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Forums - Mixing & FX
Subject: brittle mixes
Original Message Date: 18-Oct-02 @ 11:46 PM - brittle mixes
argh, I've got digital bite. A term I've heard about for harsh brittle mixes done a digital recording setup.
I've been noticing that a lot of my recordings are really brittle. I notice that the uppermids and highs mix together in this weird way causing a digital harshness that irritates the hell out of me. On a low volume everything sounds good--nice and smooth. But once I turn the volume up, ouch, my ears begin to bleed.
I think my problem is that I dont give enough headroom or make enough headroom by cutting off and rolling off frequencies. But this all makes me wonder... I use a digi 001 and I use it's mic pre's and inputs. Could there be any link in the 001 casuing a harsh sound? Or is it that I'm not knowledgable (sp?) enough in getting a good sound that mixes good together.
I hate that feeling when I turn up some music (on the same monitors) and get absolutely no harshness or bite. bums me out.
Anyone have any ideas on what I could do or what to improve with?
I've been noticing that a lot of my recordings are really brittle. I notice that the uppermids and highs mix together in this weird way causing a digital harshness that irritates the hell out of me. On a low volume everything sounds good--nice and smooth. But once I turn the volume up, ouch, my ears begin to bleed.
I think my problem is that I dont give enough headroom or make enough headroom by cutting off and rolling off frequencies. But this all makes me wonder... I use a digi 001 and I use it's mic pre's and inputs. Could there be any link in the 001 casuing a harsh sound? Or is it that I'm not knowledgable (sp?) enough in getting a good sound that mixes good together.
I hate that feeling when I turn up some music (on the same monitors) and get absolutely no harshness or bite. bums me out.
Anyone have any ideas on what I could do or what to improve with?
Message 11/38 19-Oct-02 @ 09:27 PM - RE: brittle mixes
you're just jealous because you've got a stupid k2k instead of an intelligent pro-one. inside, you can feel the difference. outside, you can see the difference. inside, stop. inside. see the difference. dragons, the policeman knew, were supposed to breathe fire.
(yeah.. you can hear the difference, even on something like a dr110 clap)
(yeah.. you can hear the difference, even on something like a dr110 clap)
Message 13/38 19-Oct-02 @ 10:56 PM - RE: brittle mixes
I usually build the sound of my mixes off the atmosphere of the drums. If they sound dark or if they sound bright. I tend to the sound of the drums. So if its bright I usually leave high end wide open. But if it's dark I roll off the high end frequencies.
I think it all cumulates as I put things together. One reason is that when I solo a channel and turn it loud, I do not hear the brittleness or harshness that I originally heard at a full mix play. So I'm thinking that it might be the relationship between the two sounds that's causing that 'obnoxious' sound.
I dunno, sometimes I just find my mixes sounding like ass when turned loud. I even tried rolling off the top end 12 - 18k and still got this dry nasty sound but without the harshness. yet again, I'm still bummed.
How do I record? Synth -> Boss VF-1 -> Digi 001 -> Focusrite D3 Compressor Plug-in (which is used on everything except drums). That is pretty much how I do it... and also for my eqing, I use Waves 2.3 and Opcode Fusion Filter.
So any tips on getting it right? Should I eq every channel until I find a good high-volume mix? Or should I just eq the master fader?
One thing to note, is that I use distortion A LOT!!! Is there anything I should know about eqing distortion
I think it all cumulates as I put things together. One reason is that when I solo a channel and turn it loud, I do not hear the brittleness or harshness that I originally heard at a full mix play. So I'm thinking that it might be the relationship between the two sounds that's causing that 'obnoxious' sound.
I dunno, sometimes I just find my mixes sounding like ass when turned loud. I even tried rolling off the top end 12 - 18k and still got this dry nasty sound but without the harshness. yet again, I'm still bummed.
How do I record? Synth -> Boss VF-1 -> Digi 001 -> Focusrite D3 Compressor Plug-in (which is used on everything except drums). That is pretty much how I do it... and also for my eqing, I use Waves 2.3 and Opcode Fusion Filter.
So any tips on getting it right? Should I eq every channel until I find a good high-volume mix? Or should I just eq the master fader?
