Do you feel like you aren’t getting the most out of your studio space?
Do your mixes sound great in your studio but terrible everywhere else?
Well you’re in the right place because In this video, you’ll learn the 3 most common ways that your studio is lying to you.
By the end of this video, you’ll know how to overcome these misperceptions and create mixes that sound great no matter where your audience is listening.
What’s the goal of a studio, what is it for?
A studio is a place where you record and listen to sound with precision and accuracy.
But, if your studio environment is not accurate, it won’t give you a genuine perspective of the sounds you hear.
Which is why your room is the first way your studio is lying to you.
1. Your Room Is Lying
In a studio, there are typically two spaces: a live room and a control room.
The live room is where the performance takes place, while the control room is where the engineer listens to the recording and makes adjustments.
Our goal in each space is to achieve a balanced acoustic response by absorbing or diffusing early reflections and absorbing bass frequency buildup.
This is crucial to ensure that we’re hearing a balanced perspective of the instrument being recorded, and not the room it’s being recorded in, which can often be unpleasant.
Capturing an acoustically dry recording allows you to place that performance in a different space with effects like digital reverb.
If your recording is already roomy or noisy, this will just add mud and clutter to your mix. And of course, all these nuances become more noticeable once your control room is treated for a proper listening position.
Check out this video for more on setting up your listening position for mixing.
Solutions:
– Treat your Space (Acoustic Treatment Videos)
– Use someone else’s Treated Space (You can contact me about your next project!)
– Eliminate the Room Factor/Go all in on headphone mixing
But headphones alone don’t fix the problem, and neither does acoustic treatment
Although it is a great step towards an accurate listening space,
It’s not the only way you’re getting fooled.
And that’s because ….
2. Your Speakers Are Lying
Your speakers are “lying” to you because the design of the speaker box greatly affects the output of low frequencies.
The speaker driver needs to be in a cabinet to isolate the in-phase signal from the out-of-phase signal coming out of the back.
This creates a build-up of pressure within the speaker box which acts like a pillow to push back against the driver as it moves.
This pressure increase within the speaker box greatly affects the output of low frequencies which take a lot of energy to produce.
What you get is similar to a HPF that chokes out your bass.
A famous example of this being the Yamaha NS-10 which is a sealed box design that is boosted in the midrange and rolled off on the low end.
To correct this low end roll off many speaker box designs feature an air port (reflex port) which decreases air pressure in the cabinet allowing the driver to move with less obstruction.
The result is a steeper cutoff that does not affect low midrange frequencies as much, allowing the ported speaker to deliver a deeper bottom end to the listening experience.
Comparing two speakers with similar size drivers, such as the Yamaha NS10s and the Yamaha HS8s, can show that the frequency of the high-pass filter cutoff is determined by the volume of air trapped in the box.
The Yamaha NS10 have a 7” woofer with a smaller cabinet size and no reflex porting .
Its Low Frequency roll off is at 60Hz.
The Yamaha HS8s have a 35% larger cabinet size, with a reflex port which creates a lower low-frequency cutoff at 38Hz, providing a fuller listening experience with more bass extension despite having a similar woofer size.
Sealed Cabinet Speakers – less bass extension, more midrange focused listening experience (Yamaha NS10s 60Hz LF roll off)
Ported Cabinet Speaker – More bass extension, Fuller listening experience
(Yamaha HS8s 38Hz LF roll off)
So, if you’re serious about accurate low-end reproduction in your mixes, remember that bigger is better when it comes to bass, and huge speakers cabinets will always have an advantage in that their low frequency cutoff is low enough to not be a problem for mixing.
Luckily most modern near-field speaker designs use reflex ports to reinforce the resonance of the speaker’s low end.
Solutions:
– Get Massive Speakers for more accurate bass
– an A/B speaker setup is essential to correcting this issue (in combination with headphones, or a friend in another listening space)
Learn the ins and outs of the gear you have available and use that to frame your target sound.
For Me – my Neumanns sound deeper/bass sounds hotter (despite being smaller), my Yamaha’s are thinner
So I can calibrate how much is enough bass in the Neumann’s
And I know that if the bass isn’t in my face on the Yamaha’s i don’t need to go pushing the fader.
Let me know if you’d like a video on how to set up an A/B speaker switch for your monitors. (And more about A/B monitoring)
Now that your room is sorted and you have some big booty speakers, There’s nothing holding you back right. You’ve got your studio all set up.
But what about YOU?
Specifically lets talk about how Your Ears are Lying to you.
3. Your Ears Are Lying
Our ears can be deceiving and cause an inaccurate perception of sound.
Our ears are sensitive organs that can become fatigued over time when exposed to loud or continuous sound.
This can result in a temporary loss of sensitivity, particularly in the higher and lower frequency ranges, leading to a less accurate perception of sound.
The fatigue of our ears can also affect our ability to perceive differences in volume and dynamics, making it more difficult to accurately judge the level of various elements in a mix.
This can make it harder to make informed decisions when working on a track.
Solutions:
It’s important to set your monitors to a consistent listening level for mixing.
You’ve probably heard of the Fletcher-Munson curves: the set of graphs that show how our ears hear different frequencies at different loudness levels.
It shows that our ears are more sensitive to some frequencies than others, and this can change depending on how loud the sound is.
The curves show that at low volumes, our ears are less sensitive to high and low frequencies. Our ears are most sensitive to mid-range frequencies (2-5kHz) which are commonly associated with the intelligibility of speech.
This is important to keep in mind when mixing music, because it can affect how we perceive the balance of different instruments in the mix at different volumes and cause us to overcorrect if mixing too quiet.
The dynamics of our hearing is most consistent at moderate listening levels, typically around 70 to 85 decibels (dB).
(70dB) is a great starting place for mixing in Smaller Rooms its what I set my big knob to.
80dB may be appropriate for Larger Rooms where your listening position is further away from the speakers.
At this range, our ears are most sensitive to changes in volume and we are able to perceive a wide range of frequencies and dynamics accurately.
However, it’s important to note that prolonged exposure to any loud sounds, even within this range, can still cause damage to our hearing.
It’s always a good idea to take breaks and listen at a safe level.
One of the first videos I ever made was on ‘The Pomodoro Technique’ which is a great way to incorporate breaks into your workflow to give our ears time to rest when working in a studio or listening to music for extended periods.
This can really help reduce the risk of ear fatigue and ensure you have a more accurate perception of sound.
So in conclusion, to ensure you’re getting the most truthful and accurate sound:
– Know that the room you listen and record in is often the forgotten link in the signal chain. Don’t underestimate the power of good room treatment for accurate listening.
– Get the biggest speakers you can afford, and ideally a second pair of speakers, or headphones, so that you can do A/B tests and frame your desired mix outcome.
– Set a proper listening level to give your ears the most balanced input, and take breaks to keep your ears from getting tired and losing sensitivity.
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Do you have any other tips or ways your studio might be fooling you? Let me know in the comments.
Thank you for watching this video and I’ll see you in the next one!
