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The highpass thing really depends on the kind of music that you make. On electronic music I even highpass the different layers of distorted bass sounds and replace the low end with a pure sine. So when I mute the kick and the sine bass there is nothing below 80Hz. That way the subwoofer gets pure sine waves. Subs love sine waves, you know :-)
With every genre it's an issue use plugin doctor and just see when u boost and low cut.. Absolute mess. That's why edm sounds like crap.. Overprocessed over equied use instead filters if u want to get rid of bass or highs
That’s completely unnecessary. Taken to the extreme, a distorted bass is approximately a square wave. A square wave is just a sum of sinusoidal components. The fundamental, e.g 50 Hz, and then the third, fifth, seventh etc. harmonic. So with crossovers in the sound system and everything, what you really should be saying is: subs won’t be reproducing anything but sine waves, even when feeding distorted bass to the system
I'm newbie in EDM. Recently I found myself doing default stuff. I used a lot of EQs, filters, compressors probably on every channel. So, my CPU usage was extremely high. But the fun thing is, I opened my old projects up and deleted all the default stuff(except really necessary) and mixes started to sound better(or not worse). Now I start to understand that mixing can't save bad track. But if it's good, proper mixing can seriously improve it.
@@TheHardRage13 Someone correct me if I'm wrong but I believe he's talking about when people get in the habit of adding a high pass filter on every kick, bass, snare before they can even hear the mix. If it sounds like you need a high pass on a snare or hat, create a bus channel with your high pass instead of going to each individual track adding separate high pass filters.
I actually found that using a low shelve cleans My tracks much more and removes mud much better than high-passing... I have tried this with the tracks of my first album which were poorly recorded and suddenly applying a low shelve cleaned My guitars and made them appear much more clearly in one move than applying a high-pass, a Bell at 220hz a low pass to remove hiss and a bell to Boost the highs, suddenly I could get almost the same tone on My guitars but sounding much more clearly and natural just by cutting the lows by ear with a low shelve. To me it was a Game changer
It's funny how the guy is just saying, "high passing is great, just use it properly" and everyone is getting butthurt. He is helping you all get a good mix. Phase issues are a new engineers nightmare. If a new engineer does it by default because some guy on UA-cam says to cut everything then they are gonna be beating themselves up wondering why their mix is falling apart. It is great advice. If you are getting offended by a guy trying to help you out, maybe you need an ego check.
I’ve seen some videos from In the Mix recommending high passing above 20hz by default, is this okay? We don’t need anything below that because we can’t hear it, and I don’t want it removing headroom. Obviously I wouldn’t high pass like 80hz by default but is what I’m doing okay?
@@OK-ei7io honestly highpassing at 80 isn't bad in itself depending on the instrument. High-passing rolls down to 0 it doesnt cut at 80. That means cutting at 20 rolls down to 0 which only controls the very very low frequencies under 10 depending on the curve. I would say get an analyzer and see if there is any buildup down there. Download voxenga span. It is very helpful and free. Check your mic's frequency response too. There is a good chance that your mic doesn't even pick up anything that low so cutting at 20 wouldn't really change anything unless there were a lot of artifacts down there. If you want to adapt the cutting at 20 rule then do it on a master group channel or the actual master channel at the end. Messing with eq too much can mess up your phase which in turn can cause some big headaches in the future. If you are using a synth, high-passing is only needed to shape the sound to clean it up and fit it in a mix by giving bass more room. If you record a vocal, high-passing can take out possible mic stand hits or low frequency pops from the "P" sound. If you are highpassing a guitar track you can literally pull it as far as you need to isolate it over the bass. For guitar just remember you want to feel some bass of the guitar to 1. Make the instruments feel like they're still in the same place and 2. So you can still feel the hit and body of the notes. There is a lot of misinformation online from people copy and pasting mixing tips. The thing to remember about mixing is that there is no standard, no magic numbers and every genre, instrument and song needs different numbers. That is why learning by ear is so important. High-passing is totally fine in any situation, just remember to always check your phase. If your phase is doing fine, go nuts with your high-passing just remember that lots of instruments benefit from having a balanced low end over having no low end. Send me a message if you'd like some advice for your specific situation.
Haha well said. I'm not surprised David is getting fed up. He is just trying to help and people are trying to shit on him. I guarantee his mixes are better than all these complainers combined.
@@OK-ei7io I sometimes even push it to 30 and it sounds ok but ye, humans can't really hear that sound but be careful and don't cut too much, I usually do that cut during the mastering stage, but cutting too much takes away a lot of the energy
I seriously did not know that EQs will cause phase shifting like that... that changes everything. EDIT: Years later, after learning more.. it does not change everything lol This is one of those things that, while technically true, gets blown way out of proportion.
It doesn't really, we have been using minimum phase EQs for a 100 years with no problems! Anybody who mixed on analog equipment will laugh at all this BS. The phase shift is what gives an EQ it's tone, it's the reason why we love certain EQs. Phase shift isn't a bad thing it's the mojo, you just have to know how to use it to your advantage.
I’m a very amateur producer, so sorry if I’m doing something really wrong, but: Is it okay to high pass below 20hz by default? We can’t hear those frequencies and I don’t want it taking up headroom, and I’m not mixing a genre where a lot of sub is beneficial. Obviously I wouldn’t high pass below 80hz or something by default, but is what I’m doing okay?
LOL.... let's kill our ears by cutting anything below 2k please so no one can hear music ever again. That is our goal as producers and musicians yeah? ROFLMAO
Officer Oink In reverbs I like to cut the low end pretty drastically, but that is an EQ on an EFFECT, not an original signal for a track. There is a huge difference in my opinion.
Officer Oink "What about reverbs? Abbey roads cut below even 700 Hz as a default." ~ Officer Oink I was just talking about reverb. Of course I use the HPF on cymbals or anything that belongs in the 5k~ range. I was just saying that anything that has reverb is generally going to be in the midrange to highrange spectrum.
Holy Shit, This is exactly the frustration i have with mixs. thinking i'm doing the right thing whith HPF. Can't wait to try it. I also remember bringing up an earlier version to grab a clip and thinkin. Shit the old one sounded better so now i'm trying to recreate that sound by removing plugins later. Now i just trash all plugs and start over with the current version ....who's with me on this one
Lost days doing this, stated again cropped al lot off stuff out and ended with a better mix!! phase issues are like chickens they all come home to roost.
A cut in the low mids often fixes what u think is a low end problem. A cut in the high mids often fixes what u think if a high end problem. Forwhatever reason people think u can to hp and lp everything and it sounds awful.
@@Jupiter1423 yeah i believe its called mirrored EQ, taking from a region adds to the region next to it, like cutting in the low mids like 200 - 400 hz helps a lot the mid highs sound clearer, so you dont need to boost it.
@@Jupiter1423 I'm in the same boat -My goal is always to EQ as much as possible with the mics anyway. Ideal for me is pull up the faders and have that be the mix. Done. Buuut -I'm a big fan of some parametric EQ, for sure it really brings the mix to another level -Especially if you're working with less than ideal mics...
I've had a sneaky suspicion of this for years, but every single video I've ever seen regarding mixing has said that you should HP all tracks except kick and bass. I'm gonna try a different approach on my next mix and see how it turns out. Thanks for the advice man!
It's all about giving each instrument its own room to breathe and using your ears. Yes, hi-pass on a distorted rock guitar at the appropriate frequency to give the kick and bass their room to breathe in the low-end. This COULD mean cutting below up around 200hz, depending on the material and song, as always.. But let's say it's a clean hollow-body on a jazz track, cutting below 200hz would castrate the guitars and murder the sound of the track. So yes, you'll almost always want to use a hi-pass and a lot of tracks, but as always, the frequency varies wildly. You just have to listen. "Where can I apply the hi-pass that doesn't cut off this instrument track's balls?" As an example, there is never a reason in my mind where, in general, you'd need anything below 60hz on a rock guitar track, or below 300hz-ish hz in the hi-hat, So yes, in general, hi-pass on almost everything. No sense in mixing 24 tracks of mic rumble stacking on top of each other turning the entire track into stale, low-end mud.
@@hjon5988 try taking them all off and comparing. If it sounds better, then sure. I prefer really thin and airy hihats so I always highpass them, but it’s completely an artistic choice.
