Finding Your Low End Sweet Spot In Your Studio

Jesco Lohan has no shortage of information here. The guy’s brilliant. Check out any of his videos and he’s likely to reference his bass hunter technique. In short, you put a speaker in the front of your room on the floor, play some music with nice rich low end, then roll around your room in

The Four Compressors Types You Must Be Fluent Using

I honestly don’t really care about a specific brand/model, but more so the energy and character of the compression accomplished. Vibey The untransparent compressor in your stable. It slams, it crushes, it eats stank faces for breakfast. My go to? The vulfcomp by Goodhertz. Fast Quick, transient controlling, de-spike-ifying, king of wackamole. Keeps things in

What Sonarworks Does For My Studio

What is Sonarworks? A software platform that carefully guides you through measuring the frequency response of your studio with a reference mic, then gives you an EQ curve that “flattens” out the anomalies in your room. Here’s my studio’s frequency response before the Sonarworks correction curve (blue), then the correction curve itself (green). Room Response

What’s With The Air Gap Behind Sound Panels?

Properly deployed velocity based sound absorbers (the most common sound damping you’ll find) always have an air gap behind them. Why? The green line shows us a 6″ thick panel with NO air gap. The blue line shows us a 6″ thick panel with a 6″ air gap. **The higher the line is on the

How Do You Know When Your Mix Is Done?

Pretend you’re showing it to a trusted friend, someone who has a great set of ears. Before you hit space bar, what would you qualify? “Well, the bass player didn’t play very evenly.” “The drums weren’t recorded with much punch, so sorry things don’t hit very hard.” You will not be there to defend your

Vocal Ducking Ping Pong Texture Delays

If you asked me about three years ago if I relied upon reverb or delay to create “space and depth” within a mix, I would’ve said “80% verb, 20% delay”. And even then, the delay was mainly for lead lines. The tides have turned, especially for how I treat vocals. I’ve been heavily relying on

Optimizing Studio vs Live Speaker Systems

Studio Setup optimize speaker placement for best stereo imaging make system tonally balanced for one person at the mix position subs optional tune for tonal neutrality – AKA “flat response” only one industry standard mains configuration – L & R speakers, toed in at 60° Live System optimize speaker placement for best audience coverage (stereo

Some Clarity On Compression Attack Times

Spoiler Alert – there’s no “industry standard” dictionary definition for attack time in compression. My definition: The amount of time it takes for a compressor to complete its intended gain reduction once the detected signal crosses the voltage threshold. What Attack Time Is NOT: The amount of time the compressor waits to start compressing. A

Beware of Graph

The digital age has afforded us some nice big screens to analyze our music with. Plugin manufacturers like FabFilter and iZotope have put a TON of work into making their plugins not only sound fantastic, but look beautiful. Even though you and I work in an auditory field, intuitive visuals can heavily influence our workflow.

depth: A Prototype For My New Spatializer VST

The below video series by FabFilter and Dan Worrall (watch parts 1-3) inspired me to make a new plugin that simplified one of the last techniques used to give more stereo width. Depth Plugin It is VST only for now and you can get it here. Get the source code on GitHub. Why did you

Four Things I Learned From Putting My Bass Pedalboard On The Test Bench

The Test Use SMAART v8 run pink noise out of the reamp outputs of my interface into my bass pedalboard. Perform a transfer function (a mathematical comparison between a measurement and reference) and look at the impulse response, phase response, and magnitude response. Measurement Source – Reamp output 1 came out of Zen Tour, into

2020’s Rap Vocal Mix Chain

It’s a bit extra. But here we go, in order : ) airwindows PurestGain – Sets gain structure iZotope RX 6 De-Ess – Spectral setting, general de-ess duties airwindows Channel8 – SSL setting, drive at 100%. Gives some nice aggression Reaper ReaEQ – High Pass Filter around 120Hz, fine tune to taste soothe2 – The

Phase Flip or Polarity Flip?

Polarity flip, even though several professional console manufacturers have “phase flip” on their channel strips. **sigh** What’s the difference and why does it matter? Polarity Flip inverts the waveform of the incoming signal. Sound is a series of alternating positive and negative pressure waves. A microphone converts these waves into electrons, which is tracked by

Experimental Psychology Made My 3:1 Compression Rule

It’s easy to drown in granularity when working on a digital desk. On a Yamaha CL5 I can set the attack time on the channel strip compressor to 10ms, or 11ms. Maybe 12ms? There’s a stand in experimental psychology that focuses on JND – Just Noticeable Difference. My ear can’t hear the difference between an

Three Major Benefits of LCR Panning

LCR panning – primarily panning mix elements all the way left, center, or all the way right – is my jam for three reasons. Eliminates yet another source of decision fatigue. This is first in the list for a reason. I can write/produce already knowing where something will be panned in the mix (since I

Controlling Mix Reference Plugins In Reaper

Knowing I’m an Enneagram 9, reducing friction ANYWHERE in my workflow helps make sure I don’t come grinding to a halt. Above is an incredibly nerdy video walking you through the details. After a few frustrating hours of programming, I’ve come up with a sleek system to make mix referencing a breeze. I’m still convinced

Leveraging The Opposite of Phantom Center For Wider Mixes

Let’s establish some ground rules: Phantom Center – How your brain decodes hearing two copies of the exact same signal arriving at the same relative time to both ears. We put on headphones that play sound directly onto each ear, but (most) lead vocals feel like they’re sitting in front of us. Why not leverage

Analyzing Large Gear Purchases & Investing In Your Gremlins

I’ve had the privilege of speaking into several projects where decisions were being made on how to spend money on gear. A facility’s sound system upgrade, studio overhauls, production company purchases. A common thread keeps popping up: most want to solve the problems they’ve been having with one or two giant leaps. The mix isn’t

How To Unlock Your Most Powerful Audio Tool

What if you could unlock your most powerful audio tool by learning a few vocabulary words? Here’s the problem: most folks can notice and describe when a mix feels tonally unbalanced (too bright, muddy, harsh), but have no idea how to translate those adjectives into actions towards a better sound. EQ helps you achieve tonal

Should you cross-train as a live AND studio engineer?

Absolutely. David Epstein shows us in Range that specializing too early isn’t a head start, but a roadblock. Investing in adjacent disciplines to your craft only makes you sharper, not a laggard. A few examples from my career: Running a mastering company helps me get program loudness and peak management right when mixing for live

Using Softer Hands To Sound Louder

Gary Willis, legendary jazz bassist, blew my mind the other day. He asks you to fret with your index finger and start with zero pressure, then slowly press down on the string, plucking 8th notes as you go. At first the string’s muted by your lazy finger resting on top. A little more pressure gets