High/Low Pass Question

R

Robert W

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May 13, 2009
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Ok, by a miracle of modern science, and some very good "dumb it down" advice I got on Reaper's forum, I figured out how to import all my old songs that I recorded on Riffworks into Reaper for EQing.

Thanks to forum member CruzControl, I was able to get here,

http://i204.photobucket.com/albums/bb42/Robert7779/eq1.jpg

After some trial and error, I figured out how to apply the high/low passes, at least I think I did :D.

Here's the original. Linsten to: Shootreaper
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=1065508

Here's the riff after I cut everything below 100 and everything above 8000. I also cut 1dB at 400 and another 1dB at 550 I think. Listen to: Orange
USE SAME LINK AS ABOVE.

This is my very first try at applying high/low passes, so if you think it sucks, take that into consideration.

You can pretty much get what kind of tone I'm going for, although I'm probably going to tweak the tone a little, and maybe back off on the gain very slightly. Anyways, could someone please give me some advice on where to cut and at what dBs to do so at.

Thanks
 
Honestly the original tone sounds better. The problem is a guitar tone by itself is much different than a tone in the mix. The whole reason for hi and low passes are to either A) get rid of unwanted sound (like getting the kit out of the cymbals) or B) make an instrument not step on the other instruments' dicks (like guitar low end overpowering the bass).

So by itself, a hi/low passed tone may sound thin/weak etc. But it allows you to create more focus in the big picture (full band mix) on the frequencies that matter on said instrument. Make sense?
 
Uhhh, you didn't apply any High or Low Pass at all:confused:
Your EQ is totally flat, it's nothing doing anything.
 
Harry Hughes said:
Uhhh, you didn't apply any High or Low Pass at all:confused:
Your EQ is totally flat, it's nothing doing anything.
Click to expand...

Okey dokey.

Like I said, it was my first attempt at trying this.

As for it being "nothing doing anything" (not sure exactly what that means) I did cut everything below 100 and everything above 8000, so technically I was doing something, wasn't I.

As for it sounding "totally flat", well I was following your advice mostly, so....
 
zackpennington said:
Honestly the original tone sounds better. The problem is a guitar tone by itself is much different than a tone in the mix. The whole reason for hi and low passes are to either A) get rid of unwanted sound (like getting the kit out of the cymbals) or B) make an instrument not step on the other instruments' dicks (like guitar low end overpowering the bass).

So by itself, a hi/low passed tone may sound thin/weak etc. But it allows you to create more focus in the big picture (full band mix) on the frequencies that matter on said instrument. Make sense?
Click to expand...

Gotcha.

The purpose of the exercise was not to create the guitar tone itself, but just familiarize myself w/ the process.

As I understood it, cutting everything below 100 was, generally considered the thing to do for guitars, hence my doing so here. As for cutting above 8000, again, this was something I thought was SOP, but perhaps I'm mistaken?

Anyways, I was hoping to get a little more in the way of constructive criticism than "it sounds flat", but you can't always win them all, can you?
 
what Harry is saying is that the picture you posted has no Eq changes I think.

cutting above 8khz is not a written rule, actually it´s pretty rare to cut so low. some people don´t lowpass guitars at all, other lowpass beyond 10/12 khz, etc. And highpassing at 100 is more common, but the freq will vary a lot, depending a lot on the tuning. Many low tuned bands might highpass at 60hz, others might even go higher than 100 hz
 
You didnt low or high pass anything in the photo you sent .... it should look something more like this ....

high_low_pass.jpg


The blue represents the EQ Curve. This particular screen shot shows a cut of 15db at 100hz and 8000hz
 
:DThat wasn't a post of the actual setting I used. I just posted that pic to show what EQ I was using as a point of reference!:D

Here's the one I actually used,
EQ2.jpg


So I cut everything under 100, everything above 800, -1dB at 400, and -1dB at 800.
 
Robert W said:
Explain please.
Click to expand...

Well, the hp and lp are a bit too extreme, distorted guitars have a very big range of "useable" frequencies (it is distorted guitars we're talking about right? I haven't heard the clip in the OP, can't listen to anything here) and you're most likely cutting a big part of it off by limiting the guitar to such a narrow space. What tuning do you use? you should try setting the highpass to the lowest note just as a starting point, and move up or down slightly until it feels right enough. About the Lowpass, it's actually a matter of opinion and as I stated before, some guys don't even Lp guitars at all, other lp at 10, 12, 16 khz, but 8 is really a bit too below standard, it can make the guitar tone sound unpleasantly "dark", as in lacking brightness.