There's a lot of great advice and useful information in this vid, but I think the problem is perhaps a bit over emphasized. High-passing is imho still the best tool to shape the low end of your mix and actually help the low end to sound more punchy and pronounced. Yes, phase shifts are a consequence, but it's a very natural one that is not necessarily something to worry about too much. I pretty much never use linear phase EQ because I think it tends to replace a (usually non-) issue with something that's more problematic and unnatural, but ymmv. If I start EQ-ing, cutting super low frequencies that have no real musical information is typically the first thing I do on pretty much any track. Often even the kick drum. If done right, it makes the low end sound fatter and the whole mix louder as a bonus. Adding a low cut at 80Hz or something doesn't really remove anything below 80Hz, a HPF there just shapes what's going on below (and around) there and can actually emphasize a low frequency range while attenuating unnecessary rumble at once. For example: If you want to make 60Hz more pronounced for your kick to make it fatter, add a high-pass filter at 60Hz; if it's not fat enough make the EQ slope steeper (it'll cut more below 60 and emphasize around 60 more). "Don't do anything by default" is fantastic advice in general of course, but high-passing is perhaps not the best example to make that point.
The trick is to use a gentler slope on the HP so the low end cut is gradually blended into the higher frequencies. Try a single pole (6db/oct) HP and watch your mixes instantly improve.
I got the LoCut advise from a mastering engineer who has a name in the industry. His name is Friedemann Tischmeyer. He published one of the first mixing in the box books years back. You can read it there.( F. Tischmeyer, Internal Mixing, pp. 142; 206) He suggests exactly what you call bullshit. Locut on everything that is not Bass or Bassdrum. And to do it multiple times even. Up to four locut instances for vocals eg. On the microphone, on the pre amp, on the individual channel and on the vocal group channel again. Acoustic guitars in case you just want the hi end can take locut at around 250 Hz (cf p142 as well) The only reason that you instead have to call it b.s. is the phase shifts that you may encounter. Hello? Every non linear phase eq will have this "problem" Thats why there are linear phase eqs on the market if you want one. But in the vast majority of cases we do not even want one!!!! We want the phase shifts, my friend. Examples of famous non linear phase eqs wanted? Manley Massive Passive, Pultec, etc I have seen the reference list of artists that Tischmeyer mixed or mastered. And he is also a known adviser of broadcasting international on the mere technical aspect of audio and if I remember it correctly was on the team of the EBU that provided the new loudness industry standards. In short he is an acclaimed audio expert. I benefitted a lot from the locut advice. My bass section became not only more defined but also more powerful without the mud from the other tracks. I do not know your name or your reference lists of artists that you have mixed. Just shouting bullhit on youtube is not enough to shake trusted mixing techniques followed by many.
Perfectly right. I absolutely don´t know what is the point of your video. When you say don´t hipass everything except for bassdrum and bass by default, it is the exact opposite of what Tischmeyer says, when he suggests exactly that BY DEFAULT. That is MY POINT. One thing for reconciliation: There is some good advice in your video, but it is hidden, because you create the impression that you call locutting everything other than bass and bassdrum bullshit. Which it is definitely not. The good advice is varying the locut point. Even more so because some eqs have a hump before the cutting point. But don´t forget, the locut that is built in in the mic, is always fixed. Some pre amp locuts are also. I used them anyway. The benefit is far greater than the "damage" done. And I dont also criticize the multi mic situation where grouping before locutting is useful.
Even if someone with reputation says you need to do something by default, doesn't necessarily mean that. I find it very, very odd to suggest that you absolutely need to high pass everything but the bass and the bass drum. The frequency content of a track depends on so many things that it's virtually impossible to make rules to how to eq it! It depends on the instrument itself (even two of the same kind are likely to sound different) and how it's played, the type of mic that was used, and in what kind of room, from which distance and angle... The factors are so many that everything just depends. Yes, in many cases high passing does help, and that's why mics and preamps have the option. But there's a reason they also have the option to turn it off!
Basically every mixing decision should have a purpose. I’ve been mixing for almost 10 years and I just learned to stop using plugins just to try and make the plugin shine when it should be the song that shines. I have so many fancy plugins that I automatically reach for them and put them on mixbuses but I tried a test exporting with all plugins then taking most of them off that didn’t serve a specific need and volume matching and I was shocked at the percentage of songs that sounded better when I took off a lot of plugins. Adding plugins just because they are nice will most likely not improve it. So i’d say the biggest thing I’ve learned as an engineer is to only make decisions based off of need and not by default like you said. Great advice.
As a Mastering engineer for almost 25 years and mastered and technically reported over 650 albums, I would like to comment that I double HPF, once with the analog chain and further, in digital domain, around 25/35 Hz because there is almost nothing really musical down there. For the rare cases of LFE, this very last octave usually eats a lots of headroom and does not add musically. Also, concerning HPF filters, the phase shift above its Fc is minimum. We have to have an eye and ear in what the phase shift that shall be messing in the frequency zone prior to Fc.
Hm. I get where you are coming from but I have made the opposite discovery. When reference-listening to American rap records like 50 Cent I was kinda baffled when I saw that there were lots of things going on below 30 Hz, and when I lowpassed them the music lost it's punch.
While I never just high-pass at set frequencies, I have been high-passing almost everything but kick and bass, as recommended by so many. It turns out I was high-passing too much on many of the other instruments. After watching this video, it makes perfect sense to me. Take out a few db if you need to, but don't just lop off the entire spectrum of all your instruments in that range. D'oh! Thanks for the eye-opening info. :)
Why not use HPFs to cut out much of the woofy, useless-in-the-mix sound that chews up your headroom? Particularly on mid-range instruments such as guitar amps - HPFs on your tracks can help clean up unnecessary low end that is covering up your bass and kick drum. That's the theory I've always worked under, and its never made my mixes thinner in a non-musical, non-helpful way.
I think what he is saying is that you shouldn't use a HPF for every instrument. He is talking about people that don't have the capacity or equipment to record live instruments correctly. Yes, use the HPF on instruments that are meant to be in the mid/high range; I think he is just saying that you shouldn't overuse the HPF and never stick to a standard of using it on every instrument because you don't have the proper tools to record your low end instruments effectively. Every session that you are responsible for mixing/mastering on a professional level should be approached in a way that has many variables, and use the HPF as a tool when you see a certain abnormality. Use your judgment instead of some rule book that will limit your success. Chill out bro, it sounds like he really knows what he is talking about.
You should render hpf and move the clip to put inphase... Thats the way i keep the correlation betwen clips but always is easy not to hpf the instrument jajajja
Finally someone said it. Energy is important, just because you don't see doesn't mean you don't feel it. This can really save you years of headaches from mixing.
I think that most of the time artists forget the nature that comes from recordings, there's proper rich harmonics that should be up, I'm completely agree with "don't do anything by default" that's a huge trap that make you lose your human touch while mixing.
From someone who has done a lot of work mixing live, I do high pass anything I can get by with as it helps to minimize stage rumble etc. But yes in studio situations it's not always ideal as it's properly acoustically treated. best bet, set the highpass cutoff to something that you don't hear the change from said instrument or other audio source.
some good advice here. I haven't really seen a whole lot of bad advice since I learned what bad advice was, lol, because I don't need a tutorial on some things like sidechaining or something now. Using my ears has been the solution to my real problems. You can hi pass a lot of things and it be a huge improvement. You can do the same things on another song and it sounds terrible. Every track is different and it's just a matter of treating the problem areas at first, then boosting what needs it, and not all things need boost either. You nailed it on the head when you said "BY DEFAULT". "Default" mixing is mindless.
cutting low end works for two reasons. FIrst, in a home studio, at the hobbyist level, most folks are using directional dynamic mics. These will probably be choked up on the sources like drums or guitars quite close. So they have unnatural bass boost from proximity effect. Second, you like to feel the air move? Fine, but most playback systems are not going down to 20hz. You can only take 80hz and up for granted. btw always cut 400hz.
You have phase problems in the kick and subkick section..before mixing try to group all of ur tracks in 5 or 6 group channels and mix them starting from the kick and bass groups..to avoid phase cancelation in kicks find the start of the kicks' waveforms and make them start together (at the same phase) for the first miliseconds...the tricky part of a mixing is to use correct your monitors in ur room.what this guy says in this vid is correct..if your mix sounds boomy you go to bass or kick or whatever is between 20 and 200 hz and eq not everything but only the annoying band of Hz that makes your mix boomy by setting the Q of your EQ to a max level(like resonance)so you can easily find the area of the mix that destroys the whole mix !!
