Headphone correction with a console

[FrankD77]

I've seen a lot of adds for headphone correction software.

I also see large consoles in the back and that raises a question. I'm using an x32 and use the internal recorder and part of FX. So my headphones are connected to the x32. As far as I can figure out this will not work with the correction software because i don't want the correction in my recording and connecting the headphones on the desktop means I'm missing the whole FX chain.

So do they just use their consoles as controle interfaces ?
Or do i miss something.

 

[drtechno]

I've seen a lot of adds for headphone correction software.

I also see large consoles in the back and that raises a question. I'm using an x32 and use the internal recorder and part of FX. So my headphones are connected to the x32. As far as I can figure out this will not work with the correction software because i don't want the correction in my recording and connecting the headphones on the desktop means I'm missing the whole FX chain.

So do they just use their consoles as controle interfaces ?
Or do i miss something.

They use their daw as the mixer with an interface and the console in control surface mode with midi over Ethernet. But headphone correction software works for some but not with all people. Mix with 600 ohm headphones and you don't have to use an EQ correction for the impedance mismatch on the headphone amp. I use beyerdynamic DT880 600 ohm headphones and they translate well for me.

 

[FrankD77]

They use their daw as the mixer with an interface and the console in control surface mode with midi over Ethernet. But headphone correction software works for some but not with all people. Mix with 600 ohm headphones and you don't have to use an EQ correction for the impedance mismatch on the headphone amp. I use beyerdynamic DT880 600 ohm headphones and they translate well for me.

Although my room is far from perfect i still prefer the Adams. I do check with headphones later in the process.

It would be nice if you could upload the eq curve into the headphones

 

[drtechno]

Although my room is far from perfect i still prefer the Adams. I do check with headphones later in the process.

It would be nice if you could upload the eq curve into the headphones

Well since the x32 is a clone of the midas board I used in the past, it does have what they call a "control room" bus, so what you do in the daw is use an aux send from the master fader to a aux fader channel then rout that aux fader channel to something like aux 5/6 out instead of stereo master, and then use your plugin on the aux fader channel, then on the x32 board, select aux 5/6 as the source of the monitoring bus aka control room bus. Then the control room monitors on 15/16 out instead of monitor/control room bus out.

 

[FrankD77]

But that would mean i don't hear the FX from the x32 via the inserts I believe

Have to look further at that

 

[drtechno]

But that would mean i don't hear the FX from the x32 via the inserts I believe

Have to look further at that

you would hear it and solo it in the daw

Edit: besides that, most DAWs let you patch the solo bus. But since you want to use a plugin on the headphones you need to route it or have a way to inset it on the out channel. But it all depends on which DAW you use.

 

[ecc83]

"It would be nice if you could upload the eq curve into the headphones"
Out of the mouths Frank! We already have more DSP controlled speakers than you can shake a stick at (just bought some new ones) so I see no reason why similar electronics could not be put in a set of cans? Program from lappy via blue tooth.

Dave.

 

[FrankD77]

Took me a while but i solved it for now.

I'm using the wireless+ aiaiai headphones. But they are way too muddy. That's why I was looking for correction software.

Because I'm working on a console i thought it would not work but....

Aiaiai has a free plugin for your daw that does the correction. My setup is max 16 stereo busses where i route my tracks to and those are send to the x32.

I have copied the plugin to all busses at the top and the difference is insane. From totally unusable and muddy to wide open and super clear.

Only thing is i have to remember to disable the plugin when dumping to the recorder

Anyone that knows a way to disable all instances at once ?

Would be even better if it would run on an external device but for now this works great.

 

[ecc83]

"Would be even better if it would run on an external device but for now this works great."

So Frank, do you mean a high quality headphone amplifier that can host a plugin? If so I would talk to people like Grace, Presonus, Cranbourne.

Dave.

 

[FrankD77]

For example.
Now i have to enable and disable the plugin which would count for all users of a console. So changing levels and settings during final mix will be tricky.

External solutions should solve this.

