Mixing through headphones?

kubeek

kubeek

New member
I am recording my band, and beacuse I still don´t have enough money for proper monitors, I use sennheiser HD-555 headphones instead.
http://www.sennheiser.com/sennheiser/icm_eng.nsf/root/products_headphones_high-end_05342

Do you think it is possible to get good results with these?

I think that there is a point in mixing with good headphones, because today most people listen to songs through mp3 players with earphones, so the stereo image can be made for headphones and not for properly stereo-set speakers in a good room.
 
Headphone mixing

You'll find that most of the forum members shun mixing with headphones. Just look at some of the posts in the Mixing and MP3 forums. Here is my experience:

I live about 10 minutes from Sweetwater's new headquarters. They have several "sound engineered" rooms adjoining their retail showroom. I pop in occasionally with a mix of a new song on a CD and listen through some very expensive monitors, some reasonable monitors, and some inexpensive monitors.

It is amazing how different the mix sounds when switching back and forth between Adam A7s, Adam P22As, and Mackie HR824mk2s, all of which go for more than $1,000.00 per pair. There is a vast distinction between the speakers in all frequency ranges. Plus, the speakers have their own adjustments for frequency ranges. Go figure! If they are supposed to be accurate, why the capability of tuning them to make them sound better?

The cheap ones with 4 inch woofers, Like the Edirols, are incredibly inaccurate with awful booming bass!

As I posted in my summary of a recent Sweetwater workshop conducted by a, supposedly, high end recording engineer, unless your mixing room is engineered for sound, lots of money on monitors is a waste.

I mix using Sennheier HD280s, then I might tweak while listening through Sony home speakers with 8 inch woofers. Rarely do I make any adjustments after taking a mix to Sweetwater and hearing it through the expensive stuff.

I know I'll get slammed for this, but it is my opinion based upon my research.
 
Actually I agree with you and I expect to get slammed also! :D

But I do my critical listening with Sennheiser HD-650's ...... they're flatter and more detailed than most of the budget monitors that are in common use and with the Headroom headphone amp you don't have that 'locked between your ears' effect that you usually get with cans.
I do listen to all mixes thru a variety of different things to try and make my mixes work no matter what someone listens to them on but my final decisions are often decided on the 'phones.
And it's not 'cause I have no monitors or can't listen to them late at night ...... it's just that those Sennheisers are so detailed.
 
if you're gonna mix with headphones, remember this: just cause you can't hear the bass in your mix, it doesn't mean its not there. its just that the headphones most of the time can't reproduce the low ends. so, if headphones are all you got, you should mixdown every time you think you have a good mix and go listen to your mix on a good speaker system and make sure the eq is flat
 
Hey I can actually agree with them for the most part. I believe that people "know" their speakers or headphones so well that they can generally tell you how its going to sound in another system (sort of) For the most part I wouldnt say its a terrible idea but you are probably going to end up making some CD-Rs playing them in different speakers and then throwing it away and making a new one eventually you may understand your mix but I would suggest using atleast some type of speaker system to go along with the headphones even if its just mono you can check to see if the frequency responses are decent- looking at the meters on the software can actually help with this if you turn the bass down all the way and your mixes are still pumping the same volumes you might wanna check to see if you got the bass up : but the main problem ive had with mixing in headphones is its almost always the bass guitar and drums but then again when u listen to professional mixes the drums and guitar sound good in both right? Use the meters thats what theyre there for! hope this helps some
 
I generally do 90% of my recording and preliminary mixing on Sennheiser HD497 headies. When I eventually go to my monitors I'm always rudely surprised by how thin and generally crap everything is. I need a lot more experience mixing with my monitors, but haven't got the chance because of the noise factor.
 
I too use the Senn HD280's they'er inexpensive and sound good, but have a limited bass to them, which in my case works better. I have a pair of M-Audio BX8's and they are bass heavy. I use headphones for putting instruments where they belong in the mix, and adjusting volumes it works for me. I use the reference monitors for "referencing" my mix and setting up the final mix/edits. I always find myself listening on different systems, and using headphones, lots of people listen on headphones and computer systems too.
 
The BX8's are bass heavy huh? I have BX5's and many people with them have bought bass boost units for them. Not me though.

I find that headphones are pretty useful for getting a rough idea of where to place things in a mix, though it never sounds quite the same once you use monitors to listen to it.