I've been doing the same low cut EQ to all elements except kick and bass in all the mixes I've done so far. At the end of the day, my mixes were always messing up. I think the reason is clear lol. thank you very much
There are fundamental frequencies for every type of instrument, there are charts available to see what those are. Use them to know where you can cut off low end without destroying the fundamental frequencies.
Paralysis for analysis...shit is too technical...just mix for feeling not for math period!! Fuck it if it clip long as the final mix and master doesn’t clip
@1:30 No. It comes from old mixing desks. Most good mixers had a lowcut button on every channel and most any mixing engineer would cut sources he didn't need to have low end. Not to say your video doesn't make a point, but low cuts have been a part of mixing way before people started mixing in the box.
Guys, I just did this test in protools as Audiosuite and as an insert recording to another audio track using the FabFilter Q2 at zero latency and with the EQ3, and in all cases the phase did not change, certainly not to any point where it would be out of phase with anything else. Any thoughts? I've never seen this issue raised by anyone of the "big guys".
Hello..I mostly do hip hop and edm. I rarely use real instruments. Will using hpf on these instruments will cause phasing issues or just real instruments where you record with multiple mics? Also what do you think of hpf vocals? Is it better to cut some low frequency out using hpf or just do like a small dip on the eq?
***** thank you for taking time to answer my questions. I was really confused about this and was getting different answers. I never use to eq the low end of virtual instruments till recently. I noticed that my beats were just muddy but now i noticed they are alot clearer. I still need time to perfect it but its getting there.
Great tip, this is prob one of those things i used to do all the time, and i acatuallty tought it sounded better when i didnt low cut, but since all those producers from future music where sayin it, i just did it, haha, but i stoppet after i accidentally removed all my eq from my busses, and noticed the track i was working all of a sudden became so much fuller and fatter, and this video just confirms that yes, Low end is absoloutly necesarry
Bass frequencies are hungry for headroom in the digital world. In a dense mix I see no sense sacrifacing it for stuff that doesn't necessarily represent anything useful about the instrument of interest.
Dude, when I saw the video title, I was prepared to not agree with you because I do a lot of high pass (I find it very useful when doing live sound engineering) but your reasons and explanations are valid and make good sense. You opened my eyes, even though I kinda knew this but had gotten myself into the "high pass by default" mode. Thanks for a great video, you got yourself a subscriber!
Shit, so you stand a chance of messing up your phase by high passing after phase alignment (something generally done very early)... that's damn important to know! Some of my bass guitar tracks have DI, distortion and fuzz running simultaneously, through hardware... that could easily end up with the phase going out without me realising I'd fucked up! Top advice man, cheers
Awesome TIP for the studio! But not so much in the Live sound world. Yes there can be the same problems in the live sound world but you almost have to hipass on the instruments that do not need certain frequencies just to control low end feedback. But in the live situation you have so many anomolies working against you like the room, the sound system , sub-harmonic distortion, stage volume etc. GREAT VIDEO and it is so true and is what I do in the studio.. but as a live engineer it just has to be used more! Thanks and Cheers!
home boy spoke abt studio, and u up here bringing up live shit. y'all always got some smart to say. like u think we dont know the difference between live and studio. man, i hate ppl like u trying to always add some smart shit just to be seen or heard. lol dont hate me i speak the truth. love all of yall
i think it also has something to do with the HPF notching certain higher frequency range (especially in zero latency mode, i think FabFilter has that video)and making your mix sound weaker...
It depends what the guitars are tuned to. If for example they are tuned to standard E then a HPF set to around 80Hz (The bottom E string is 82.41Hz) is appropriate. Always think of the relative pitch of frequencies.
Yeah ive kind of realized that. Music production is pretty much all preference, the professionals have just been in the game for too long and know certain master secrets. I have serum, decapitator, and fl 12. Dont mind the beat that is on my channel already (not properly mixed). I will be uploading beats regularly starting this week.
I must say that I respectfully disagree with a lot of what you are saying. Cutting/eq-ing does indeed shift the phase and the correlation between multi-micing will be affected but it's really not that much of an issue if you just check your correlation with each eq adjustment that you make. Removing the low-end "energy" from one mic whilst leaving the other intact can make for very interesting sonic dynamics. Besides that, some mic signals will be fatter/smaller/boomier/thinner than the others, and will have more/less frequency ranges. One should always check the correlation between mics and be aware of the problem. Bussing 2 signals together and treating them the same does indeed make for easier handling but sometimes you cannot/will not get the results needed. Alone with a snare drum: you might want to eventually compress the hell out of the bottom mic. This too will greatly affect the correlation. You might even have to flip phase or use a phase alignment tool but you should not be afraid to try. You are right that when your room acoustics are not truthfully letting you hear the results then you cannot know if what you are doing is right or wrong and to that I can only say: If you are not sure, then leave it alone. And even better: go to a real studio and let the Pros handle it or at least watch and learn :) That being said, great tutorial and keep up the good work!
+MixbusTV My disagreement was only that you implied one should "never" do those things when, in fact, if you know what you are doing, is perfectly fine and quite standard - like eq-ing multi mic recordings. For a "newbie" maybe less :)
Larry Tate My understanding (besides what you've mentioned) is that various sounds contain low frequency energy that's not needed nor wanted in that sound. These low frequencies build up (or sum) and can make your bass muddy or difficult to mix. How well this technique works or it's detriment-( also, how much you cut) comes down to the quality and type of HPF's used. Some HPF's will butcher your sound- so finding the best types is key IMO.
I think people are right about it being genre specific. In a metal band doing more brutal styles like Death Metal, you really need to make sure that none of the instruments get in each other’s way, so you need high and low pass filters to prevent interference, and especially because usually the frequencies you’re cutting is just sound. I do think that I will keep most of the things here in mind though. Good video.
I agree. Low end needs to be alive with tension,,,,like a water ballon full of water which vibrates under the tension of the balloon. I believe the trick is to manage the frequency population for low end / cutting so 10 items are not sharing or/// competing for that frequency
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how and why I do it (sry for english btw): I usually use a lowpass and pull it down till the point were the sound loses every bit of character and only the rumble mess stays. This can be at 200, 80 or even 50hz. After I do that, I just change the lowpass to a highpass. I do that as default on literally anything that isn't bass or kick ect. why id say this is important? because let's say you want to put a comp on your bus. You dont want those frequencies to stack up and influence the result of your comp. remember, just because you can't hear it, doesn't mean its not there anymore. In other words, cutting all low end by default is (imo) the right way, as long as you really only take out the unnecessary parts in the spectrum. I hope that made sense and I'm open to critique if any of you have a better way of approaching it.
Pretty much everything about that is messed up, first how you "decide" what to take out, by only listening the low end, you're eliminating masking and that will always make you cut wrong. Second it sounds like you're cutting by listening in solo, again, wrong, nobody cares about your tracks in solo, this is not math, is mixing and mixing means elements and their low end need to co-exist and BLEND, glue together, it's not a puzzle were you cut one thing to make space for the other. Third, your reasoning for cutting is wrong again, you cut to avoid low end to trigger a compressor? That's what sidechain HPF are for, available in pretty much every compressor out there. Use that, problem solved. Forth, the point of the video is NOT to avoid cutting, is to avoid parallel filtering. Fifth, and arguably most important, you say "if you can't hear it", that means your monitoring system can't reproduce it, which means, you can't mix it, hence you eliminate it? That's exactly how skimpy mixes are made. But hey, you like your results? Keep doing it
There are no rules, sure, but there are mistakes you can make while mixing that might be overall detrimental to the sound of your mix. This dude is raising a ton of great points for producers of any kind.
Oh God... Of course you shouldn't just do something by default. BUT... here's the catch: learn your freaking instruments or use a damn Carnegie chart! If your instrument has no sound whatsoever below a certain frequency, you should definitely cut everything below it. The lowest key of a piano for instance is at 27.5 Hz. There's no sound below that and you shouldn't leave any frequencies in that range get in your mix (electronic hum, static, room noise etc) because that's not "low energy" or "balls", that's useless noise that you might not even hear (human ears don't pick up frequencies below 16-20 Hz) but it will add up to the rest and eat away your headroom. A 4 string bass goes as low as 41Hz. There is and shouldn't be anything below that! Whatever is there, is not musical sound. So cut it for God's sake... A normally tuned 6 string guitar has nothing useful under 82 Hz. Don't apply "one size fits all" solutions and certainly don't cut every channel at the same frequency, but learn where the lowest useful frequencies are for each and every instrument and cut below that!
