
 
Farview said:
And you also have to learn that some instruments, mostly stringed instruments, have more power an octave above the fundamental note that is being played. Low E on a guitar is around 82hz, but has more energy at 164hz
Click to expand...

totally agree! it's easy to get carried away lol I also like to sometimes boost certain harmonics or cut them.
 
FYI
Generally speaking
up to 100 Hz is low end
100-500 is lower mids
500-3000 is mids
3000-6000 is upper mids
6000 and up is highs

They are just ballpark , but is how I think of it.

Anything below 40hz and above 20,000 (20k) is not all that useful. Generally speaking, boosting 60hz for the kick drum gives it oomph. Cutting around 500 removes some mud and boosting everything GENTLY above 6k gives it sheen.

They are just some newb tips because let's face it we have all been there..
 
Farview said:
And you also have to learn that some instruments, mostly stringed instruments, have more power an octave above the fundamental note that is being played. Low E on a guitar is around 82hz, but has more energy at 164hz
Click to expand...
I think I know what you're saying here, but it's not technically true. The relative strength of various harmonics is a matter of the pickup's position along the vibrating length of the string. In all cases, the fundamental is always loudest. The distribution tends to be flatter (and a bit less "comb-like") closer to the bridge. In fact, if you're playing through the neck pickup, and play the open E (or really an open string) you shouldn't get much of anything from at that first octave harmonic, but if you go up to the 12th fret, it'll be as loud as it's gonna get.

Closer to the truth, I think, is our brains have a harder time processing the lower frequencies as notes, so that they seem to speak an octave higher sometimes. You "feel" the 80Hz as something like girth or weight, but if you had to match the note by playing it on a piano or synthesizer, you'd probably go for the 160Hz.

This is exacerbated further by the fact that any distortion added to the fundamental will tend to reinforce - or even create - that octave harmonic, and a lot of the things we run our guitars through tend to shave off that bottom end to keep it "tight" and "punchy".
 
The phenomenon holds for acoustic guitars, banjos, mandolins, etc... Whether it's an actual physical thing or a perception thing doesn't matter much in practice.

I always figured that since higher frequencies travel farther than lower ones at a given force, the octave harmonic is just louder by the time it gets to your ear. But I guess that wouldn't explain electric guitar.
 
Farview said:
Whether it's an actual physical thing or a perception thing doesn't matter much in practice.
Click to expand...
I agree with this. There are situations where knowing why it happens can help you to get the most of the phenomenon, but yeah. The "Low" or "Bass" knob on most things is centered around 100Hz. Play a 100Hz sine wave and nobody would ever think you could get that low on a guitar, but it's actually just sharp from the 3rd fret on the 6th string.
 
From your post, I'm going to assume you are at the mastering stage but really don't understand frequencies. That means you probably have recorded everything and balanced your mix, one instrument to another. So although most of the comments are right (like the one suggesting you stop and do some reading) it might help if you learn more about the frequencies you are hearing. I suggest you go on Youtube and type in mastering tutorials and start there. There are several on there that will explain in step by step what to do with the tracks they are working with. Regarding frequencies you need far more information. Simply put, the sounds in your mix are very low (rumble) low (bass and bass drum) low mid, (snare, toms, lower notes) mid (guitar, vocal, sax, etc.) mid high (snares, higher notes) high (hi-hats, some sibilance) and very high (sibilance). Keyboard run up and down these ranges as well as some other broad range instruments like guitar and sax. This is a simple way of looking at frequencies in your mix right now. The second part is the range of frequencies present in any one sound, whether low or high. I won't get into the physics of this right now. This will help you hear the frequencies a little better to start. A high pass filter rolls of some of the lows so you can turn your gain up to more reasonably match commercial projects without increasing the rumble at those lower frequencies. The tutorials will help you see what the results are as well as how to decided what is needed next. From your post it seemed that frequencies in general was your major problem. Do some searching on the internet with your question about guides to frequencies. Just keep in mind that there are notes (isolated frequencies) and harmonic frequencies (those frequencies that make the note sound rich and full) This is a very simplified version but it will start you out on your search. You are just learning right now and you might get a lot of push back because you're a newbie but don't give up. At some point we were all where you are. Good luck,
Rod Norman
Engineer

Sir Alibi said:
So i was just wondering if any of y'all can help me out with a guide to frequencies in EQ. I'm trying to get a grasp of the tool but I'm having some trouble understanding. For the time being someone advised me to shave off anything below 80 hertz but i don't completely understand. Is the 80 hz in the BASS section? also i was told to eliminate the mid, so how would i go about that? thanks.
Click to expand...
 
Here are three sites that should help. Take your time. This subject can get deep at times.

https://excessmusic.wordpress.com/2009/07/24/hello-world/
RECCOMENDED EQUALIZATION FREQUENCIES
Interactive Frequency Chart - Independent Recording Network

Rod Norman
Engineer

Sir Alibi said:
So i was just wondering if any of y'all can help me out with a guide to frequencies in EQ. I'm trying to get a grasp of the tool but I'm having some trouble understanding. For the time being someone advised me to shave off anything below 80 hertz but i don't completely understand. Is the 80 hz in the BASS section? also i was told to eliminate the mid, so how would i go about that? thanks.
Click to expand...
 
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