Volumes are another thing that isn't always accurate...especially for more bassy sounds. My headphones accentuate the bass I guess, whereas my monitors leave it a bit thin.
 
My personal conclusions:

Unless you have a professional mastering studio-quality room, you are not hearing your mix accurately.

Every monitoring source, be it headphones or speakers, will have its own unique shortcomings. (Not to mention the room).

In order to diminish the negative effects those shortcomings, you can use multiple monitors, and even multiple rooms if you are lucky to have more space.

Treat the room as best as you can. Try having a couple of sets of nearfields, a set or two of headphones, and a couple of consumer stereo systems (have a sub on at least one system). Wire it all up so you can switch between them easily (that may take some effort and some money, but it's worth it). Also have a professional mix cued up and ready to play on the same monitors so you can A/B as you go.

Each system will play your mix differently. If you can make a mix translate well on EACH system you have AND it sounds good when compared to your reference mix, you've probably got a decent mix going on.

One set of monitors (or cans) probably does not cut it, unless you dig frustration.* I would say one set of reasonably good nearfields, two consumer systems (one cheap, one good), at least one set of good headphones, and at least some educated attempt at room treatment is the bare minimum for getting good results.

Just my opinion.
 
I love how someone asks how they can do things with minimal equipment because they have no money and someone will respond that they need to get several different pairs of monitors .... a couple of stereo systems and some room treatment at a bare minimum.
How does that answer his question at all? He can't do that because "he has no money!"
If he has money to buy multiple systems he likely wouldn't even be asking the question.

The short answer kubeek is that, yes, it's possible to get passable results mixing thru those 'phones if you know what you're doing. I could, and quite a few others here could although they wouldn't produce as good a result as we would get in a treated room with a dozen different systems to crosscheck everything on :rolleyes:.
In your case since I'm assuming you're at least somewhat new to this because you're asking basic questions ..... your results will probably be less good.
I'd suggest taking some commercial CDs that have good sound and that you know really well and listening to them on several systems ..... car systems .... maybe a friend has a nice sounding stereo .... that sort of thing and then listen to them on your 'phones to get a good idea of how your 'phones reproduce the different freqs and how they sound. Then try to mix to that. After your first mix ..... just assume it needs more work and go listen to that mix on all those different systems that you can find access to. Gotta be someone you know with a good home system or car system.
 
The problems I have with mixing with headphones are less about frequency response and more about nonrealistic seperation. With phones, your left ear hears the left channel, your right ear ear hears the right channel, and that's that. But with monitors, each ear is hearing both channels, with both level and time differences on the "bleed" compared to the direct sound. This affects stereo image, and it affects time based effects like reverb.
I love my headphones (AKG 240DF), and have always loved listening to music on headphones, but no matter how flat they are, there's no getting around the isolation problem.
 
Lt. Bob said:
I love how someone asks how they can do things with minimal equipment because they have no money and someone will respond that they need to get several different pairs of monitors .... a couple of stereo systems and some room treatment at a bare minimum.
How does that answer his question at all? He can't do that because "he has no money!"
If he has money to buy multiple systems he likely wouldn't even be asking the question.
Click to expand...

I know it's fun to get all sarcastic and put other people down, but...

He didn't say "no money", he said "enough money for proper monitors". How much is that? What's a "proper" monitor? I bought a good set of used active Wharfedales for $100. Passive Alesis M1 MK2's can be found for less than $100. Most people already own a stereo or two. How many threads on cheap DIY bass traps are there? It's assumed that most of us are doing this on the cheap. This ain't the Gearslutz high-end forum.

If you can't scrape up a hundred bucks now and then, recording is probably a bad choice for a hobby, would you agree Lt.?

I'd rather know the PROCESS of HOW to get it right (without having to drive around town listening to all my friends' stereos ;)).
 
head phones

actually, cheapo speakers are great to mix with. i dont think you can get an honest sound with phones because you're not hearing with the natural air that someone else will be hearing it.
 
Robert D said:
The problems I have with mixing with headphones are less about frequency response and more about nonrealistic seperation. With phones, your left ear hears the left channel, your right ear ear hears the right channel, and that's that. But with monitors, each ear is hearing both channels, with both level and time differences on the "bleed" compared to the direct sound. This affects stereo image, and it affects time based effects like reverb.
I love my headphones (AKG 240DF), and have always loved listening to music on headphones, but no matter how flat they are, there's no getting around the isolation problem.
Click to expand...
Sure there is but you have to have an amp like my Headroom that has a circuit
to compensates for that. It sounds virtually identical to my in the room JBL monitors as far as the left ear hearing the right speaker etc.
 
leddy said:
I know it's fun to get all sarcastic and put other people down, but...