I have to assume that that's what you mean, being a pro (unlike me, I am a musician who does this as a hobby) but that's not how it came through to me. I probably misunderstood it, but I still felt the need to make it clear
I actually found out about this issue the hard way, my mixes were really dull and muddy, so I realized that before I started doing all this EQ's everywhere, the track was sounding much better. so that being said, my question now is, do I apply low/high cuts just based on what my ear tells me? is there a "rule" or parameter that I could follow? thanks for the tutorial, I'm subscribing.
+MixbusTV isn't eq just messing with phase when using audiosuite on specific regions? A regular insert on the track strip will also do this to your waveforms?!
just got here and it's a very good video... but ***** , let me disagree (respectfully) with you on one single thing you said: I totally agree with the main point: don't hipass by default just because someone said so... but... a lot of materials simply don't have information in Low frequency range, but that area can (in some cases) add eletric interferences for example.... take a trumpet or a flute for example, there will be absolutely nothing "usable" in Low or even Low-Mids... the fundamental note itself starts at a higher point, and harmonics are generated from there on... never "backwards"... Do you disagree? Once again, congratulations! i subscribed!
I only cut below where the instrument actually is... You can even check where that is with an LPF, and what is there is rumble. So when you cut, you take nothing but rumble out. Usually its pretty low frequency. But any bass mixing i'm going to use more subtle band pass and low shelves. Worst advice is that you cut 80hz on guitars, becasue that's the lowest note: nope you listen, many guitar sounds have sub frequencies and cabinet resonance. The other worst advice was to LO PASS...wtf...?? Kill all harmonics? that's the way to a dull recording! Also linear phase EQ is much better, if you can get one... which solves that other problem. There's a huge noticeable difference with linear phase, the 'balls' are not lost nearly as much as standard EQ. Still, pull down an LPF to 80 hz....a lot might be rumble and mush if you are doing this, just don't know why it needs to be there. agree very much about eqing mics together. You have them to mix a reasonable eq just by balance. There would only be some rare occasion some noise or rattle occurs on one you'd notch a single one. In which case if the glitch was so bad, you'd probably just scrap that mic track and solo the other one. I think its sometimes a good source of advice, that gets lots along the lines. Like 3:1 rule...people keep telling me to do it to match phase alignment form single sources by making a sweet spot where the speed of sound arrives complimentary: that's not what its for and physically impossible! -it is just to reduce spill when using multiple sources. This is kind of the same, you are not meant to hipass into the actual audible range of the instrument! It sure sucks when your violin is causing weird rumbling of the player's foot tapping, or a nearby engine is vibrating into the mix.
***** I think a good rule is: -make sure you can't hear the cut you are making in isolation. -but when you monitor with a low pass, its should make that rumble, and that sub frequency masking disappear and get stronger bass. The higher frequency the instrument the more this is going to work tbh. I don't really use instruments in the box though, everything is through an amp or acoustic that i do, so its essentially noise and subharmonics, i don't know if i'd apply it to a soft synth so much.
Just absolutely wow over here, this is the actual information that my confused brain needed right now.. I've been doing it the mainstream youtube guide way, and always been in wonder why the track sounds weak after mixing. Thank you. Please make a video on how you would go by attacking such issue. This is surely useful info!
Can someone clarify this once and for all: when you cut the low frequencies in an EQ - thats called HIGHpass? And vise versa i LOWpass? If so, when i automate logic's stock EQ, i can choose low cut frequency for ex. and it will cut off the low frequencies, and not the high ones. Im still confused abou what is called what..
Thanks for providing some really important info, and for clarifying issues that most tutorials leave out. I admire you for having the balls to go beyond the usual fare, and actually teach something that gets to the heart of an issue, instead of just offering a one-size-fits-all solution. Cheers, homie.
High pass filter is for removing inaudible signals - not audible. (or rumble picked up from machinery or traffic etc.) If the waveform changes from phase shift as much as the waveform does in the video - than the frequency it is set is definitely too high. On a voice track, like the one used in the video, the sound of the voice should not be affected.
I'm a beginner who works with a professional musician, recording artist, producer and studio owner. He works on the national stage, so to speak. As I have been applying my learnings, the first thing he does when he sees my mix is take off all the EQ, especially the HP filters. I tell him, "but all the courses and UA-cam videos say to HPF pretty much everything but the kick and bass to eliminate unuseful low end that causes muddiness. " He said, but I never understood, "that just complicates your mix." I never understood it and thought maybe it is because he came up on tape machines, analogue tracking, etc. - ole school. But this video is very eye opening.
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The highpass thing really depends on the kind of music that you make. On electronic music I even highpass the different layers of distorted bass sounds and replace the low end with a pure sine. So when I mute the kick and the sine bass there is nothing below 80Hz. That way the subwoofer gets pure sine waves. Subs love sine waves, you know :-)
How much do you high-pass your bass?
Totally agree.
With every genre it's an issue use plugin doctor and just see when u boost and low cut.. Absolute mess. That's why edm sounds like crap.. Overprocessed over equied use instead filters if u want to get rid of bass or highs
That’s completely unnecessary. Taken to the extreme, a distorted bass is approximately a square wave. A square wave is just a sum of sinusoidal components. The fundamental, e.g 50 Hz, and then the third, fifth, seventh etc. harmonic. So with crossovers in the sound system and everything, what you really should be saying is: subs won’t be reproducing anything but sine waves, even when feeding distorted bass to the system
sure, but there's the possibilty you're fukcing with the phase alignment of the bass.
"Do not do anything by default."
Best advice for all artists.
So by default he meant dont use the same high pass settings all the time?
I'm newbie in EDM. Recently I found myself doing default stuff.
I used a lot of EQs, filters, compressors probably on every channel. So, my CPU usage was extremely high. But the fun thing is, I opened my old projects up and deleted all the default stuff(except really necessary) and mixes started to sound better(or not worse).
Now I start to understand that mixing can't save bad track. But if it's good, proper mixing can seriously improve it.
True
if its a good enough mix, it doesn't even really need to be messed with in the master bus.
@@TheHardRage13 Someone correct me if I'm wrong but I believe he's talking about when people get in the habit of adding a high pass filter on every kick, bass, snare before they can even hear the mix. If it sounds like you need a high pass on a snare or hat, create a bus channel with your high pass instead of going to each individual track adding separate high pass filters.
'If you cut everything down there we get rid of a lot of energy.' - Yep!
Am I the only one who got the pun XD or there was no pun 😅
I actually found that using a low shelve cleans My tracks much more and removes mud much better than high-passing... I have tried this with the tracks of my first album which were poorly recorded and suddenly applying a low shelve cleaned My guitars and made them appear much more clearly in one move than applying a high-pass, a Bell at 220hz a low pass to remove hiss and a bell to Boost the highs, suddenly I could get almost the same tone on My guitars but sounding much more clearly and natural just by cutting the lows by ear with a low shelve. To me it was a Game changer
It's funny how the guy is just saying, "high passing is great, just use it properly" and everyone is getting butthurt. He is helping you all get a good mix. Phase issues are a new engineers nightmare. If a new engineer does it by default because some guy on UA-cam says to cut everything then they are gonna be beating themselves up wondering why their mix is falling apart.
It is great advice. If you are getting offended by a guy trying to help you out, maybe you need an ego check.
I’ve seen some videos from In the Mix recommending high passing above 20hz by default, is this okay? We don’t need anything below that because we can’t hear it, and I don’t want it removing headroom. Obviously I wouldn’t high pass like 80hz by default but is what I’m doing okay?
@@OK-ei7io honestly highpassing at 80 isn't bad in itself depending on the instrument. High-passing rolls down to 0 it doesnt cut at 80. That means cutting at 20 rolls down to 0 which only controls the very very low frequencies under 10 depending on the curve. I would say get an analyzer and see if there is any buildup down there. Download voxenga span. It is very helpful and free.
Check your mic's frequency response too. There is a good chance that your mic doesn't even pick up anything that low so cutting at 20 wouldn't really change anything unless there were a lot of artifacts down there.
If you want to adapt the cutting at 20 rule then do it on a master group channel or the actual master channel at the end. Messing with eq too much can mess up your phase which in turn can cause some big headaches in the future.
