Tag Archive for: mixing

Mixing with Headphones

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This subject has done the rounds for years.

Often it is the cash strapped home studio owner who has to resort to using headphones, the cheaper and space saving solution, instead of speakers to conduct mixing projects. There are obvious advantages to using headphones for mixing, but glaring disadvantages too. There are no winners here on either side of the fence. Quite simply, if you want to be fully armed to conduct the best mixes, then a combination of both is essential.

Good quality headphones can reveal detail that some good speakers/monitors omit. In terms of sound design, a good headphone is imperative as it will be unforgiving in revealing anomalies. In terms of maintaining a clean and noise free signal path, it is crucial. On the flip side, stereo imaging and panning information is much harder to judge on headphones. Determining the spatial feel of a mix is almost impossible to convey on headphones, but simple with speakers. Pans are pronounced and extreme on headphones and do not translate across well when used with speakers. Even EQ can come across as subdued or extreme.

I find that if I mix on headphones alone, then the mix never travels well when auditioned with monitors. The reverse is also true.

When using monitors and because the monitors are placed in front of us our natural hearing perceives the soundstage as directly in front of us. With headphones, because the ‘speakers’ are on either side of us, there’s no real front-to-back information. Headphones also provide a very high degree of separation between the left and right channels, which produces an artificially detailed stereo image. Our brains and ears receive and analyse/process sound completely differently when using headphones as opposed to monitors. When using headphones, each ear will only hear the audio signal carried on the relevant channel, but with speakers, both ears will hear the signals produced by both loudspeakers.

You also need to factor in the fact that different people perceive different amounts of bass – factors such as the distance between the headphone diaphragm and the listener’s ear will change the level of bass. The way in which the headphone cushion seals around the ear also play a part, which is why pushing the phones closer to your ears produces a noticeable increase in bass. This increases the bass energy and this alone negates the idea of having correct tonal balance in the mix being auditioned.

With monitors, both ears hear both the left and right channels.

If your room is acoustically problematic and you have poor monitors, then headphones may well be a better and more reliable approach. But it is a lot harder to achieve the same kind of quality and transferability that comes more naturally on good monitors in a good acoustically treated room.

I find that if I record and check all my signals with headphones, then I am in a strong position to hear any anomalies and be in a better position to judge clarity and integrity of the recorded signals. This, coupled with speaker monitoring, assures me of the best of both worlds; clarity and integrity married with spatial imaging.

If you want further reading on this subject then I recommend Martin Walker’s seminal article here entitled: Mixing On Headphones.

Mixing to Pink Noise

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I am often asked why I teach my students how to mix to a pink noise profile, be it at the channel stage, or pre-master prepping. The answer is simple: ‘the most important aspect of production is the understanding and management of relative levels.’

When I first began this wonderful and insane journey into audio production I was blessed to have had producer friends that were also my peers. In those ancient days, the industry was very different. The community aspect was both strong and selfless. We were not competing with each other. Instead, we chose to share our knowledge and techniques. It was then that I was introduced to noise as a mixing tool, and coupled with my sound design experience I took to it like a pigeon on a roof.

I was taught the old school method of tuning your ears and mindset to work from a barely audible mix level. If I did not hear everything in the mix then I had to go back and work the quieter channels. If something stood out in the mix then I knew the culprit had to be re-balanced, and all of this relied heavily on relative levels.

Relative levels in a mix context deals with the relationships between all sounds, and that includes effects and dynamics. You may think that relative levels refers only to volume but that is not entirely accurate. Relative levels deals with all level management, from sounds to effects and dynamics. Eq is an excellent example of frequency/gain management, but so are reverb levels, balancing parallel channels or wet/dry mix ratios, and so on……..

An example of how this technique helps the student to understand all areas of relative gains is by throwing in the classic reverb conundrum. We’ve all been there. If there is too much reverb level then the sound will either lose energy through reverb saturation, sound too distant if the wet and dry mix is imbalanced, or sound out of phase. By continual use of this technique, the student learns how well the sound and its effect sit together, whether the dry/wet ratio is right and whether the right reverb algorithms were used. This level of familiarity can only help the student and is the only simple working way of attuning the ears to not only hear level variances but also if something somewhere sounds ‘wrong ‘.

In some ways, this is very much like ear training but for producers as opposed to musicians/singers.

When I feel my students have reached an acceptable level conducting level and pan mixes (another old school apprentice technique), I move them onto pink noise referencing. By the time they have finished countless exercises using all manner of noise responses, they develop an instinctive understanding of gain structuring every aspect of the signal path, from channel to master bus, and with that comes an understanding and familiarity of what sounds natural and ‘right’.

Supplemented with listening to well-produced music this technique has saved my students both time and money and it is such a simple technique that even Trump could do it………well…..with help of course.

Eddie Bazil
Samplecraze

If you prefer the visual approach then try this video tutorial:

Mixing to Pink Noise

Relevant content:

DIY Mastering using Pink Noise

The Different Colours of Noise