How to get a huge snare sound in a mix?

Ermz said that already, but blending right samples and different characteristics. Eq not-wanted middle "mud" away depending on the mix you're doing and blend in some room to that snare. Bricasti M7 impulses are great for this. Then just some reverb and you're done. Don't boost that 200hz as maniac. That will destroy your mix soon.
 
My idea of a 'huge' snare is something more like this:



Samples make your life easier. Blending a half dozen different snares to get all their tonal characteristics in the right balance is a better starting point than simply using one 'cracky' snare and trying to EQ the world into it. Don't underestimate the value of room mics, and don't be afraid to plate verb the snare up until its airy and has some serious sustain. Parallel compression helps bring the body out more. The rest is heavy handed EQ and compression work.

I do this, but I've always wondered if producers mix the different snares in a third party audio editing app, or right in the mix using drum replacement stuff... I find this last option kind'a senseless because different snares have different attack/decay times and you should at least align those... which way you go about this Ermz?
 
If your reverb plug-in has a pre delay knob, try fiddling with that. It might help with keeping the snare in front.
 
Hey guys, I know this post is a few months old now but i've been REALLY interested in that Dead Throne snare posted above since the album came out. Any ideas on how to get a similar sound? It seems to have none of the nasty low end mud without losing that little thump it needs. Also a hell of a snap to it
 
David Bendeth made Matt Nicholls snare pretty fat in Sempiternal.
Here is the Isolated Drums

But in my opinion it sounds fatter in the full mix:

The reason its sounds big is because it so many sample layered together, and an electronic snare as well.
Thats one of my favourite snares anyway!
 
Some real good advice here. So the thread necromancy won't hurt. I'll definitely second all of the classic stuff (carving out other instruments, predelay, good parrallel compression etc.). Here's some more ideas, that helped me on... let's say "suboptimal recorded" snare drums:

1.) Send the snare to two parrallel busses. One of them being the "fatener" and one beeing the "attacker".
- Gate (lots of release) the fatener and shape it with ultrafast compression (1176style or maybe SKnote Disto) or even crank the sustain on a transient-designer. Add some distortion (yeah Decapitator works great, but I love me my SDRR :cool:). Let this baby sing!
- If it needs to, bring out the attacker with some transient design (whatever plugin's at hand, SPL, Oxford or BitterSweet... Sleepytime is nice as well). Maybe even add some harmonic enhancement (no saturation!).
- EQ both busses - switching between phase-linear and "standard" EQs. (Sometimes even phase-distortion is your friend.) Blend to taste. Especially make use of high- (attacker) and low-pass (fatener).

2.) EQ is not allways what (at last my) ears expect. Try some mid-crack (1.2 to 1.7 kHz) and some 500 cycles as well.

3.) Lots of drummers kill all lowend-sustain of their snare - I seriously hate this in mixing jobs! (It's extremely common over here... :mad:). Even if there's a big 180-200Hz bump, it's most likely gone after the initial attack. You may try a tiny amount of very short (<300ms) reverb and no ERs in mono with an extreme lowpass (just above 500Hz) in front of your compression.

4.) Bring down the stereo-width of the snare-verb. (The one you wanna hear a little.) I just demoed Valhalla Plate and I shall most likely buy it (next year ;)). Use predelay to seperate this kind of rich-tail reverb from any early reflection-patterns and to make the snare upfront and standing out.

5.) Sometimes it needs a little Lowender in guitar mode. But be careful...

...seriously: BE CAREFUL!

6.) Still kind of a secret, but free, weapon: Blockfish!

8.) Put 5orcery on your guitars. Use the snare on the sidechain and duck 150-300 Hz. Sometimes I even scan the envelope of my snare, invert it and use it for EQ-automization.

9.) Play it back in a real room and record the verberation. Use your stairwell or whatever's at hand. Preferably put the mic into a narrow corner of the room.

Have fun and a happy new year!
Henning

EDIT: There's no #7... so I'll say: less bottom mic - more noise! :heh:
 
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good (hard) hitting drummer, good tuned snare, hard compression, 400-600hz cuts, 150-250hz boosts, transiend designer, reverb works for me :p
 
Yum on that BMTH snare! I came super close with some 808 samples, a few EDM/modern pop samples and my trusty old Alesis D4.

I had something like total of 6 snare samples on three tracks. First track had three EDM/pop samples and a D4 sample, two other tracks were a D4 and an another EDM sample. Every track had different reverb settings with some compression going on in the single tracks as well as in a group. All sorts of cool tricks to make it smash hehe :lol:

Not 100% dupe, but still very in the zone. It would be easy to tweak it to near identical, but this is more than enough for my own needs.
 

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EQ, compression and reverb (plate mostly).
I also use a limiter especially on the reverb.

And as always, your source sound must be perfect before any post-process
(sample or mic'ed must be of quality)