If you are using a synth, high-passing is only needed to shape the sound to clean it up and fit it in a mix by giving bass more room. If you record a vocal, high-passing can take out possible mic stand hits or low frequency pops from the "P" sound. If you are highpassing a guitar track you can literally pull it as far as you need to isolate it over the bass. For guitar just remember you want to feel some bass of the guitar to 1. Make the instruments feel like they're still in the same place and 2. So you can still feel the hit and body of the notes.
There is a lot of misinformation online from people copy and pasting mixing tips. The thing to remember about mixing is that there is no standard, no magic numbers and every genre, instrument and song needs different numbers. That is why learning by ear is so important.
High-passing is totally fine in any situation, just remember to always check your phase. If your phase is doing fine, go nuts with your high-passing just remember that lots of instruments benefit from having a balanced low end over having no low end. Send me a message if you'd like some advice for your specific situation.
Haha well said. I'm not surprised David is getting fed up. He is just trying to help and people are trying to shit on him. I guarantee his mixes are better than all these complainers combined.
Simp
@@OK-ei7io I sometimes even push it to 30 and it sounds ok but ye, humans can't really hear that sound but be careful and don't cut too much, I usually do that cut during the mastering stage, but cutting too much takes away a lot of the energy
I seriously did not know that EQs will cause phase shifting like that... that changes everything.
EDIT: Years later, after learning more.. it does not change everything lol This is one of those things that, while technically true, gets blown way out of proportion.
I learn a lot in 10 minutes
It doesn't really, we have been using minimum phase EQs for a 100 years with no problems!
Anybody who mixed on analog equipment will laugh at all this BS. The phase shift is what gives an EQ it's tone, it's the reason why we love certain EQs. Phase shift isn't a bad thing it's the mojo, you just have to know how to use it to your advantage.
MIXING DOESN'T HAVE RULES!
IT HAS GUIDELINES.
One rule should be: don't sound like shit. Bass drowning out everything else violates this rule, yet a lot of sound guys are stupid about it.
Bob LeGlob I am guy
@@bobleglob162 even if you sound like shit you may have bunch of followers came to listen to your "weird, but interesting" music
@@paulminter3511 any music you can't really hear can't be that interesting.
@@kbmsmania5053 why?
You gotta watch the entire video, or you'll never use a high pass again
Very good presentation. I'm guilty of the high pass thing.
"If you cut everything 'down there' you will lose a lot of energy."
As a male, I totally agree with that statement ;)
based and manpilled
'Don't mix by default' is a really good tip to keep in mind. Thanks for the info this is a great video!
"cut your mix's balls" - say it like it is dude! :-D
"Don't do anything by default" single greatest device I've ever heard
I’m a very amateur producer, so sorry if I’m doing something really wrong, but:
Is it okay to high pass below 20hz by default? We can’t hear those frequencies and I don’t want it taking up headroom, and I’m not mixing a genre where a lot of sub is beneficial. Obviously I wouldn’t high pass below 80hz or something by default, but is what I’m doing okay?
@@OK-ei7io yes you can!
Cut below 500hz said no one ever.
LOL.... let's kill our ears by cutting anything below 2k please so no one can hear music ever again. That is our goal as producers and musicians yeah? ROFLMAO
What about reverbs? Abbey roads cut below even 700 Hz as a default.
Officer Oink In reverbs I like to cut the low end pretty drastically, but that is an EQ on an EFFECT, not an original signal for a track. There is a huge difference in my opinion.
Jay M. Summers You never cut 1Khz and below from cymbals? Or layer instruments to create a new sound? Really there are countless uses for a hpf.
Officer Oink
"What about reverbs? Abbey roads cut below even 700 Hz as a default." ~ Officer Oink
I was just talking about reverb.
Of course I use the HPF on cymbals or anything that belongs in the 5k~ range.
I was just saying that anything that has reverb is generally going to be in the midrange to highrange spectrum.
Holy Shit, This is exactly the frustration i have with mixs. thinking i'm doing the right thing whith HPF. Can't wait to try it. I also remember bringing up an earlier version to grab a clip and thinkin. Shit the old one sounded better so now i'm trying to recreate that sound by removing plugins later. Now i just trash all plugs and start over with the current version ....who's with me on this one
Lost days doing this, stated again cropped al lot off stuff out and ended with a better mix!! phase issues are like chickens they all come home to roost.
Often, softening the lows with a gentle shelf is much more effective than high passing in my experience.
A cut in the low mids often fixes what u think is a low end problem. A cut in the high mids often fixes what u think if a high end problem. Forwhatever reason people think u can to hp and lp everything and it sounds awful.
@@Jupiter1423 yeah i believe its called mirrored EQ, taking from a region adds to the region next to it, like cutting in the low mids like 200 - 400 hz helps a lot the mid highs sound clearer, so you dont need to boost it.
@@ericktellez7632 i honestly focus on sourcing so i barely use eq or compression anyways
@@Jupiter1423 I'm in the same boat -My goal is always to EQ as much as possible with the mics anyway. Ideal for me is pull up the faders and have that be the mix. Done. Buuut -I'm a big fan of some parametric EQ, for sure it really brings the mix to another level -Especially if you're working with less than ideal mics...
I've had a sneaky suspicion of this for years, but every single video I've ever seen regarding mixing has said that you should HP all tracks except kick and bass. I'm gonna try a different approach on my next mix and see how it turns out. Thanks for the advice man!
It's all about giving each instrument its own room to breathe and using your ears. Yes, hi-pass on a distorted rock guitar at the appropriate frequency to give the kick and bass their room to breathe in the low-end. This COULD mean cutting below up around 200hz, depending on the material and song, as always..
But let's say it's a clean hollow-body on a jazz track, cutting below 200hz would castrate the guitars and murder the sound of the track.
So yes, you'll almost always want to use a hi-pass and a lot of tracks, but as always, the frequency varies wildly. You just have to listen. "Where can I apply the hi-pass that doesn't cut off this instrument track's balls?"
As an example, there is never a reason in my mind where, in general, you'd need anything below 60hz on a rock guitar track, or below 300hz-ish hz in the hi-hat,
So yes, in general, hi-pass on almost everything. No sense in mixing 24 tracks of mic rumble stacking on top of each other turning the entire track into stale, low-end mud.
I understand cutting extremely low frequencies such as
What about let's say a high piano sound? or claps and hi hats? I cut them just still they start to sound thin then back off is that hurting my sound?
cut what? u didn't say.
Idiots.
@@hjon5988 try taking them all off and comparing. If it sounds better, then sure. I prefer really thin and airy hihats so I always highpass them, but it’s completely an artistic choice.
There's a lot of great advice and useful information in this vid, but I think the problem is perhaps a bit over emphasized.
High-passing is imho still the best tool to shape the low end of your mix and actually help the low end to sound more punchy and pronounced. Yes, phase shifts are a consequence, but it's a very natural one that is not necessarily something to worry about too much. I pretty much never use linear phase EQ because I think it tends to replace a (usually non-) issue with something that's more problematic and unnatural, but ymmv.
If I start EQ-ing, cutting super low frequencies that have no real musical information is typically the first thing I do on pretty much any track. Often even the kick drum.
If done right, it makes the low end sound fatter and the whole mix louder as a bonus. Adding a low cut at 80Hz or something doesn't really remove anything below 80Hz, a HPF there just shapes what's going on below (and around) there and can actually emphasize a low frequency range while attenuating unnecessary rumble at once. For example: If you want to make 60Hz more pronounced for your kick to make it fatter, add a high-pass filter at 60Hz; if it's not fat enough make the EQ slope steeper (it'll cut more below 60 and emphasize around 60 more).
"Don't do anything by default" is fantastic advice in general of course, but high-passing is perhaps not the best example to make that point.
It's not a myth and more like 25hrtz
The trick is to use a gentler slope on the HP so the low end cut is gradually blended into the higher frequencies. Try a single pole (6db/oct) HP and watch your mixes instantly improve.
I do happen to high pass almost every track and I get my mixes sounding loud, full and clear using this technique.
I have more recently been using a lot of 6db hp. It’s nice how high you can cut above the fundamental before it’s apparent to the ear.
Don’t know why but I love that linear phase ringing sound.
More of an 8/9db per octave guy myself, but I agree haha
"If you can't hear it, you can't mix it." That's the quote of the day.
