What's your EQ process?

B

Beats09

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I know that every Beat is different and you have to apply EQ differently each time, but what's your general EQ process?

Do you apply a high pass filter on everything besides the kick + bass? at what hz do you do it at?



etc etc etc
 
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Hey man, I don't get your question that much, but I'll give you my take on EQ see if I can help ya out.
Eq is commonly misunderstood, most of the presets are like " Add Brightness, Bass Boost, etc. So people think Eq is for adding stuff.
While most of the times I use the Eq to take shit out.
Thats when you really star getting the picture.
I love pinpointing weird frequencies and pulling them out.
So thats my tip right there bro, try listening and cleaning that sound, mold the sound to your liking.

Peace bro any question hit me up
 
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I'm still learning EQ myself so I don't have a set method yet. Right now I'm learning to sweep the frequencies and make small cuts like Barc3lona was talking about.

Check out this thread on EQ https://www.futureproducers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=29861 it's stickied up at the top.

The biggest thing I have learned is better arrangement. By cutting down on the amount of instruments playing at one time it clears things up and I need less EQ.
 
An EQ is a correction tool. You first need an issue, then, the solution will be obvious.
 
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moses said:
An EQ is a correction tool. You first need an issue, then, the solution will be obvious.
Click to expand...

Yeah at first...while learning how to eq.

But once you learn that, you'll also start to be able to use eq to add texture and colors to your sound. Not just for equaling out the frequencies.
 
Try panning all your instruments first, sometimes you won't need to e.q. But E.Q. can be corrective or creative. Corrective basically cuts any unneeded/annoying frequencies out. Or it cuts out any frequencies that are clashing with each other to improve the harmonic balance of the track. Creative E.Q. adds color and can completely change a sound and add lots of character.

---------- Post added at 10:00 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:52 AM ----------

To start..
cut everything that is not needed.

Turn your Q as high as possible. then turn the gain to 10-18 dBs. Then sweep across looking for any annoying frequencies. then turn the gain to negative and see if it sounds better with the cut or not, play with the Q a little. Cuts are usually narrow.
After a while, you will be able to listen to the track and estimate the frequency that you want to cut, and then sweep around that are. You should sweep for everything and bypass things to see if you are really improving the sound or just making it louder (easily confused amongst beginners)

Vocals, lcf/hpf around 80hz,
Piano, around 100hz or so
bass, maybe around 30hz
 
I always try and trim sounds I know has stuff that I don't need. I take a lot of low end out of piano, strings, brass, ect. Really anything that's not a low synth, sub bass, bass, or kick.

I also like to scoop out the 1.5kHz out of a lot of things because that's where people are going to hear your vocals. And of course taking 500Hz out of a mix to reduce the muddy sound. Essentially there is no difference to boosting and cutting if you do it equally, but I find it's easy to take out the problems than enhance the good features.

If you get too crazy with eq, it may sound good while your doing it but your final mix will come out harsh and annoying to listen to. Try not to boost or cut more than 3 db or so when your first starting out.

I also like to filter before compression and eq after. You can spend time getting a sound perfect with eq and then throw on a compressor to find out it's changed the sound and you need to eq again but at the same time you don't want unwanted frequencies pumping your compressor.

My signal chain usually goes: Filter -> Compressor -> Eq -> Aux Buss -> Compressor -> Eq. And for vocals I usually use two compressors back to back before going to buss compression.

For mixing I like to mix downward. I start with the Kick or Vocals at 0db. and everything else all the way down. Bringing up one thing at a time until I have a full mix. Then I lower all the tracks so it's not clipping the master fader. Bounce. Then move to mastering.
 
On the master fader of the entire song.....

Cut @30-32khz
Shelf with a sharp "Q" @ 64hz and boost by 1-2db

Done. Until a direct problem presents itself.
 
I use eq as a corrective tool as well as a tool to add texture. Just depends on what the song needs and overall feel that I am going for. I take the whole song and eq it by octave using the range of 20hz to 20kHz
I roll off at 40hz, then eq whatever is in these octave ranges.
40hz to 80hz - octave one
80hz to 250 hz - octave two (really its about an octave and a half)
250hz to 500hz - octaves four
500hz to 2kHz - octaves five and six
2kHz to 4kHz - octave seven
4kHz to 6kHz - about a half of an octave
6kHz to 20kHz - octaves 8 to 10
 
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