Plugin (EQ) idea - something like this out there?

[beej]

Ok, I was having a think about EQ. Rather than having the usual setup, say 6 bands, you can adjust the frequency, cut/boost and Q of each, lo/hi pass filters etc, I'm imagining it working like this:

Let's say we have 6 bands to play with. FIrstly, the plug should have modes (Vocal, Kick, Snare, Mix, Bass, Electric Guitar, Acoustic Guitar). I'm calling it up on a vocal, so the first thing I do is select the Vocal mode.

Ok, now, my six sliders come up, defaulting in the middle, labelled: Fundamental, Warmth, Body, Harshness, Sibilance and Air (for example). Internally, they are mapped to specific frequencies and Q settings, and each of these frequencies and labels will change depending on whether I'm in Vocal mode, or Bass Guitar mode, or Acoustic Guitar, related to the fundamental properties of the instrument. (If desired you could maybe create your own ones, but let's keep it simple for now).

Ok, so now I can twiddle my sliders up/down to give me more warmth, less harshness and more air etc. To help people learn, you could have a display that indicates which frequencies do what, so people get a mental model they can transfer to regular EQ's.

So far so good, nothing too out of the ordinary. Now, here's the "clever" bit. You have a global "shift" knob, that shifts the frequencies of *all* sliders up or down together. In effect you are moving the entire EQ curve up or down, not just one individual band at a time. This would let you adjust the EQ to the source, and give you some interesting shaping possibilities. I've not seen many EQ's where you can shift the entire curve up or down, only individual frequencies.

Lastly, you could have a "lock" switch on each band, so they are not affected by the "shift" knob. So your band that's reducing the harshness can stay at the set frequency, while you slide everything else up and down to hear what it does to the signal.

Anything out there that does something similar? Anything where I can shift an entire EQ curve up and down? I have no idea whether the effect would be useful, but it certainly sounds interesting to try...

[Kingston]

Not a bad idea at all, in fact it might be very useful, especially with the lock. Sounds like a good tonal shaping powertool.

I would skip with the presets though, and just have the global freq shift with lock added to a basic parametric EQ. This should be a piece of cake with SynthMaker for example, and it should sound very competetive especially with oversampling.

[beej]

The thing about the preset modes is that generally speaking there are "rules" for which frequency ranges have what effect on a certain type of source.

I'm expected to know that for example, "warmth" on a vocal is often around the 250Hz mark. The point with the modes is that that information is in the plugin, and doesn't rely on the user to know - hence it's a good way to start learning that stuff, if you don't know it already... It also means that you don't need to worry about selecting frequencies for each band, as the modes do that for you - otherwise, you start going back to just being a regular 6-band EQ - obviously, the shift/lock thing might be a useful addition to a regular EQ as well, as you suggest...

[Kingston]

yeah, well I wasn't really thinking about beginners, but the extra global shift + lock mode to make a regular parametric EQ more of a power tool than it already is. The studio engineer book "preferred EQ ranges" are a highly subjective matter and I certainly don't agree with all of them, and they are also mix vs. source dependant, instead of purely source dependant.

[kylen]

Nice idea - a super sweeper! I'm in...the only thing I know of remotely similar to your "shift" idea was Elemental Eqium Harmonic filter - but the spacing between nodes was a fixed (odd/even/slope optional) harmonic progression off of the fundamental - still that was fun too.

[beej]

The studio engineer book "preferred EQ ranges" are a highly subjective matter and I certainly don't agree with all of them, and they are also mix vs. source dependant, instead of purely source dependant.

Yeah of course. To be honest, at that level, you will probably prefer a full parametric EQ anyway, but like I say, you could potentially edit the modes and/or create new ones ("Natasha Vocal", "Overdrive Bass" etc) with your own required freq/Q values, which would make it more versatile. Or maybe you could have an "expert" mode where the frequencies and Q knobs become visible?