I got the LoCut advise from a mastering engineer who has a name in the industry. His name is Friedemann Tischmeyer. He published one of the first mixing in the box books years back. You can read it there.( F. Tischmeyer, Internal Mixing, pp. 142; 206) He suggests exactly what you call bullshit. Locut on everything that is not Bass or Bassdrum. And to do it multiple times even. Up to four locut instances for vocals eg. On the microphone, on the pre amp, on the individual channel and on the vocal group channel again. Acoustic guitars in case you just want the hi end can take locut at around 250 Hz (cf p142 as well) The only reason that you instead have to call it b.s. is the phase shifts that you may encounter. Hello? Every non linear phase eq will have this "problem" Thats why there are linear phase eqs on the market if you want one. But in the vast majority of cases we do not even want one!!!! We want the phase shifts, my friend. Examples of famous non linear phase eqs wanted? Manley Massive Passive, Pultec, etc
I have seen the reference list of artists that Tischmeyer mixed or mastered. And he is also a known adviser of broadcasting international on the mere technical aspect of audio and if I remember it correctly was on the team of the EBU that provided the new loudness industry standards. In short he is an acclaimed audio expert.
I benefitted a lot from the locut advice. My bass section became not only more defined but also more powerful without the mud from the other tracks.
I do not know your name or your reference lists of artists that you have mixed. Just shouting bullhit on youtube is not enough to shake trusted mixing techniques followed by many.
Perfectly right. I absolutely don´t know what is the point of your video. When you say don´t hipass everything except for bassdrum and bass by default, it is the exact opposite of what Tischmeyer says, when he suggests exactly that BY DEFAULT. That is MY POINT.
One thing for reconciliation: There is some good advice in your video, but it is hidden, because you create the impression that you call locutting everything other than bass and bassdrum bullshit. Which it is definitely not.
The good advice is varying the locut point. Even more so because some eqs have a hump before the cutting point. But don´t forget, the locut that is built in in the mic, is always fixed. Some pre amp locuts are also. I used them anyway. The benefit is far greater than the "damage" done.
And I dont also criticize the multi mic situation where grouping before locutting is useful.
Yes you are so right Mister Willi. This clearly a click bait video to make himself feel important
Willi Schirwa I think doing it multiple times may be like using serial compression, a few 12 db/oct cuts may do less damage than a super steep cut
Willi Schirwa wer ist Tischmeyer? Hab sein Buch selbst und finde es war rausgeschmissenes Geld.
Even if someone with reputation says you need to do something by default, doesn't necessarily mean that. I find it very, very odd to suggest that you absolutely need to high pass everything but the bass and the bass drum. The frequency content of a track depends on so many things that it's virtually impossible to make rules to how to eq it!
It depends on the instrument itself (even two of the same kind are likely to sound different) and how it's played, the type of mic that was used, and in what kind of room, from which distance and angle... The factors are so many that everything just depends.
Yes, in many cases high passing does help, and that's why mics and preamps have the option. But there's a reason they also have the option to turn it off!
Basically every mixing decision should have a purpose. I’ve been mixing for almost 10 years and I just learned to stop using plugins just to try and make the plugin shine when it should be the song that shines. I have so many fancy plugins that I automatically reach for them and put them on mixbuses but I tried a test exporting with all plugins then taking most of them off that didn’t serve a specific need and volume matching and I was shocked at the percentage of songs that sounded better when I took off a lot of plugins. Adding plugins just because they are nice will most likely not improve it. So i’d say the biggest thing I’ve learned as an engineer is to only make decisions based off of need and not by default like you said. Great advice.
As a Mastering engineer for almost 25 years and mastered and technically reported over 650 albums, I would like to comment that I double HPF, once with the analog chain and further, in digital domain, around 25/35 Hz because there is almost nothing really musical down there. For the rare cases of LFE, this very last octave usually eats a lots of headroom and does not add musically. Also, concerning HPF filters, the phase shift above its Fc is minimum. We have to have an eye and ear in what the phase shift that shall be messing in the frequency zone prior to Fc.
Hm. I get where you are coming from but I have made the opposite discovery.
When reference-listening to American rap records like 50 Cent I was kinda baffled when I saw that there were lots of things going on below 30 Hz, and when I lowpassed them the music lost it's punch.
Low cut below 80 to 130Hz is common live mix at outdoor locations. Especially on mics. it carried over into studio for a group of pros.
This is Invaluable video. As most of David's are. Common sense. Seeing the waveform phase shift was life changing lol.
I'd definitely be interested in hearing your thoughts on pre-ringing in linear phase EQ
While I never just high-pass at set frequencies, I have been high-passing almost everything but kick and bass, as recommended by so many. It turns out I was high-passing too much on many of the other instruments. After watching this video, it makes perfect sense to me. Take out a few db if you need to, but don't just lop off the entire spectrum of all your instruments in that range. D'oh! Thanks for the eye-opening info. :)
samething, but with electronic music.
Why not use HPFs to cut out much of the woofy, useless-in-the-mix sound that chews up your headroom? Particularly on mid-range instruments such as guitar amps - HPFs on your tracks can help clean up unnecessary low end that is covering up your bass and kick drum. That's the theory I've always worked under, and its never made my mixes thinner in a non-musical, non-helpful way.
I think what he is saying is that you shouldn't use a HPF for every instrument. He is talking about people that don't have the capacity or equipment to record live instruments correctly.
Yes, use the HPF on instruments that are meant to be in the mid/high range; I think he is just saying that you shouldn't overuse the HPF and never stick to a standard of using it on every instrument because you don't have the proper tools to record your low end instruments effectively.
Every session that you are responsible for mixing/mastering on a professional level should be approached in a way that has many variables, and use the HPF as a tool when you see a certain abnormality. Use your judgment instead of some rule book that will limit your success.
Chill out bro, it sounds like he really knows what he is talking about.
You should render hpf and move the clip to put inphase... Thats the way i keep the correlation betwen clips but always is easy not to hpf the instrument jajajja
News flash: Guitars go down to 80hz.
Finally someone said it. Energy is important, just because you don't see doesn't mean you don't feel it. This can really save you years of headaches from mixing.
No phase shift if you use FIR filters.
very interesting stuff about HFPs and phase shifts in multi-mic setups like live drums. watching this one a few times so it sinks in
ITS BECUSE YOUR ARE USING LINAR !!!!! TRY TO USE natural phase !!!! DONT USE ZERO LATENCY OR LINIAR
I cut everything below 10kHz.
lpmaskman I do the same, but at 20khz. You’ve heard my songs before you just don’t know it.
@@godofspacetime333 what the hell does that mean lol
Man! They're making the EDM/HOUSE music boomy as phuck nowadays.. The kicks almost burst your speakers without adding any bass to the song at all....
It's the best way to neuter your mix. Haha
I think that most of the time artists forget the nature that comes from recordings, there's proper rich harmonics that should be up, I'm completely agree with "don't do anything by default" that's a huge trap that make you lose your human touch while mixing.
Ok I won't do it. Gosh man!
Lmfao
From someone who has done a lot of work mixing live, I do high pass anything I can get by with as it helps to minimize stage rumble etc. But yes in studio situations it's not always ideal as it's properly acoustically treated. best bet, set the highpass cutoff to something that you don't hear the change from said instrument or other audio source.
some good advice here. I haven't really seen a whole lot of bad advice since I learned what bad advice was, lol, because I don't need a tutorial on some things like sidechaining or something now. Using my ears has been the solution to my real problems. You can hi pass a lot of things and it be a huge improvement. You can do the same things on another song and it sounds terrible. Every track is different and it's just a matter of treating the problem areas at first, then boosting what needs it, and not all things need boost either. You nailed it on the head when you said "BY DEFAULT". "Default" mixing is mindless.
cutting low end works for two reasons. FIrst, in a home studio, at the hobbyist level, most folks are using directional dynamic mics. These will probably be choked up on the sources like drums or guitars quite close. So they have unnatural bass boost from proximity effect.
Second, you like to feel the air move? Fine, but most playback systems are not going down to 20hz. You can only take 80hz and up for granted.
btw always cut 400hz.
