Equalizer (General)

Equalizer (General)

An audio Equalizer is used to adjust the frequencies of our instruments in order to achieve the best sound



Common mistake:
They overuse it. With no need. They use presets even if they don't need them

Don't use your EQ settings to one of your projects just because it was useful at an another project. That's silly.

The source is the most important thing to get a nice sound.

Of course you can fix the sound with EQ, but if the source sucks you'll end up tweaking and tweaking and recording again.

If you want a nice and clean sound spend some time to the source (microphones, amps etc).You will save much time later EQing.

And you don't need to use EQ just because you have it or you used it before.


Remember 2 basic things:
* Good sound in = Good sound out
* If it sounds good. It's good. Need no more tweaking.


Lets see some characteristics of an EQ in VST format:


In this photo we can see the Equalizer of the daw Reaper.



As you can see we have Frequency, Gain, Bandwidth and some faders.

* Frequency: Adjusts the frequency we want to work on.
* Gain: With gain we boost or decrease the volume of the selected frequency.
* Bandwidth (also known as Q): With large bandwidth we select a wide range of frequencies. With narrow bandwidth we select less frequencies.


You can see that we have some different slopes too.

* Band-pass filter: Selects a range of frequencies (usually works with Q)
* Hi-pass filter: Cuts low frequencies.
* Low-pass filter: Cuts high frequencies.
* High-Shelf: The curve of these filters level out at a specified frequency (high)
* Low-Shelf: The curve of these filters level out at a specified frequency (low)

Hi and Lo-Passings are deadly important for every recorded track and the whole mix indeed..For guitars, i'm blendind multiple (2 or maybe 3) cabinet impulses to achieve "unique" sound..Don't avoid from making cuts in the range between 1500-2000hz with a 10 or more Q setting, it obviously alters the distortion character..Cut or maybe boost like 5-6dB's to the taste

Hi guys

Just tip learned from a local engineer. (I'm sure some may know this!)

Try using a waves RDe-esser 1st in the chain for Guitar. Open the Plugin and activate the sidechain button. This allows you to dial directy into the unwanted hissy, ear piercing frequencies and is a good alternative to low-passing your tracks.

I mainly deal with metal so I generally high-pass guitars at around 80hz, depending on the amps etc...... If it hasn't enough balls I usually boost at 150hz with a Q of around 2.

I don't add much else as I concentrate on the sound going in. I rarely compress distorted guitar as I believe it can ruin the dynamic of an already awesome sound.

i am just a n00b on this, but i found compression on distorted guitars very useful to deal with the punchy bass sound of a low G or A.

if you eq this stuff, tell me how, for a lowcut on 80hz wont do.

@slammer: in my opinion sound always becomes worst if more than one impulse is used. so far I favour quad tracking with 2 different impulses on each side (1 per track)

wins0n wrote:

i am just a n00b on this, but i found compression on distorted guitars very useful to deal with the punchy bass sound of a low G or A.

if you eq this stuff, tell me how, for a lowcut on 80hz wont do.

@slammer: in my opinion sound always becomes worst if more than one impulse is used. so far I favour quad tracking with 2 different impulses on each side (1 per track)

if your purpose of compressing is to have tighter lows, multiband compression sounds like a good tip. Compressing only the low range and leave the mid and high range untouched

@ wins0n

I get rid of unwanted highs and lows like lows below 80hz and highs between 10-12khz. Apart from that I generally don't need to EQ as my sound going in is usually dialled. Your 70%-80% there already if your drums, guitars, bass, vocals etc sound great going in.

I found that multiband compression baffled me when I was a n00b!!!!! It can be good when used correctly though.