EQ-ing

[HelloWorld]

Can somebody explain this?
What are the rules?
Tricks and tips?
I need to learn how to eq so bad
but i just can't understand it at all

 

[preppypmp_82]

Check out this book: Mixing Secrets For The Small Studio by Mike Senior. It truly helped me to get better mixes in Reason. But the information applies to mixing, period. You would just adjust to the use of your personal DAW choice. I think it is exactly what you're looking for. Half of the battle is learning how to properly use high pass filters, to filter out any unnecessary frequencies, and it gives your tracks space within the audio spectrum.

 

[SonicPlaygrounds]

simply put. try not to overlap frequencies of different elements unless you're doing it on purpose for layering effects. The best mixes are when each different element of the track has it's own space in the frequency spectrum. Get a free spectrum analyzer and start using it to understand where different sounds are represented in terms of frequency. Use LPF/HPF (filters) to get rid of low and high frequencies when they aren't an important part of the overall sound. Also, cut before you boost.

 

[scrapheaper]

Eq is easy to understand but very hard to learn how to do.

If you understand how a spectral analyser works, you know how eq works, it just lets you make particular parts of the spectrum louder.

As for why and when you should do, that's a bit harder.
Generally speaking, you boost the frequencies in a sound that you think are important and not loud enough, and cut all the frequencies you don't need- but it can be hard to know which bits you need, which bits you don't need and how much to boost or cut them by.

Youtube will have some good tutorials, I'm sure, if you just want to understand basic function

 

[krushing]

Good points already mentioned. I'd also advise for googling for Sound On Sound's EQ articles - there's a lot of stuff from theory to practical stuff on there, that goes well beyond what's reasonable to expect in a forum post.

And while it might sound like there are a bunch of "EQ laws" - cut, don't boost; always cut the lows; cut/boost these frequencies for this effect; don't let these instruments overlap etc. - they're not rules but guidelines. If boosting sounds good, do it. If cutting from the "wrong" place sounds good, do it.