 

[FrankD77]

Saw the arc which does exactly that
I mostly use my speakers but for the future i can see me getting one of those.

 

[rob aylestone]

If you are using headphones with poor sound, then why not just assign your headphone output to something internally where you can just EQ it on the X32? I always use the normal sends for clicks and stuff, and just use the EQ?

 

[FrankD77]

I can use an eq on the x32 but that is not a calibration.

The aiaiai studio and Sony 7510 are both not bad as far as I understood. I want to get a better monitoring system. My room is not perfect. Good enough for what i do but it can be better.

That's why I want to try to get something accurate with the aiaiai the difference is night and day.

Also it helps when setting up eq and FX in the rack next to me.

Ill start testing tomorrow
It's free so why not

I'll also try te recreate the correction curve in the x32

 

[bouldersoundguy]

Use an external hardware device.

ARC ON•EAR

ARC ON•EAR standalone headphone DAC and amplifier instantly corrects your headphone's response and recreates the experience of mixing on professional studio monitors.

www.ikmultimedia.com

 

[FrankD77]

I saw the ARC looks exactly like what I would want.
I mostly use my monitors for for now I'll keep it to the software solution but the ARC will someday find it's way here

 

[rob aylestone]

I’m really confused? You said the headphone sound is muddy? Presumably direct into the desk, or through wireless? You want to correct the audio that through your monitors is good, through the headphones, muddy? You’ve made certain that the mix audio is the nice sounding one. You don’t want to use EQ to ray to replicate the nice sounding one, so are wanting to find a way to use software that will be external to your mixer? So you want to go mixer out, to interface in, then that to your headphones with the software in the DAW you are only using for headphone modification?

I can’t get my head around this way of working. Surely if your mixer is connected using a DAW, and using the X32 preamps, then you’d do the recording to audio file in the computer not the X32? The signal flow I see in my head is a bit strange? Would it not be better to find some headphones you like?

 

[FrankD77]

It's not that hard.

My monitors are ok. But due to the room limitations I want an extra option to check my mixes.

Aiaiai themselves (and many others) deliver software to correct the headphones response to flat or natural. Which takes the muddy part away and opens up the midhighs and the aiaiai.

The problem i experienced is that when i started the thread I only saw software that did both room and eq correction and that software is based on placing one instance on the masterbus. If you're using a console this doesn't make sense because you are not using the masterbus. When mixing I'm dumping it via the x32 recorder.

I'm routing all groups of instruments to dedicated busses (aux es) in logic. I can use max 16 stereo busses (aux es) (32 inputs on the x32)

It's a very flexible setup.
Problem is the fact you can't use room emulation software because of phasing issues and huge latency when using more than one instance. This is where I stopped when posting it at first.

However i missed the part where you can use the correction file on the busses/auxes without those issues. It doesn't phase and it adds no (noticable) latency. In essence it's just an eq curve. Just make sure it's on the bottom and off when dumping
You could even emulate the curve in the eq section on the masterbus on the x32.

The reason you "need" room emulation is easy to explain.
Sound in the room reaches both left and right ear via different routes. In headphones there is only left or right when hard panned. a room has an ITDG and RT60 which are not in headphones unless you use software that emulates a room.

By using the aiaiai eq correction on all busses/auxes (max 16 (stereo) instances) I'm already a big step forward. But for the room emulation i think something like the IK arc on ear will be needed.

My problem was when starting this thread i saw it as a one step solution via one plugin. Somehow missed you can also split the two.

It still sounds different from the monitors in the stereo field but now I can just sit in front of the rack and do minor adjustments while playing. It's a huge upgrade when working with gear that is not placed in your stereo field of the monitors.

Ps
Recording and sound is my hobby/passion.
So in essence you don't need it as a hobbyist. I could just opt to listen to the headphones for a few weeks and get used to it. This is more fun however and in the end more accurate. The difference is really huge.

