Monitors - why do I need them?!

  • Thread starter Thread starter westermane
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I mix with my studio headphones.

This provides me (I said me) with optimum results.

Whenever I listen to music (not my own) and want to distinguish between the various instruments, the panning, effects used etc I listen through headphones as this provides the most conclusive results im my opinion.
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You are welcome to your opinion. And for some aspects of recording, I will absolutely agree with you. Stereo imaging and pan settings seem to be more obvious with headphones, simply because there is minimal or no acoustic crosstalk between the signals arriving at each ear (assuming any of us have gray matter rather than acoustical limiting material known as "air") :)

We have done our track laying with monitors as well as headphones - since we generally record everything "flat" and "dry" the most important thing for us at this stage of recording is making sure we are getting the cleanest, highest level possible to the recorder. Headphones are fine for this, as is almost anything.

The final mix, then the mastering process, we use true monitors. We use them because as others have said earlier, they enable you to hear recording flaws that other methods of audio reproduction will hide, or color if you will. Home stereo speakers (and headphones) often cut the midrange a bit so the bass sounds better and the highs sound brighter, in contrast to a flat response.

Trust me though, it is important to listen to the final mix on headphones, switch over to decent home speakers, and even cruddy speakers, as well as pop the CD in boom boxes, the car stereo, and of course, a cheap disc-man clone. This is done based on the assumption that most consumers do not have pro-audio equipment with Polk monitors :)

Hope I helped in some small way.
 
[QUOTEYet having said that, I've asked a question here before that nobody really knows how to answer it seems. At this point, the stuff I'm recording is *very* simple - voice and acoustic guitar. Minimal compression, and minimal EQ tweaking required - mostly just adjust the levels and trim the ends off the track. I'm not even panning anything. So, why not do this through cans? I can understand completely why monitors are superior for multi-track takes with a handful of instruments and panning and all that. 5-7 hundred dollars is a *lot* of money to pay if I don't need to. I don't know what I'm missing, I know. But do I need to? If I were playing with ONE other instrument, I'd be down to my local monitor emporium tomorrow like *that*! (dobro snaps fingers dramatically) [/B][/QUOTE]

Snap your fingers my friend :) You are not recording something very simple. Voice and acoustical instruments are probably the most complex signals, in fact. Vocals I presume is obvious, but acoustic guitar would have intonation information from the wood charactoristics, the picking noise, fingernail noise, string buzzing on the frets, maybe even the guitarist's cotton shirtcuffs swiping across the bridge. This information you would more accurately hear with monitors, simply because they have a more flat response - this mid-range audio "stuff" is more available to your ears.


When you purchased your guitar, did you walk into your music store and in 30 seconds are less say "gimme the blue one with that white tag on it?", or did you try five or six of them until you found the one that felt, and sounded "right" to you? If it was the latter, monitors would benefit you because then you'd hear that "right" uncolored and as pure as you can afford.

Also, there is absolutely nothing wrong with purchasing used monitors. Just test them before you put them into your car and head for home. Used gear can save you some money if you are careful. We got our Tannoy Reveals that way.
 
If mixing in headphones works for you then do it. I personally have tried it with a mix that had 12 dif things going on at any given time and so I figured I would get a better handle on the panning and imaging in headphones. While the mix translated well to other headphones it sounded like shite on speakers. Absolute shite. For some reason there seemed to be a huge gap from 800-1k and the volumes were not balanced. (This was on AKG240s) Everyone understands the critical role space plays in listening to music. Music sounds dif when its 20 feet away vs when its 3 feet vs a centimeter. Clearly, the space between you and the speaker gives you a much better sense of the balance in your mix. Mixes done on speakers translate to headphones while mixes done on headphones dont necessarily translate. Its not for lack of detailed sound as was suggested here, any good pair of headphones will probably have more detail than your monitors but the sense of space and perspective you get with monitors is what gets the whole thing sounding balanced and that is why they are so critical to my mind.
 
what are the headphones in question.

If you listen to your music through grado rs-1 or stax lambda nova(with tube amp) at $450 and $1500 respectively, you will think that something is wrong with your music. WHy, because they have so much detail and so much clarity, that you can tell the difference between your stuff and professional stuff.