He didn't say "no money", he said "enough money for proper monitors". How much is that? What's a "proper" monitor? I bought a good set of used active Wharfedales for $100. Passive Alesis M1 MK2's can be found for less than $100. Most people already own a stereo or two. How many threads on cheap DIY bass traps are there? It's assumed that most of us are doing this on the cheap. This ain't the Gearslutz high-end forum.

If you can't scrape up a hundred bucks now and then, recording is probably a bad choice for a hobby, would you agree Lt.?

I'd rather know the PROCESS of HOW to get it right (without having to drive around town listening to all my friends' stereos ;)).
Click to expand...
All valid points I believe ...... however, I don't believe I got sarcastic and 'put anyone down' in any way. I specifically raised an issue that I thought had merit which is that your response was more on the theoretical side of things and didn't really address his question.
And your point of "what is a proper monitor' is also valid ...... if he meant something that's $1500 a pair, then there would certainly be alternatives to just using 'phones that would be a lot cheaper.
But when someone says they can't afford 'proper' monitors and so could they just use cans, to me that comes across as not having any money available to buy anything and so the thing to answer is his question of whether he can mix with cans and the answer is he can ........ will it be as good as if he had the things you mentioned available to him? No. But he can do it for sure.
As for the idea that this is a bad hobby if you can't spare $100 now and then ...... any hobby is bad if you can't afford that much. I can't think of a hobby of any note that doesn't make it easy to spend cash, but thru the years here I've seen more than one recordist that couldn't afford to eat, much less buy gear and they have to do with what they've got, so they need help getting what can be gotten from the stuff they have rather than telling them to get other stuff.
All just my opinion and YMMV, but I wasn't putting you down if it came across that way, I was just making an observation.
 
Monkey Allen said:
The BX8's are bass heavy huh? I have BX5's and many people with them have bought bass boost units for them. Not me though.

I find that headphones are pretty useful for getting a rough idea of where to place things in a mix, though it never sounds quite the same once you use monitors to listen to it.

Volumes are another thing that isn't always accurate...especially for more bassy sounds. My headphones accentuate the bass I guess, whereas my monitors leave it a bit thin.
Click to expand...

was about to say the same thing! (tried +1, site wouldn't let me)
 
Lt. Bob said:
Sure there is but you have to have an amp like my Headroom that has a circuit
to compensates for that. It sounds virtually identical to my in the room JBL monitors as far as the left ear hearing the right speaker etc.
Click to expand...

Someday I'll have to hear that. You could even try to do it on a mixer with a pair of sub busses fed from the stereo buss, slightly delayed, then crossed back to the headphone buss. But there's still some finer points of source location not addressed.
 
Robert D said:
Someday I'll have to hear that. You could even try to do it on a mixer with a pair of sub busses fed from the stereo buss, slightly delayed, then crossed back to the headphone buss. But there's still some finer points of source location not addressed.
Click to expand...
well .... that wouldn't do the same thing as the Headroom circuit. It also rolls off the freqs that would get rolled off in the process of passing around your head ..... it does a first rate job.
Also, for me, I find it easier rather than harder to locate things in the soundfield with cans as opposed to monitors. But that's just my feelings on it.
 
Lt. Bob said:
well .... that wouldn't do the same thing as the Headroom circuit. It also rolls off the freqs that would get rolled off in the process of passing around your head ......
Click to expand...

Yes, that was one of the "finer points" I mentioned. You'd want to get a Neuman KU-100 Binaural dummy head and do some FFT analysis of how each opposite ear "heard" the opposite speaker, and apply the transform to the crossing sub foldback.
Or...... you could just get a headroom headphone amp. :)
How much?
 
Robert D said:
Yes, that was one of the "finer points" I mentioned. You'd want to get a Neuman KU-100 Binaural dummy head and do some FFT analysis of how each opposite ear "heard" the opposite speaker, and apply the transform to the crossing sub foldback.
Or...... you could just get a headroom headphone amp. :)
How much?
Click to expand...
Mines about 10 years old so I'm not sure but they probably start around a couple hundred and go all the way up to a few thousand.
 
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