A Few EQ Tricks

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Smoove03

New member
A couple of ground rules...

One, you should try to cut about five times as often as you boost, especially with shelves. High and low shelves were designed to remove hiss and rumble, respectively.

Two, I like to leave the low end to low end instruments - bass and drums. We all know that the human ear hears about 20 to 20k. Well, the first octave, (20 to 40hz) is generally made up of stuff like thunder and trains. So dont boost it, ok?

Three, be VERY careful about boosting anything around 200 hz. This makes your whole mix sound muddy. A little can fatten things up, but hopefully you wont have to use this.

Four, take all this with a grain of salt. This is meant to be a guideline to help get you started. This is NOT meant to be a cookie cutter solution to everything. Remember, if it sounds good, it IS good.

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Kick Drum - Boost at 80hz, cut around 350-400hz, (removes "cardboard" sound) and beater smack is around 2-4 k.

Snare Drum - Fatness at 240 hz, crispness at 5k

Hats/Cymbals - Gong sound at 200hz, shimmer/air between 8-12k.

Toms - Boom between 60 and 200 hz, scoop out 100hz to 4 khz, attack at 5k.

Bass - Boost between 80 and 150 hz. To make a passive bass sound active, scoop around 350hz. Boost 800hz for clarity or punch and the slappin' poppin' thing is around 2.5k.

Electric Guitar - Rolloff at 80hz, cut at 800 hz to remove "cheap" sound, and edge is around 2.5k

Acoustic Guitar - Bottom at 120hz, body at 240hz, clarity at 2.5 to 5k

Piano/Organ - Just like acoustic guitar except piano might need a little boost around 10k.

Vocals - Scoop at 240hz. if muddy, boost at 4k for presence and anywhere above 8k to brighten (sibilance is between 8 and 10 k).
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Good Luck, hope it helps ;]
Smoove
 
If you post this one more time, I'm going to drive to DC and beat you about your face and neck.
 
Yo Smoove:

Kind of odd that in my great hit, "The River Turned Muddy When She Turned Me Down," I didn't use any of your formulas.

Right Bear?

Green Hornet:cool: :p :p :p :D :p
 
Excellent data........


that you can find a million places across the internet and yet still claim it as if you discovered it first.


Would have been better to just post the sites where this can be found.

Newbs....what are you gonna do.
 
This is taken directly out of Artist Pro magazine, almost word for fu#kin' word... thanks for the info, I don't know what I would have done without you!!!!!!!!
 
the dude is just trying to help......yeah, its info ALOT of us already know.......but if it helps 1% of us, thats still ALOT......
 
The EQ suggestions for Bass above are too general to be of use. I think these type of suggestions are good for getting people to start thinking about where sounds reside but frankly, EQ is highly variable and dependent on the what the mic, preamp and limiter have done prior to EQ.

There are no global reccomendations that can be made because of these variables. The best you can do is give someone a frequency chart, discuss how to eliminate mud, rolling off cycles below 40 and other general considerations.

After that it's all real world and specific EQ reccomendations are kind of useless. I know he had good intentions but I hate to think of the novice using these settings and discovering their sound basically sucks. Study the charts, get a frequency analyzer and study existing artist's sound profile. This is more beneficial advice to learning how to EQ.
 
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i understand that completely......but "general" Eq charts are part of learning, and given by even the experts.....

again, i understand where you guys are coming from, but its easier to just skip over this thread if you dont have anything positive to add, and leave the flames to Chessrock......
 
Middleman said:
Study the charts, get a frequency analyzer and study existing artist's sound profile. This is more beneficial advice to learning how to EQ.
Click to expand...


How do I find a freq analyzer and sound profiles for songs? I would love to get one of these charts, cause I'm kinda lost sometimes.
 
Isn't Smoove03 a Newbie? So I guess we will beat up on him, huh? Let's go...ha ha ha, just kidding...

Smoove03, don't let that bother you and thanks for sharing. As you can read, some of the members think your post helped.

No one can know everything. To some, it may sound/read like it is elementrary, but for a few, it may just be, well, God send. They don't really mean you harm. Just irritated because some info for them are 'too old'. Hey, couldn't read all the old posts, could we?

Welcome to the Board! Don't be a stranger.

__________________
"For God so love the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him, shall not perish, but have everlasting life"
 
guitarfreak12 said:
How do I find a freq analyzer and sound profiles for songs? I would love to get one of these charts, cause I'm kinda lost sometimes.
Click to expand...

Frequency Analyzer here - http://www.brainspawn.com/about.htm
Free demo and low cost if you decide to buy. Drop it on a track and you can see what's going on.

Sound profiles - Har-Bal is the ticket but it's not cheap.

Pick up a parametric EQ with 4 or more bands and play with it. This is probably the quickest way of figuring out where different sounds reside in the spectrum.
 
guitarfreak12 said:
How do I find a freq analyzer and sound profiles for songs? I would love to get one of these charts, cause I'm kinda lost sometimes.
Click to expand...



I have a free one I found a long time ago. I can't remember the name. It works pretty well. I put it on a send in cubase. That way I can check out any track to see what it's doing. If you PM me an email address, I'll send it to you. It's a small file.
 
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