Har-Bal

B

Bill Assumpcao

Member
How do all,
Has anyone had any "hands-on" experience with Har-Bal? I've done a search, to no avail. Apparently, the demo version is 8-bit and it's hard to hear what's going on. If it does what it says it will do, I might consider getting in on the $95 introductory price. As a learning tool if nothing else. Cause,
what do I know?
Bill
 
I'm a spectrum analyzer kind of guy so I picked up Har-Bal a little while ago. I got it for the same reason to learn a little bit better how to push eq bands around - both narrow (1/3 or 1/6 octave) and wide (1 or maybe 2 octave) - when and why to push up or down on a band.

Paavo, the developer, is easy to work with thru email and his forum. I haven't talked to him in a few weeks but he is continually developing the product and believes in his approach and technique - so do I among other techniques.

I was worried about the initial price but the lower introductory price is just right.

One of the main points in mastering that I've come away with is you have to know your monitoring equipment, reference material, and mix or tracks you're trying to balance. Then you'll better be able to judge when to push up a band or push down on a peak.

Basically what I've found out the secret is - if there isn't much energy in a particular band then be careful when pushing it around, on the other hand if there is energy in a band be careful pushing that around too ! Ha Ha that's no secret eh ? - be careful, listen, watch spectrums, take breaks to rest the ears.

I think it's a fine learning tool and will help you use your other tools better. I'm a garage rebalancing and pre-mastering kind of guy and have tools in the Voxengo, Ozone, T-Racks, Sonar3, CEP price range so I have to be pretty good to make the correct settings I think - as opposed to owning a HED192 or GM EQ.

kylen
 
Well, I'm new here 'mallcore pop' and don't know you yet.

How do you re-balance the EQ of a mix - If you say Pultec or GML then I understand ! :)
kylen
 
Pultec or GML. :)

Actually, I don't really re-balance eq on a finished mix (as far as "mastering" or even pre-mastering). If you're adjusting eq on a two-track, it's not mastering, you're just still mixing.

In any case, using an s.a. like Hell-Bell is pretty worthless, in that program material varies so much in frequency content between different tracks from the same genre, and between different tracks from the same artist. Therefore. . .

It's just an extension of the preset mentality. If you can find a track you like, you can import it as a template, press analyze, and be done with it. But that's not how it works.

Same with normalizing. Worthless.

MP

p.s. But if I do 0.5db-1db at 12-15k with LinEQ (which, oddly enough sounds clean/smooth at times, and brittle at others), followed by shaving a few db off with some VintageWarmer or L2 for a demo project. . .
 
I see where you're comin from MP !

When I pull a past mix out of the shoebox and want to change how it sounds I'll rebalance it - either the EQ, dynamics or both. I call that re-balance, pre-mastering, finalizing or incorrectly mastering. For me mixing is already finished at that point - it's a rebalance. Many times I don't have the individual tracks.

If I want to throw a group of songs together on a new mix CD I'll rebalance the songs so they all fit together soundwise - I'd use any of the same names above although I'm actually rebalancing.

Har-Bal is actually designed to help maintain some consistency thru-out a project but it is a fact that there is very little consistency even between songs of similiar instrumentation and energy - like you said. In other words you can't push your song into the narrow curves of someone elses just like you can't push your songs curve into a flat pink noise curve.

You can however back up and look at the bass, mids, and highs and how a commercial recording slopes using a spectrum analyzer like Har-Bal, CurveEQ or Ozone2. There is no 1-button morph or EQ copy solution that sounds good - believe me I tried that Ha! Ha! And you can't look too closely at the curve of your reference material - but you can look at the broader slopes I mentioned and get an idea about how some of the greats (mastering & mixing engineers) balance their music.

Sometimes you may have a live-to-2track mix or a past mix where you can't remix and need to adjust a narrow band spike (imagine the singer forgetting to work the mic for a moment). That's where an RTA S.A. and a combination of EQ and narrow band limiting help a lot. Otherwise if I could I'd be more than glad to remix stuff if I had the tracks ! Now Har-Bal won't do that very well yet - that's a job for a realtime analyzer. I use CurveEQ and Ozone2.

So you gotta start somewhere - otherwise EQing is just a bunch of 1/6 band sliders to push up and down. Watching a real time spectrum and morphing and har-baling all help you learn so you can walk up to a mix and go - "I think I'll bump 14KHz to add some more air" like you did. Or know when to drop 300Hz a dB or so. Or peak the kick at 79Hz. All those analyzers and tools help you learn - along with balancing 100's of mixes or pre-masters ! :)

But I hear what you're saying a lot of folks don't go in for Spectum Analyzers - they just listen. That's where I'm headed - but there's some space in between here and there. I imagine I'll be watching a RTA S.A. for a while though.

kylen

PS Bill - Paavo, the Har-Bal developer has himself noted that some of the stuff on the home page there is somewhat - 'hypey' shall we say. I think the purchase order I'd recommend is Voxengo CurveEQ and Ozone2 (or a S.A. with overlays and time decay), then Har-Bal if you're going to go the S.A. route. Otherwise I'd recommend great reference monitors, great reference amp, great room and acoustic treatments (I don't have that stuff !)

OK, what's next normalizing ? :) just kiddin ! Some other time...
 
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wow

G'mornin' Kylen+MP,
I seem to have stepped into a puddle that's deeper than I am tall.
I've read this thread several times and don't understand one bit of it. I'd better do alot more reading and practicing before addressing this again.
Thanks for your responses. But, now if you'll both excuse me,
I think I'd better go find some water wings :D
Bill
 
ooh, sorry Bill ! I should have asked -

What piece of audio were you going to run Har-Bal on - individual tracks yet to be mixed, a single complete mix of a song, or many complete mixes to put out on a CD ?

Har-Bal is really meant to [re]-balance many songs for a complete CD project. It has a saturator you can push into also and adjust your 'loudness' a bit that way too (by varying the rms and peak headroom kind of things)

It's fun enough if you have the $95 but like MP said you have to be careful about believing too much of the hype that has you pushing your EQ curve into a known good one. Certain parts will match - others won't - that's the trick, which parts match?

Same with using an EQ 'morph' tool like freefilter or CurveEQ - you can use the auto EQ settings as a starting point (sometimes not !) but you always have to listen and make your own adjustments by yourself in the end. I think tools like these speed up the process in my case - maybe yours too.

Happy EQing !
kylen
 
Say hey Kylen,
Nuttin to be sorry about. I'm so noobie that I'm still searching for a reference point. I'm monitoring through "came with the 'puter speakers" and/or cheapo cans. Being the lazy SOB that I am, I was hoping for an easy starting point. I'll just have to find the time to analyze the material that I like and find out whether that will apply to my material or not.
Thanks for your time,
Bill
 
Ok Bill, Cool ! :cool: If you're even a little bit like me then the journey is half the fun, gettin there is the other half ! kylen
 
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