One thing to note, is that I use distortion A LOT!!! Is there anything I should know about eqing distortion
Message 14/38 21-Oct-02 @ 01:50 AM - RE: brittle mixes
"Should I eq every channel until I find a good high-volume mix?"
each channel
its not the HIGH end thats the problem, man...its usually the mids/high mids that make stuff sound annoying
every tried a freq sweep to see where its comin from?
get a parametric EQ, narrow Q, set the gain high, (careful!) and then sweep the frequency...
the "bad" sound will jump right out at ya. You could do this on a mix, but...then you wouldnt know which sound(s) are the problem...
also a good way to find a sweetspot to BOOST, too
each channel
its not the HIGH end thats the problem, man...its usually the mids/high mids that make stuff sound annoying
every tried a freq sweep to see where its comin from?
get a parametric EQ, narrow Q, set the gain high, (careful!) and then sweep the frequency...
the "bad" sound will jump right out at ya. You could do this on a mix, but...then you wouldnt know which sound(s) are the problem...
also a good way to find a sweetspot to BOOST, too
Message 15/38 21-Oct-02 @ 09:56 PM - RE: brittle mixes
xoxox -- i _think_ you're overlooking an important issue...
"a 22k saw will record exactly the same as a 22k sine or anything. "
if we can only hear up to 20k, it doesn't matter what the waveshape of a 20k wave is -- all the harmonics (which would distinguish a sin from a saw from a square) will be 40k and up (since 20k is the fundamental)... thus they'll ALL sound like a sin...
i think.
raigan
"a 22k saw will record exactly the same as a 22k sine or anything. "
if we can only hear up to 20k, it doesn't matter what the waveshape of a 20k wave is -- all the harmonics (which would distinguish a sin from a saw from a square) will be 40k and up (since 20k is the fundamental)... thus they'll ALL sound like a sin...
i think.
raigan
Message 16/38 22-Oct-02 @ 02:29 PM - RE: brittle mixes
yep, that's right.
and i'm not doing the digital debate again
but according to nyquist, even 2 samples (at 44Khz) is enough to recreate the original sinewave _exactly_ (by post-conversion filtering, a required part of a D/A converter)...
and i'm not doing the digital debate again
but according to nyquist, even 2 samples (at 44Khz) is enough to recreate the original sinewave _exactly_ (by post-conversion filtering, a required part of a D/A converter)...
Message 17/38 22-Oct-02 @ 05:26 PM - RE: brittle mixes
that's a consequence of mixing to low... when you turn it up you always get thaty harshness as you are OVER compensating those frequencies at low volume to aid definition, but when it then is loud that definition becomes harsh at loud volume.
Message 18/38 23-Oct-02 @ 08:43 PM - RE: brittle mixes
aah but swan we're not just sensitive to sound with our ears, and the main point is that, if you follow my little 'point count' thing down, you're getting some pretty rough approximations of the true waveform (low distortion, hi fidelity, high distortion, low fidelity, jamaicans know) way down into the mids.
but still.. digital silence makes it all worthwhile imho
but still.. digital silence makes it all worthwhile imho
Message 19/38 23-Oct-02 @ 09:14 PM - RE: brittle mixes
not exactly... i don't want to get into too much; but that's not a problem at all with digital per se. it may be that you think you need a higher sampling frequency, but that's a different issue (and i have heard differing reports on whether a saw and sine at 20Khz are discernable... some who say they are, some who say they aren't. you need a lab oscillator to test this unfortunately so i've never tried it myself).
but: if the signal fits into the nyquist, it can be reproduced perfectly (with some caveats, yes there are some weird things going on in the higher octaves, but this isn't one of them).
if it doesn't fit into the nyquist, it won't be reproduced distorted, it just disappears. a 20Khz triangle will become a 20Khz sine when sampled on a 44.1Khz system; the 'distortion' is simply a removal of all harmonics outside the nyquist range, to do it without aliasing everything above 20Khz is filtered out beforehand. at 96K they will be slightly different; the 2nd harmonic at 40Khz will then be inside the nyquist and be samples; this will still look different from a typical sawtooth due to higher harmonics.
but: if the signal fits into the nyquist, it can be reproduced perfectly (with some caveats, yes there are some weird things going on in the higher octaves, but this isn't one of them).
if it doesn't fit into the nyquist, it won't be reproduced distorted, it just disappears. a 20Khz triangle will become a 20Khz sine when sampled on a 44.1Khz system; the 'distortion' is simply a removal of all harmonics outside the nyquist range, to do it without aliasing everything above 20Khz is filtered out beforehand. at 96K they will be slightly different; the 2nd harmonic at 40Khz will then be inside the nyquist and be samples; this will still look different from a typical sawtooth due to higher harmonics.
Message 20/38 23-Oct-02 @ 10:35 PM - RE: brittle mixes
so kilo, should I do what you said... turn it loud and tweak the eq?
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