There is no musical frequencies below 40hz i prefer usually cut them
Ali Can Vatanperver but u can feel them
You have phase problems in the kick and subkick section..before mixing try to group all of ur tracks in 5 or 6 group channels and mix them starting from the kick and bass groups..to avoid phase cancelation in kicks find the start of the kicks' waveforms and make them start together (at the same phase) for the first miliseconds...the tricky part of a mixing is to use correct your monitors in ur room.what this guy says in this vid is correct..if your mix sounds boomy you go to bass or kick or whatever is between 20 and 200 hz and eq not everything but only the annoying band of Hz that makes your mix boomy by setting the Q of your EQ to a max level(like resonance)so you can easily find the area of the mix that destroys the whole mix !!
I've been doing the same low cut EQ to all elements except kick and bass in all the mixes I've done so far. At the end of the day, my mixes were always messing up. I think the reason is clear lol. thank you very much
There are fundamental frequencies for every type of instrument, there are charts available to see what those are. Use them to know where you can cut off low end without destroying the fundamental frequencies.
sub separation is important though
What does sub separation mean? Can you explain me, bro?
Paralysis for analysis...shit is too technical...just mix for feeling not for math period!! Fuck it if it clip long as the final mix and master doesn’t clip
Great video. Everybody’s high-passing every track, while on the other side everything sounds harsh af. I’m doing more High-Cuts than High-Pass.
@1:30 No. It comes from old mixing desks. Most good mixers had a lowcut button on every channel and most any mixing engineer would cut sources he didn't need to have low end.
Not to say your video doesn't make a point, but low cuts have been a part of mixing way before people started mixing in the box.
Thank you very much. This was a very useful tutorial. I've been making these mistakes for a while now.
Guys, I just did this test in protools as Audiosuite and as an insert recording to another audio track using the FabFilter Q2 at zero latency and with the EQ3, and in all cases the phase did not change, certainly not to any point where it would be out of phase with anything else. Any thoughts? I've never seen this issue raised by anyone of the "big guys".
Hello..I mostly do hip hop and edm. I rarely use real instruments. Will using hpf on these instruments will cause phasing issues or just real instruments where you record with multiple mics?
Also what do you think of hpf vocals? Is it better to cut some low frequency out using hpf or just do like a small dip on the eq?
***** thank you for taking time to answer my questions. I was really confused about this and was getting different answers. I never use to eq the low end of virtual instruments till recently. I noticed that my beats were just muddy but now i noticed they are alot clearer. I still need time to perfect it but its getting there.
Who high passes at 200-400hz? And yes, most stuff below 60hz on most things besides bass and drums is just garbage.
Wow, this is stuff no one talks about!
you're kinda all over the place with this video like get to the point. almost feels like you're making things more complicated
Also, if you agree with this, remember to hipass your compressor detection range, if you want to have it behave according to the audible audio.
Cool video. I was wondering why you have to cut low fq, just because.
Great tip, this is prob one of those things i used to do all the time, and i acatuallty tought it sounded better when i didnt low cut, but since all those producers from future music where sayin it, i just did it, haha, but i stoppet after i accidentally removed all my eq from my busses, and noticed the track i was working all of a sudden became so much fuller and fatter, and this video just confirms that yes, Low end is absoloutly necesarry
Bass frequencies are hungry for headroom in the digital world. In a dense mix I see no sense sacrifacing it for stuff that doesn't necessarily represent anything useful about the instrument of interest.
Wow, the most solid 12 mins of mix advice I've had the pleasure of listening to!! Thank you, you rock!!
Dude, when I saw the video title, I was prepared to not agree with you because I do a lot of high pass (I find it very useful when doing live sound engineering) but your reasons and explanations are valid and make good sense. You opened my eyes, even though I kinda knew this but had gotten myself into the "high pass by default" mode. Thanks for a great video, you got yourself a subscriber!
Cheers mate! I'll be watching more of your stuff soon!
Shit, so you stand a chance of messing up your phase by high passing after phase alignment (something generally done very early)... that's damn important to know! Some of my bass guitar tracks have DI, distortion and fuzz running simultaneously, through hardware... that could easily end up with the phase going out without me realising I'd fucked up! Top advice man, cheers
Awesome TIP for the studio! But not so much in the Live sound world. Yes there can be the same problems in the live sound world but you almost have to hipass on the instruments that do not need certain frequencies just to control low end feedback. But in the live situation you have so many anomolies working against you like the room, the sound system , sub-harmonic distortion, stage volume etc. GREAT VIDEO and it is so true and is what I do in the studio.. but as a live engineer it just has to be used more! Thanks and Cheers!
home boy spoke abt studio, and u up here bringing up live shit.
y'all always got some smart to say.
like u think we dont know the difference between live and studio.
man, i hate ppl like u trying to always add some smart shit just to be seen or heard.
lol dont hate me i speak the truth.
love all of yall
Something to do with the Granularity of the System.
Also this hpf everything is more important in live....
i think it also has something to do with the HPF notching certain higher frequency range (especially in zero latency mode, i think FabFilter has that video)and making your mix sound weaker...
Pink Floyd would fire this guy as their engineer in a heartbeat. Lol
I’ve been a sound engineer since 1981.
Why
Untreated rooms are usually Bass / Boom Heavy, so when you take your mix out the room it usually results in Disapearance of the bass
the lowest string on a guitar has about 80 hz in standard tuning so why should i not be cutting everything below it?
on guitars... you definitely need 80hz.
Lol
Not in a full band mix
not in a calvin harris track
It depends what the guitars are tuned to. If for example they are tuned to standard E then a HPF set to around 80Hz (The bottom E string is 82.41Hz) is appropriate. Always think of the relative pitch of frequencies.
not always
This was almost like a slap in the face = - = I will look at EQ from a new perspective
Nice information.
I would be interested in a "pre ringing" issue video tho
How do i say it??..Clean up the bullshit! LOL
im so damn confused. Beat school teachers like busy works say that you should cut out anything that isnt necessary
Yeah ive kind of realized that. Music production is pretty much all preference, the professionals have just been in the game for too long and know certain master secrets. I have serum, decapitator, and fl 12. Dont mind the beat that is on my channel already (not properly mixed). I will be uploading beats regularly starting this week.
I only record acoustic guitar and vocals (together) and always high pass both because of what I've seen on UA-cam! It's even the first thing I do! :(
MixbusTV Thanks man, good video!
I must say that I respectfully disagree with a lot of what you are saying. Cutting/eq-ing does indeed shift the phase and the correlation between multi-micing will be affected but it's really not that much of an issue if you just check your correlation with each eq adjustment that you make. Removing the low-end "energy" from one mic whilst leaving the other intact can make for very interesting sonic dynamics. Besides that, some mic signals will be fatter/smaller/boomier/thinner than the others, and will have more/less frequency ranges. One should always check the correlation between mics and be aware of the problem. Bussing 2 signals together and treating them the same does indeed make for easier handling but sometimes you cannot/will not get the results needed. Alone with a snare drum: you might want to eventually compress the hell out of the bottom mic. This too will greatly affect the correlation. You might even have to flip phase or use a phase alignment tool but you should not be afraid to try. You are right that when your room acoustics are not truthfully letting you hear the results then you cannot know if what you are doing is right or wrong and to that I can only say: If you are not sure, then leave it alone. And even better: go to a real studio and let the Pros handle it or at least watch and learn :)
That being said, great tutorial and keep up the good work!
+MixbusTV My disagreement was only that you implied one should "never" do those things when, in fact, if you know what you are doing, is perfectly fine and quite standard - like eq-ing multi mic recordings. For a "newbie" maybe less :)
Doesn't high passing open up more space in the mix to give it to the instruments that rly need it?
Which instruments do u normally high pass?
Larry Tate My understanding (besides what you've mentioned) is that various sounds contain low frequency energy that's not needed nor wanted in that sound. These low frequencies build up (or sum) and can make your bass muddy or difficult to mix. How well this technique works or it's detriment-( also, how much you cut) comes down to the quality and type of HPF's used. Some HPF's will butcher your sound- so finding the best types is key IMO.
I think people are right about it being genre specific. In a metal band doing more brutal styles like Death Metal, you really need to make sure that none of the instruments get in each other’s way, so you need high and low pass filters to prevent interference, and especially because usually the frequencies you’re cutting is just sound.
I do think that I will keep most of the things here in mind though. Good video.
I hear “clean up the bullshit”, I click like on the video
I agree. Low end needs to be alive with tension,,,,like a water ballon full of water which vibrates under the tension of the balloon. I believe the trick is to manage the frequency population for low end / cutting so 10 items are not sharing or/// competing for that frequency
Petar Froggpond
Get Better Recordings By Going For The Big Wins
We all want a better recording. Who doesn’t? But in our pursuit of great recordings we ironically spend way too much money and effort on things that don’t make a huge difference.
