Changing Headphones Helps

gcolbert

gcolbert

Sonar Fanboi
I had an interesting learning experience last night. This may be something that is incredibly obvious to everyone else, but it was new to me. While listening to my mix through the headphones, I did an additional listen with the headphones backwards (left on right ear, right on left ear). Some parts of the mix were quite different!! Seems like my built-in biological balanced microphones are not very well balanced. Thinking about it - I would imagine that this is quite common.

You may want to consider turning your headphones around while mixing to see if it changes things. I ended up splitting the difference and think the end result was better.
 
Instead of messing up my hair, I keep the headphones where they are and just turn and face the other way.

:eek:
 
At the moment I'm bald by choice.......;)

Sometimes, I've put the phones on backwards but I don't like it. It just sounds, well, backwards. Kind of for the same reason I like the bass in the centre. Anything else can go anywhere else but I hate the sound of the bass in just one ear.#
Going back to headphones on the wrong way round, funny thing is, if I mixed something the way it sounds when back to front, it wouldn't sound odd because I've mixed it that way. But if I put the phones on the right way.........
 
Yo gcolbert. Have your doc write a referral to an audiologist. It could be the mix, but what you describe as unbalanced biological built-in mics could actually be significant hearing loss. Most people with mild to moderate hearing loss don't even know they have it, especially if it is one-sided.- Richie
 
gcolbert said:
I had an interesting learning experience last night. This may be something that is incredibly obvious to everyone else, but it was new to me. While listening to my mix through the headphones, I did an additional listen with the headphones backwards (left on right ear, right on left ear). Some parts of the mix were quite different!! Seems like my built-in biological balanced microphones are not very well balanced. Thinking about it - I would imagine that this is quite common.

You may want to consider turning your headphones around while mixing to see if it changes things. I ended up splitting the difference and think the end result was better.
Click to expand...

There's actually a fairly simple explanation for this. Naturally the tenancy is to assume that we are perfectly symmetrical, however this is incorrect. As you may know, our eyes for example are not even (on purpose) as an evolutionary mechanism to better triangulate spacial orientation. The same goes with our ears in a sense. They are a result of left brain/right brain function. In other words, our left ear processes information completely different than our right ear. Instead of my going into a wild story about how that works, here's a link to how what you have discovered is a very natural phenomenon. I wouldn't run to the doctor just yet :)

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/14/science/14ear.html
 
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