About the cuts, with those long Qs (bandwidth as reaeq puts it) you're cutting much more than just 400 and 800 as you say you do, and those cuts join up with the filters and the other cut so it's like one big cut throughout the whole track. it's quite easy to see in the picture you're cutting pretty much EVERYTHING and it's almost balanced so the cut in 400 and 800 is less noticed because everything else is also being cut. So in a way, you're almost just lowering the volume on the whole guitar track. I say "almost" because the graphic shows it's not exactly the same cut on all tracks, but for example from 200 to 500 it's pretty much the same amount of cut, so instead of cutting "a little on 400 and a little on 800" you're actually cutting alittle on the whole range from 200 to 500 (and more, just using that as an example)
 
DanLights,

Thank you for the explanation. It's going to take me awhile to fully digest all that you've written, but it is appreciated.

Oh, forgot to mention, I'm usually tuned to A standard, but this track was tuned to B standard as I thought it sounded a little tighter in that tuning.
 
you're filtering WAY too much. you need to understand why it is you're doing this and LISTEN as opposed to doing it Arbitrarilly, based on numbers.

The hi pass filter is to help eliminate any rumble. heres the best way to do it.
click on the knob to adjust it.
Close your eyes
then start moving it very slowly till you can begin to hear the bottom end clean up a little/lose some rumble
then move it back ever so slightly. Now open your eyes.

Now move the mouse over the bypass button.
Close your eyes
click wildly until you have no idea whether the eq is bypassed or not
then click alternating between the two.
when you hear which one sounds better, open your eyes and see what it is and whether you were right.

Do the same with the low pass filter.
With this you want to eliminate some of the nasty fizz you can get at the very top end (between 12-20k) on SOME guitar tracks
I tend to prefer a pretty steep filter as I feel the more gentle ones dont quite get me where I want, but you need to decide for yourself.

DO the same
close eyes,
adjust filter
see where you put it.
bypass.
click wildly
close eyes
click until you are sure which sounds better.

train your ears!
 
For what it's worth, I know you use POD Farm, and it's possible to get tones from within POD Farm where you don't even need to low pass at all if you tweak hard enough and know what to listen for.
 
Harry Hughes said:
For what it's worth, I know you use POD Farm, and it's possible to get tones from within POD Farm where you don't even need to low pass at all if you tweak hard enough and know what to listen for.
Click to expand...

Tweak hard enough?!?! :D

I've been tweaking that damn POD for years now, albeit incorrectly!

The problem I am consistently having, and which made me want to learn more about correct EQing techniques, is all the low end flub I'm getting. I'm tuned to A standard and do a lot of palm mutes, so this happens to be quite a problem for me.

I tried compensating by backing way off on the pre-amp's bass, but that just the tone sound really thin.

As I can hear the tone I want "trapped" inside the tone I'm hearing w/ the extra bass flub, I figured that I could keep the bass in the tone, which keeps the "thinness" out, and EQ the extraneous low end out later. Make sense?

Also, are there any specific things one should be doing EQ-wise when using low tunings?
 
Filtering everything so heavily (like I said, you're almost just lowering the volume o everything with such heavy filtering) will not help your low end flub, that is pretty common and sometimes not easy to fix in low tunings like yours. Normally highpassing should help, but it's barely ever a complete solution, sometimes it's just your playing technique you gotta work a bit more on, sometimes using multiband compression might help to keep the mud under control without sacrificing the low end, sometimes some narrow cuts on some specific frequencies might tame the problem a lot (narrow, not those all-over-the-track ones you did there).

greyskull's technique is really good, you should try that out, it will prove a lot more helpful than just cutting exactly where X and Y dudes told you they cut
 
Listen to it in a mix. What sounds thin alone may sound massive with a good bass tone and some drums. I like to highpass at 125-150 hz and lowpass 13-15 khz and then I have a few cuts in some low mid frequencies. Alone it's not great because there's not much low end, but bass makes a HUGE difference.
 
guitarded88 said:
Wish I could offer more help, but all I can say is the lower your tuning... the more challenges you’ll face with tone, EQ and Mixing.
Click to expand...

funny you say that cuz just yesterday I was thinking how much easier it is for me to get a better sounding tone from lower tuning things when using PODfarm

dunno I guess I'm not taking player into consideration like i should be
 
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