Many pro's use expensive, high-end headphones, not for checking volume balance, but for questions of tone.

A pro said in a magazine article, if you listen to five minutes of music through a pair of grado rs-1, with a headphone amp, you will think that your studio monitors are FAULTY. how is that for amazing.

I learnt the hard way. Don't try to adjust volume or pan with headpones. Unless you can get it PERFECT. why?, if it sounds less than perfect on your headphones, it will sound BAD(mushy, muddy, etc) on speakers.

And don't use even the expensive, baring ones . Just use them as a perfect reference.

peace

ps.

You be the judge.
Listen to what a friend of mine put on mp3.com. mixed with headphones.

http://www.mp3.com/paulbryson
and listen to "space dance"
 
No offense Cyan but I wouldnt use your friends music as evidence of the superiority or even functionality of mixing through headphones. The 2 songs I heard were very campy in writing and tone quality.
 
CJ, was that song from Flashdance?.....it seemed to be lacking seriously in the low end....dont dance songs like a good kick drum beat?....maybe if he mixed on monitors he woulda caught that.......
 
well,

we are saying exactly the same thing. Don't mix with headphones. With my monitors, we caught most of the problems with it.

Not enough kick, not enough bass, high end is way too sharp etc etc

when I eq siren to where space dance is sounding good, everything else(mixed on speakers of course) sounds dull.

So I say it again.

Don't mix on $20 headphones, and don't mix on $400 headphones either. THe mix will sound unclean

Just use the expensive headphones as reference
peace
 
You CAN mix on headphones...

...BUT...

- You have to compensate for different stereo imaging.
- You have to compensate for different frequency response.
- You have to compensate for effect levels that seem to be louder than they are.
- You have to compensate for the headphone quality itself (if you use anything less than say $500 reference models).
- You have to compensate for the fact that the mix is more likely to be heard on speakers than it is on headphones anyways, so you want to make it sound the best it can coming out of monitors.

Mixing can be difficult enough to get right via monitors, why make it even harder complicating it by having to adjust for all these other issues???

Bruce
 
Ok, but...

When auditioning speakers for a stereo system, my test is how well acoustic instruments sound i.e. do they sound real? So, this means that the speakers do NOT have "flat" response? I was led to believe that good stgereo speakers have flat response, and compensations should be done with EQ and pre-amp.
 
a modified dog said:
Ok, but...

When auditioning speakers for a stereo system, my test is how well acoustic instruments sound i.e. do they sound real? So, this means that the speakers do NOT have "flat" response? I was led to believe that good stgereo speakers have flat response, and compensations should be done with EQ and pre-amp.
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Well... we're not talking about stereo speakers here, we're talking about studio monitors! (or did I miss something?? I jumped into the thread kinda late!)

Stereo speakers tend to have been sweetened by design, studio monitors tend not to be (as in, hyping the inherent speaker's tonal characteristics is not included as part of the design). Compensation via EQ and preamp don't even enter into the picture here! You never use any EQ to try and shape a studio monitor's sound - that defeats the whole purpose!

What exactly are you trying to say when you mention compensation via EQ and preamp???

Bruce
 
There is no such thing as speaker system with a perfectly flat response, some come close, but NONE are actaully flat.
 
There is nothing in this entire UNIVERSE that's perfect.


...........'Cept me! :)

THE END.
 
Blue Bear:

"Stereo speakers tend to have been sweetened by design, studio monitors tend not to be (as in, hyping the inherent speaker's tonal characteristics is not included as part of the design). "

You've answered my question. I was thinking inside the cabinet, so to speak.

"Compensation via EQ and preamp don't even enter into the picture here! You never use any EQ to try and shape a studio monitor's sound - that defeats the whole purpose! What exactly are you trying to say when you mention compensation via EQ and preamp??? "


I was talking about "shaping" what's coming out of the amp before it goes into the speakers with regard to a stereo system. I now see that I have to think differently about the process of home recording.

Thanks to all for your comments.
 
more....

Ok, I understand what you are saying. But if monitors give you the flat, non-exaggerated sound, won't you tend to boost the bass, etc. too much when you're mixing?