 

[rob aylestone]

Ah. I see. Tail chasing. I get it. Sadly, the reason I can't appreciate the work you are doing is that I'm old school enough to think that headphones are what you use to NOT hear the room - the real absolute clean sound - what your monitors, the room and the things in it do to that clean sound. I appreciate that for some things, this is where most decisions make real sense - spacial stuff - the size of the soundstage, the placement of sounds and how wide each one is. I still can only get close with headphones. Maybe the AIAIAI approach is better, or maybe worse, but it's for me, artificial. Like recoloured black and white photos. I don't quite get the latency issue though. Latency in mixing and mastering surely is irrelevant. Longer latency values that would wreck tracking and even just playing VSTi style sounds are immaterial. If your perfect sound gives 50mS of latency, you'd only notice when pressing play and having a slight pause. My home studio with no tweaking sits at around 7mS on my mac, and in the video studio at the office, it's 11mS. So a 50% increase in the delay. I've never actually noticed this?
It sounds like you're creating slightly strange workflows and signal flows but they are working for you so that is all that matters. For me - plugging a pair of headphones in and describing the sound would mean a return, not a trip into apps and clever stuff to fix it. In my youth I had a pair of yellow foam muff Sennheiser HD25's - the best ever. Till I bought a pair on ebay and absolutely hated them. Tastes change. I think the clue was that they are bright. Very bright. Gear then wasn't, and I liked it! I remember John Cleese did some funny sale videos. In one, he is a hifi salesman, for the awfully nice Sony people. A customer says the hifi is tinny. Cleese says, "That Madam, is treble!" Up till 75 or so, we had mellow, hiss free audio, still in mono for the main body of listeners. Then the dawn of the hifi era opened up and hiss was an enemy because systems had top end and our sales of 4 track stereo 3 ¾ IPS tape machines was over. We have come a long way to get to headphones with generated room sound!

 

[FrankD77]

We all have different rooms and workflows thats why this is interesting.

A bit of history.
Owned a recording studio in the 80/90s and learned to mix and master on a console and dump to 8 track tape.

At that time it was standard to get a full drum kit in on channels 1-8 and mix that to aux/bus 1

I tried working in the box but it just doesn't do it for me. So in essence im doing it the old fashioned way.

Using logic to create every thing I need
32 drum tracks no problem
But i still route them to a stereo bus to 1/2 on the x32. Same with all the other instruments.
In essence im using logic as a huge console and the x32 as the bus part and the recording to the recorder.

Its a super clear and flexible workflow. With a console you do exactly the same only on one device and much less flexibele. In fact for some gigs we used two consoles in the studio. One smaller one for the drum kit leaving the main console open for the rest. (in that period you were limited to what you had or could afford )

Later in life (besides photography) we became one of the leading home theater companies for calibrations. I'm certified for both ISF (imaging) and HAA (Home and small cinema/studio acoustics)

I know my room is great for being there and playing but soundwise it's far from perfect ITDG and RT60 are also not perfect. I can make all the noise i want (no real neighbors) so i don't use headphones a lot. The room does sound good enough to track and mix if you know the sound

Now that my tracks are getting more complicated and I'm finding myself using rack gear more and more I'm getting more into using the headphones to be able to hear what I'm doing when I'm in front of the rack. Also the aiaiai and Sony 7510 let me hear more details in the transients which reminded me of the studio days . So that's why I was looking for solutions. I love those small details.

Btw you are absolutely right about the room emulation during the tracking this can be off of course. But during the mix stage I'm getting phase issues when you run more than one instance.

Solution is to use it only at the mastering stage. What I'm planning to do for now.

I also find that when playing with headphones i keep my volume lower after an hour.

IK had the arc on ear which seems to be an external solution someone pointed me towards. Watching some reviews soon

For some overkill for me hobby and passion
It's like a projector or tv. I can't stand them out of the box. The first thing I do is calibrate them

Ps.
Just sharing info not meant in a bad way.
Love these kind of discussions. We all have our own perfect workflow.

 

[FrankD77]

The arc in review