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Equaliser Tips and Tricks – Know Your Frequencies

Equaliser Tips and Tricks – Know Your Frequencies

Equaliser Tips and Tricks – Know Your Frequencies

Equaliser Tips and Tricks – Know Your Frequencies – The equalizer, or EQ, is a sculptor’s chisel for the audio world. It allows you to meticulously carve away unwanted frequencies and accentuate the sweet spots, shaping the sound to your vision. But with a seemingly endless array of knobs and sliders, navigating the EQ can feel daunting. The key to unlocking its power lies in understanding the language of sound: frequencies.

Equaliser Tips and Tricks - Know Your Frequencies - The equalizer, or EQ, is a sculptor's chisel for the audio world. It allows you to meticulously carve away unwanted frequencies and accentuate the sweet spots, shaping the sound to your vision. But with a seemingly endless array of knobs and sliders, navigating the EQ can feel daunting. The key to unlocking its power lies in understanding the language of sound: frequencies.

EQ Techniques: Surgical Precision

Equalizers offer two primary tools for shaping your sound: boosting and cutting frequencies.

  • Boosting: Imagine boosting a specific frequency band like adding fertilizer to a specific plant in your garden. It encourages that frequency range to grow louder and more prominent in the mix. This can be useful for making a shy vocal stand out or adding bite to a dull guitar.
  • Cutting: Think of cutting a frequency band as carefully weeding out unwanted growth. A strategic cut in the right spot can tame resonances (boomy lows or honky midrange), clear up muddiness, and create space for other instruments to shine. Often, a small, targeted cut can make a bigger difference than a broad boost.

Pro EQ Moves: Beyond the Basics

  • The Art of Sweeping: Unlike a bulldozer, a skilled audio engineer uses the EQ like a scalpel. Start with a narrow bandwidth on your EQ and slowly sweep it across the frequency range. Listen intently for any harsh resonances, boomy lows, or unwanted muddiness. Once you pinpoint the problem area, adjust the cut or boost to address it surgically.
  • Subtractive EQ is Your Friend: Many beginners fall into the trap of over-boosting, trying to force a sound to be brighter or heavier. A good rule of thumb is to start with subtractive EQ (cutting) and use boosting sparingly. A balanced mix often requires removing unwanted frequencies rather than just adding more on top.
  • Reference Tracks as Your Guide: Feeling lost? Use a well-produced song in a similar genre as a reference point. Listen to how the instruments sit in the mix, particularly focusing on the areas where you’re struggling. Try to replicate that balance using your EQ.
  • Train Your Ears: Just like any skill, mastering the EQ takes practice. The more you use it, the better you’ll become at identifying problem frequencies and making targeted adjustments. There are also online ear training exercises that can help you develop your ability to hear specific frequencies within a mix.

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50Hz
  1. Increase to add more fullness to lowest frequency instruments like foot, toms, and the bass.
  2. Reduce to decrease the “boom” of the bass and will increase overtones and the recognition of bass line in the mix. This is most often used on loud bass lines like rock.
100Hz
  1. Increase to add a harder bass sound to lowest frequency instruments.
  2. Increase to add fullness to guitars and snare.
  3. Increase to add warmth to piano and horns.
  4. Reduce to remove boom on guitars & increase clarity
200Hz
  1. Increase to add fullness to vocals.
  2. Increase to add fullness to snare and guitar (harder sound).
  3. Reduce to decrease muddiness of vocals or mid-range instruments.
  4. Reduce to decrease gong sound of cymbals.
400Hz
  1. Increase to add clarity to bass lines especially when speakers are at low volume.
  2. Reduce to decrease “cardboard” sound of lower drums (kick and toms).
  3. Reduce to decrease ambiance on cymbals.
800Hz
  1. Increase for clarity and “punch” of bass.
  2. Reduce to remove “cheap” sound of guitars.
1.5kHz
  1. Increase for “clarity” and “pluck” of bass.
  2. Reduce to remove dullness of guitars.
3kHz
  1. Increase for more “pluck” of bass.
  2. Increase for more attack of electric / acoustic guitar.
  3. Increase for more attack on low piano parts.
  4. Increase for more clarity / hardness on voice.
  5. Reduce to increase breathy, soft sound on background vocals.
  6. Reduce to disguise out-of-tune vocals / guitars.
5kHz
  1. Increase for vocal presence.
  2. Increase low frequency drum attack ( foot / toms).
  3. Increase for more “finger sound” on bass.
  4. Increase attack of piano, acoustic guitar and brightness on guitars (especially rock guitars).
  5. Reduce to make background parts more distant. 6. Reduce to soften “thin” guitar.
7kHz
  1. Increase to add attack on low frequency drums ( more metallic sound ).
  2. Increase to add attack to percussion instruments.
  3. Increase on dull singer.
  4. Increase for more “finger sound” on acoustic bass.
  5. Reduce to decrease “s” sound on singers.
  6. Increase to add sharpness to synths, rock guitars, acoustic guitar and piano.
10kHz
  1. Increase to brighten vocals.
  2. Increase for “light brightness” in acoustic guitar and piano.
  3. Increase for hardness on cymbals.
  4. Reduce to decrease “s” sound on singers.
15kHz
  1. Increase to brighten vocals (breath sound).
  2. Increase to brighten cymbals, string instruments and flutes.
  3. Increase to make sampled synthesizer sound more real.
FREQUENCY RANGE GUIDE