Also, you say that monitors help make the song sound better on all types of stereos. How's that? It seems like if all stereos sound different, if you make an adjustment in your mix, it would make the song sound better on one stereo, but then you would be making the mix sound worse on another one. I mean, if the bass sounds good on your stereo, but too light on your friends....when you boost it it will sound good on your friend's but too boomy on yours. Right?

Another question, I'm playing one of my recordings on my stereo speakers, and when I'm right in front of them, it sounds great - but if I back up a bit or stand up, the song sounds weaker or the bass is too loud, etc. This happens to an extent when I'm playing a pro CD, but definitely not as much.

What's going on here? And I'm not arguing with you that monitors are useless, I'm just trying to understand exactly how they help. Thanks for your help!
 
Re: more....

westermane said:
Ok, I understand what you are saying. But if monitors give you the flat, non-exaggerated sound, won't you tend to boost the bass, etc. too much when you're mixing?

Also, you say that monitors help make the song sound better on all types of stereos. How's that? It seems like if all stereos sound different, if you make an adjustment in your mix, it would make the song sound better on one stereo, but then you would be making the mix sound worse on another one. I mean, if the bass sounds good on your stereo, but too light on your friends....when you boost it it will sound good on your friend's but too boomy on yours. Right?

Another question, I'm playing one of my recordings on my stereo speakers, and when I'm right in front of them, it sounds great - but if I back up a bit or stand up, the song sounds weaker or the bass is too loud, etc. This happens to an extent when I'm playing a pro CD, but definitely not as much.

What's going on here? And I'm not arguing with you that monitors are useless, I'm just trying to understand exactly how they help. Thanks for your help!
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Allright, I thought this came up before, but let's try again.............

Let's say you use your home stereo to mix on, and you set the "loudness" switch in, plus you boost both the treble and boost because you REALLY want to pump you song....

You mix and everything is sounding rockin' - bass is pumping, hitting you in the chest and you're "feelin' it".
Pumped up and excited about the mix you've just nailed, you dupe it and run over to your car to blast it all over the neighborhood... boom - boom - boom........

Pop the CD in your car and crank it and.......... NOTHING!!! No bass and no highs! WTF??? You got caught with your monitors down, so to speak....

OK... what happened? You were mixing thru a system that had the the bass and highs boosted abnormally, so your sense of mix levels was completely thrown off. What sounded like a good bass level was in actuality far too low for an unhyped system... same with the highs.

There ya go - this is why you don't want to be mixing on "hyped" monitors. But that alone is not enough... as you pointed out, there are A LOT of different sound systems out there that people listen to music on. What's worse is that the sound quality of each system varies from complete crap to SmellyFuzz's amp-on-bricks with gold-wired-speakers listening to-green-painted-CDs....

So once you get a mix down on your unhyped monitors, you listen to your mix on a boombox, the home stereo, the car stereo, and those crappy Radio Shack speakers you should have on your console as a secondary reference. All these other listening references will give you at least some idea at how well your mix translates to other people's systems. If you mix sounds reasonably well-balanced on all your references, you've done you're job...

As far as moving around your stereo speakers and getting different response, this is completely normal. Much like the "sweet spot" where your nearfields sound good in front of your console, your stereo speakers will have an area in front of them that is their sweet spot. The room you're listening in will affect the size and position of that sweet spot...

Hope this helps.......

Bruce
 
These guys are right. I did a mix-down on my home stereo and it sounded GREAT!!! Better than the pros. Then I listened to it on other stereos - worse than the average amatuer. When I've got the money, I'm springin for the monitors. Hope you do too.
 
Just get a good set of consumer speakers and use them. If you have half a brain, you'll learn the personality of the speakers in half an hour. Don't waste your money . . .
 
Well... that line of thinking...

...is essentially what happened with engineers using NS-10s... but why would you intentionally subject your ears to that torture? Sure, you could learn to mix on 'em, but bad monitors get extremely fatiguing in a very short time.........

Bruce
 
Don't be dumb

I'd much rather spend a few minutes figuring out my speakers than making these 'monitor' companies rich. Christ, it's home studio for gods sake.
 
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