KVR Audio

brekehan · Post by **brekehan** » Thu Jul 31, 2014 2:28 am

I had written a post awhile ago about how my stuff sounded crap in my car, but great in my expensive headphones, and so so on my home stereo.

I've been re-something or other..mastering of sorts?, the project since. I redid all my individual tracks to -6db, redid every effect on them such that it would stay at -6db with the effect on and off, tossed a lot of worthless effects that really did nothing but add illusion through volume, and making the ranges on the low and high passes of all the EQs on each track smaller in range from one another...tightening them around points of interest.

My observation is that now it sound A LOT better on in my car and on my home stereo, but it doesn't sound as good on my expensive headphones. It sounds...less full there.

Seeing how I am targetting home stereos and cheaper speaker systems, I think this is good.

Do you guys generally try to get smaller ranges in your EQ of instruments? or leave it going from 40hz up to 20lhz and just pull up and down here and there along the way?

By smaller ranges, I mean things like, -48db cut everything under 10.5 khz and over 14khz for cymbals, maybe 90-330 for my kick, 900-3khz for my synth line, etc.

aciddose · Post by **aciddose** » Thu Jul 31, 2014 3:02 am

You might want to try to measure the response of the system you're aiming for. You'll likely find a lot of resonance and peaks/valleys in the frequency response of the car system itself, let alone the system installed inside a resonant metal box (the car body.)

So, you should find that broad low-shelf filters will work differently than peaking filters, of course. If you use a peaking filter that happens to be tuned to a frequency which is not a harmonic of the car body or speakers you'll avoid exciting those resonances.

Put it in a different car however and suddenly you'll be lined up exactly on the same frequency with your peak filter and it'll sound like it's being played through a pipe.

So you should really question whether it is good to aim for a particular system vs. try to identify how the average system might respond and aim for that. Any garbage system with excessive resonance will sound bad, just in different ways.

I would aim to get a good neutral tone out of good headphones or studio monitors and perhaps try to avoid configurations that would excite resonances, if present. It is a trade-off between having a highly EQd tone that gets where you exactly want it with a flat system vs. a conservative tone that avoids issues with a resonant system. Trying to sound approximately like other tracks in your genre is most likely the best bet, as you'll then be exactly what is expected by the listener. If you are the one track/album that is suddenly different compared to the others this could be both good and bad. You might stand out more, sure, but you also might stand out like a sore thumb.

brekehan · Post by **brekehan** » Thu Jul 31, 2014 4:00 am

Yea, I constantly play my favorite tunes and reference them. I can never get things to stand out as much as the pros, or even the armatures, but I do compare. I wish there were more videos online showing how others EQ things. Everything is "Watch me dial in my fav patch to xyz synth and learn very little" videos.

aciddose · Post by **aciddose** » Thu Jul 31, 2014 4:10 am

Unfortunately yes, but my best guess is that is due to the fact that you have to learn at your own pace and through your own methods. Tips are useful sometimes, but they'll never fill in for years of experience in finding 'your sound'. Keep at it.

camsr · Post by **camsr** » Thu Jul 31, 2014 6:04 am

Too many resonances and rattles in a car (usually) to get the details from the music.

zethus909 · Post by **zethus909** » Sun Aug 03, 2014 8:57 am

proper eqing is like a fine surgical procedure, the more sounds you introduce the more surgery needed

EQ observation