I'm just seeing this as a nice self contained plugin which is easy to use, powerful enough for many purposes, a good learning tool, and with some unique features that make it worth playing with. Which sounds like more than enough good stuff for a plugin

[Majken]

Makes me think about the EQ included with the Focusrite Saffire card. It uses presets with 4-bands where you have stuff like body, air, strings and such as names next to the bands. Very useful for beginners. It doesn't do shifting of linked bands though.

/Majken

[lucasherrero]

Nice idea! Very useful

[Ronny Pries]

I think Waves had something in this regard to offer.

[dreamkeeper]

Anything out there that does something similar? Anything where I can shift an entire EQ curve up and down?

Posihfopit, Voxengo CurveEQ, Sonitus... basically any EQ that lets you select multiple points on the GUI.

Forget the preset approach. Even beginners are better off to learn it the hard way, those "rules" that are floating around as frequency charts are way too vague. There's just no shortcut to proper EQing, it's all about trial&error, eartraining and experience.

werner

[beej]

I think Waves had something in this regard to offer.

Hmm, I can't see anything in their catalog. I have the RenEq, which is 'just' a regular parametric, although it does have some setup libraries with useful frequency ranges. The Q10 is similar. The only EQ plugs they do that *aren't* regular parametrics is the Q-clone, which is a different thing entirely, and some other things like Maxxbass etc, so I'm not sure which Waves products you're thinking of?

[beej]

Posihfopit, Voxengo CurveEQ, Sonitus... basically any EQ that lets you select multiple points on the GUI.

Yep, that would be the effect, just with a different interface. That's a good point though, I think you can select multiple points on the RenEQ, so I can go have a play with what it sounds like. Cheers for that...

Forget the preset approach. Even beginners are better off to learn it the hard way, those "rules" that are floating around as frequency charts are way too vague. There's just no shortcut to proper EQing, it's all about trial&error, eartraining and experience.

Yeah I understand that. I was just thinking of an interface alternative to a traditional parametric, which everyone will probably already have in one form or another anyway. And people actually *do* ask for EQ presets bizarrely enough, but the "modes" shouldn't really be thought of as "presets", they are frequency ranges labelled in a real-world way - no cuts/boosts etc, just start points to quickly adjust common properties in a general way. And you could always unhide the frequency/Q knobs for more power tweaking if necessary

But I do see and agree on your point, and the feedback is definitely useful...

Edit: Just tried the multiple-points method on the RenEQ, it does work, and although having to select all the EQ points first is a pain (you can't rubber band them in this case, you have to shift click each one), and the display is small, it is kinda cool setting up wild curves and dragging them around, especially on really creative parts like percussion and guitars and stuff, where you sometimes just want some different options, rather than a conventional fixing/sweetening/mixing approach...

I do like the one-knob shift function though, as an interface alternative to dragging all selected EQ points around the display. Maybe even a vector joystick to control shift and overal gain might work as well...

[Christian Budde]

Also consider Electri-Q. It let's you select more than one band and these can be moved in completely in frequency. You can also lock either frequency, gain or Q.
Also you have different modes, although modes are different than the modes you describe.

[Kingston]

Edit: Just tried the multiple-points method on the RenEQ, it does work, and although having to select all the EQ points first is a pain (you can't rubber band them in this case, you have to shift click each one)

Indeed. it would be far more elegant with a dedicated knob/slider with the possible lock button for each band. That would also open up some cool automation possibilities.

By the way, this idea is implemented for gain in PSP MasterQ. I seem to recall it allows for very speedy global gain inversions, boosting/cutting everything further (all bands simultaneously), or anything inbetween.

[loopdon]

Makes me think about the EQ included with the Focusrite Saffire card. It uses presets with 4-bands where you have stuff like body, air, strings and such as names next to the bands. Very useful for beginners. It doesn't do shifting of linked bands though.

/Majken

i was thinking of that one, too