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That's why u also need a sub woofer monitor but these sub sounds are more for movies or u get a nasty pressure in your songs if u dont cut too much
Very useful!Thanks for info.
*****
I recently mixing few songs and tips from your videos helping me a lot.
I like many videos from you guys.
Best regards.
how and why I do it (sry for english btw):
I usually use a lowpass and pull it down till the point were the sound loses every bit of character and only the rumble mess stays. This can be at 200, 80 or even 50hz. After I do that, I just change the lowpass to a highpass.
I do that as default on literally anything that isn't bass or kick ect.
why id say this is important? because let's say you want to put a comp on your bus. You dont want those frequencies to stack up and influence the result of your comp. remember, just because you can't hear it, doesn't mean its not there anymore. In other words, cutting all low end by default is (imo) the right way, as long as you really only take out the unnecessary parts in the spectrum. I hope that made sense and I'm open to critique if any of you have a better way of approaching it.
Pretty much everything about that is messed up, first how you "decide" what to take out, by only listening the low end, you're eliminating masking and that will always make you cut wrong. Second it sounds like you're cutting by listening in solo, again, wrong, nobody cares about your tracks in solo, this is not math, is mixing and mixing means elements and their low end need to co-exist and BLEND, glue together, it's not a puzzle were you cut one thing to make space for the other. Third, your reasoning for cutting is wrong again, you cut to avoid low end to trigger a compressor? That's what sidechain HPF are for, available in pretty much every compressor out there. Use that, problem solved.
Forth, the point of the video is NOT to avoid cutting, is to avoid parallel filtering.
Fifth, and arguably most important, you say "if you can't hear it", that means your monitoring system can't reproduce it, which means, you can't mix it, hence you eliminate it? That's exactly how skimpy mixes are made.
But hey, you like your results? Keep doing it
My god. There are no rules. 🐏
There are no rules, sure, but there are mistakes you can make while mixing that might be overall detrimental to the sound of your mix. This dude is raising a ton of great points for producers of any kind.
Yup
know them to break them...
There are no in art. There are rules in physics tho
VERY TRUE
Oh God... Of course you shouldn't just do something by default. BUT... here's the catch: learn your freaking instruments or use a damn Carnegie chart! If your instrument has no sound whatsoever below a certain frequency, you should definitely cut everything below it. The lowest key of a piano for instance is at 27.5 Hz. There's no sound below that and you shouldn't leave any frequencies in that range get in your mix (electronic hum, static, room noise etc) because that's not "low energy" or "balls", that's useless noise that you might not even hear (human ears don't pick up frequencies below 16-20 Hz) but it will add up to the rest and eat away your headroom. A 4 string bass goes as low as 41Hz. There is and shouldn't be anything below that! Whatever is there, is not musical sound. So cut it for God's sake... A normally tuned 6 string guitar has nothing useful under 82 Hz. Don't apply "one size fits all" solutions and certainly don't cut every channel at the same frequency, but learn where the lowest useful frequencies are for each and every instrument and cut below that!
I have to assume that that's what you mean, being a pro (unlike me, I am a musician who does this as a hobby) but that's not how it came through to me. I probably misunderstood it, but I still felt the need to make it clear
I actually found out about this issue the hard way, my mixes were really dull and muddy, so I realized that before I started doing all this EQ's everywhere, the track was sounding much better. so that being said, my question now is, do I apply low/high cuts just based on what my ear tells me? is there a "rule" or parameter that I could follow? thanks for the tutorial, I'm subscribing.
+MixbusTV isn't eq just messing with phase when using audiosuite on specific regions? A regular insert on the track strip will also do this to your waveforms?!
just got here and it's a very good video... but ***** , let me disagree (respectfully) with you on one single thing you said: I totally agree with the main point: don't hipass by default just because someone said so... but... a lot of materials simply don't have information in Low frequency range, but that area can (in some cases) add eletric interferences for example.... take a trumpet or a flute for example, there will be absolutely nothing "usable" in Low or even Low-Mids... the fundamental note itself starts at a higher point, and harmonics are generated from there on... never "backwards"... Do you disagree? Once again, congratulations! i subscribed!
nice! I'm watching your big drum room with HDelay video now... excellent stuff! Congrats once again!
Meh id rather take warren hurts view on it
I only cut below where the instrument actually is... You can even check where that is with an LPF, and what is there is rumble. So when you cut, you take nothing but rumble out. Usually its pretty low frequency.
But any bass mixing i'm going to use more subtle band pass and low shelves.
Worst advice is that you cut 80hz on guitars, becasue that's the lowest note: nope you listen, many guitar sounds have sub frequencies and cabinet resonance.
The other worst advice was to LO PASS...wtf...?? Kill all harmonics? that's the way to a dull recording!
Also linear phase EQ is much better, if you can get one... which solves that other problem.
There's a huge noticeable difference with linear phase, the 'balls' are not lost nearly as much as standard EQ.
Still, pull down an LPF to 80 hz....a lot might be rumble and mush if you are doing this, just don't know why it needs to be there.
agree very much about eqing mics together. You have them to mix a reasonable eq just by balance. There would only be some rare occasion some noise or rattle occurs on one you'd notch a single one. In which case if the glitch was so bad, you'd probably just scrap that mic track and solo the other one.
I think its sometimes a good source of advice, that gets lots along the lines.
Like 3:1 rule...people keep telling me to do it to match phase alignment form single sources by making a sweet spot where the speed of sound arrives complimentary: that's not what its for and physically impossible! -it is just to reduce spill when using multiple sources.
This is kind of the same, you are not meant to hipass into the actual audible range of the instrument!
It sure sucks when your violin is causing weird rumbling of the player's foot tapping, or a nearby engine is vibrating into the mix.
***** I think a good rule is:
-make sure you can't hear the cut you are making in isolation.
-but when you monitor with a low pass, its should make that rumble, and that sub frequency masking disappear and get stronger bass. The higher frequency the instrument the more this is going to work tbh. I don't really use instruments in the box though, everything is through an amp or acoustic that i do, so its essentially noise and subharmonics, i don't know if i'd apply it to a soft synth so much.
Just absolutely wow over here, this is the actual information that my confused brain needed right now.. I've been doing it the mainstream youtube guide way, and always been in wonder why the track sounds weak after mixing. Thank you. Please make a video on how you would go by attacking such issue. This is surely useful info!
Same issues here. And found the solution thanks to this serious explanation.
Can someone clarify this once and for all: when you cut the low frequencies in an EQ - thats called HIGHpass? And vise versa i LOWpass? If so, when i automate logic's stock EQ, i can choose low cut frequency for ex. and it will cut off the low frequencies, and not the high ones. Im still confused abou what is called what..
MixbusTV aah ok that makes sense. I didnt think of the word pass as in "let through", thought it was "you pass on them"
@@SingerinEX "I'll pass on those low frequencies"...HA!!!!!! =)
Thanks for providing some really important info, and for clarifying issues that most tutorials leave out. I admire you for having the balls to go beyond the usual fare, and actually teach something that gets to the heart of an issue, instead of just offering a one-size-fits-all solution.
Cheers, homie.
100% agree
High pass filter is for removing inaudible signals - not audible. (or rumble picked up from machinery or traffic etc.) If the waveform changes from phase shift as much as the waveform does in the video - than the frequency it is set is definitely too high. On a voice track, like the one used in the video, the sound of the voice should not be affected.
Do i always have to use a high pass filter on my vocals?
I'm a beginner who works with a professional musician, recording artist, producer and studio owner. He works on the national stage, so to speak. As I have been applying my learnings, the first thing he does when he sees my mix is take off all the EQ, especially the HP filters. I tell him, "but all the courses and UA-cam videos say to HPF pretty much everything but the kick and bass to eliminate unuseful low end that causes muddiness. " He said, but I never understood, "that just complicates your mix." I never understood it and thought maybe it is because he came up on tape machines, analogue tracking, etc. - ole school. But this video is very eye opening.
I am also for less EQ - better sound. :) EQ makes drastic change of samples.
This is exactly how I feel
nice one people need to learn how to critical listen sadly not all musicians can do this!
Iove the video! instant subscribe!
***** me too, thank you very much sir!