Submixing Your Low End

**HakimCallier** · 10-05-2009

Hi All,

I just wanted to give a quick quip about mixing the low end. I may have mentioned this before but when I mix I usually use several sub mixes. There are many reasons for this however, one reason stands out for me right now.

Submixing your low end. This is an essential part of my mixing process and something you may not already be doing. However, it is something that I have picked up over the years from great engineers and I thought it might be something useful for some of you to think about.

What I do is create 3 aux send tracks:

40 - 90hz
90 - 250 hz
250 - 800hz

My audio source channel's output - usually DI Bass, Amp Bass, Synth Bass, Kicks and sometimes Toms depending on the style of music - are sent to the main submix and then sent to one or more of the lowend submixes then returned to the main submix.

On each of the lowend submix channels I will filter according to the allotted range (40-90hz, etc.). There after I may treat the sounds with EQ, tuning, expansion and other dynamic effects that will enhance that element/range of the lowend, like transient shaping and others.

This is just a hint at what can be done. Try it out if you are not already doing this and let me know your results.

**=Angelo=** · 10-05-2009

Interesting as always hakim, do you know of any articles for futher reading on this? is it a technique you always use?

**HakimCallier** · 10-05-2009

Originally Posted by =Angelo=

Interesting as always hakim, do you know of any articles for futher reading on this? is it a technique you always use?

Not really. I think Pensado has talked about it in an article or two. I'll try and find it for you. It is a technique that is essential to my mixing process.

EDIT: Here is an excerpt from an older Digidesign article,

Pensado breaks his low-end approach into three components: The Last Octave (40-80 Hz), "where most other engineers don't work;" the Next Almost True Octave (80-250 cycles), "where you really have to make the mix stand out on small speakers to give the impression of an enhanced low end;" and the Top End-and-a-Half (250-800 cycles)," where most engineers start muddying things up."
He also strongly urges us to never simply turn up the overall bass EQ to get more low end. The secret is in paying attention to which elements in a frequency range we're actually turning up.
"If we get too much 250 or too much 350, we're going to get that cardboard sort of muddy sound. I'll ask a student, 'Wait, what are you EQ-ing? If you want more bass just take the fader up.' Now, when you turn it up you've got some other frequencies you're interfering with, for instance in the vocals a bit. Just pull out a little 600 or 1k and the bass is still fat and round, and it sounds natural and life is good again. As you do that more and more, you'll acquire the skills of cutting and notching frequencies out of things instead of adding more. That's the difference between a major league engineer and a minor leaguer."