Headphone mixing

[laputa_sync]

anyways i have edited it.

[JeffreyCreel]

Thank you, sync. You're a nice guy too.

[AKJ]

@jeffrey: one last effort to explain the contradiction in your argument. to put 2 items in a hirarchy they must be comparable in regard of a category. let's refer to the guitar/banjo example. one could compare the 2 for example in regard of loundness and then come to the conclusion that either the banjo or the guitar is louder. but if we compare them in regard of sound we cannot objectively put them in a hirarchy if we suppose that they have a different sound character. one can have an aesthetic preference for the one or the other, but that's it. with headphones vs speakers it is a similar case since they differ eg in the way they represent stereo. you cannot say that one has a better stereo represenation than the other, they are different. when I mix using speakers and adjust the reverb level and steoreo distribution and eveything seems to be fine, but then switch to the headphones, I might realize that when listening in headphones to that mix it seems a little too wet. so what I would have to do is find a compromise.

[where02190]

when I mix using speakers and adjust the reverb level and steoreo distribution and eveything seems to be fine, but then switch to the headphones, I might realize that when listening in headphones to that mix it seems a little too wet. so what I would have to do is find a compromise.

One more reason not to mix in headphones, they will always exaggerate efx.

[MacZero]

I love to write music listening thru my headphones, it's so enjoyable (i have senn's). I try my best to limit the volume so to keep my ears fresh, and always referance with my monitors and crapy computer speakers along the way, for almost every change. Easy to do with a mixing desk. That's because I know my headphones sound very different to a speaker in a room, for the points stated through-out this thread. Even if they were perfectly truthful frequency wise, theres the sterio width issue, the room ambeince, the natural compression of the inner ear, etc etc.

So my simple advice is if you like mixing with phones (not a crime) make sure you have some speakers in the room with you to referance with.

[AKJ]

when I mix using speakers and adjust the reverb level and steoreo distribution and eveything seems to be fine, but then switch to the headphones, I might realize that when listening in headphones to that mix it seems a little too wet. so what I would have to do is find a compromise.

One mroe reason not to mix in headphones, they will always exaggerate efx.

obviously, you are misunderstanding the point. a lot of people will listen to your music through phones, so in order to hear what they might hear you have to check and adjust. unfortunately, this means you have to comprimise. the perfect solution would be to make different mixes for headphones and stereo speakers and 2.1 systems etc.

[JeffreyCreel]

AKJ your argument isn't relevant to what I said. I didn't say that they were so different that they can't be compared. I said that they were different WHEN JUDGED ACCORDING TO A COMMON STANDARD RELEVANT FOR MIXING. There is no contradiction there. You're just wrong.

In your guitar banjo example, I can compare the sounds even though they're very different. IT all depends on the standard I set. If I'm looking for a certain register, I have a quantifiable standard - if I'm looking for a certain decay on the notes, I have a quantifiable standard. I'm not really that well acquainted with accoustic instruments, so my examples are going to be kind of lame, but I hope you get the gist of what I'm saying.

Think about waht you're saying. Reality check. If headphones and speakers weren't different at all, we couldn't compare them, and now you're saying that because they're different we can't compare them. Not everything is subjective and relative to taste. The difference between them is not aesthetic.

And with your reverb example - if you mix it in the right monitoring environment and you have a consistent listening technique, you're never going to mix something that sounds good on the monitors and bad on the headphones.

[JeffreyCreel]

let me clarify, you're free to the opinion that the differences between them are aesthetic, but don't attribute that to me and call it a logical contradiction when I disagree with you.

[jkotz]

First off, thanks Chase.
Second, Reverse Engineer, laputa_sync's original empty post was annoying enough; what was the point of quoting it?
Whatever, back to the discussion.

as far as I know I was talking about the auditory illusions that headphones cause (are the sounds really coming from inside your head? Or is it an illusion?)

When looked at like this, mono playback through a single speaker is the only method of playback that wouldn't cause an auditory illusion. The whole purpose of stereo recording and playback is to create an illusion.

About the whole "art" issue. The headphones argument is purely technical, unless you consider sound reproduction to be your art.

I always considered the entire process of performing, recording, and reproducing music to be a form of artistic expression. Certainly there's a lot of technical knowledge involved, but the same can be said of painting, photography, or sculpture.

If I want to communicate what I hear in my head to my listeners as transparently as possible, I'd better learn how to mix properly. Since I'm somewhat interested in making such an attempt, it makes sense to get the fine points of mixing "ironed out" so to speak.

This is true, but if you approach mixing as a purely technical task, I'd be surprised if the mixes turn out to sound anything more that dull, flat, and lifeless.

Now, I'm not sure whether "portability" is really subjective as you say. I'm not an engineer so I don't want to get into fine semantic distinctions, but it's my impression that portability would have to do the amount of information retained (not distorted or lost) across platform changes.

Yeah, you could probably come up with a methodology for quantifying this. I seriously doubt it would even approach being practical though. There are simply to may variables involved.

But if I can mix in an environment where such phase/stereo resonance problems would be apparent, I can fix them with little to no audible effect on the headphone's sound.

Sure, if you want to mix in an anechoic chamber, because that's the only place you're going to hear problems like that without the acoustics of the listening environment coming into play.

In my eyes, my stereo mixed music would be quantifiably more "portable" than your headphone mix because I can only listen to yours on headphones, but I can listen to mine on both headphones and speakers.

You seem to have missed the bit where I said I do 60-70 percent of my work on 'phones. That still leaves 30 or 40 percent of the mix process being done on stereo and mono monitors (not to mention the mastering process). In any case, there is no guarantee that your mix will sound good over headphones if it works over speakers. It could be thin in the low end without the psychological effect of "feeling" the bass. All those cool stereo effects could end up just being annoying when heard binaurally. Any number of problems can ruin a mix once you listen to it over headphones. It's the same as any other change in the listening environment. I'm not trying to say that headphones are a better "overall" mixing platform when compared to speakers. All I'm saying is that a good pair of 'phones is important for the mixing process, and that it would be silly to dismiss them out of hand because of some notion that speakers in a treated room are the perfect tool for mixing. Saying that either speakers or headphones are "better" across the board makes about as much sense as saying a flat brush is better than a round brush for painting watercolors. It's a situational dependency. There is no such thing as perfect, only what works in a given set of circumstances.

By the way, if you'd like to hear some examples of stuff that was mixed for headphones but sounds good over speakers as well, two albums come to mind:
Phantasma by the Japanese artist Cornelius, and Universal Mother by Sinéad O'Connor.


I also want to address something you said in a different post.

I'm saying that there's quantifiably less information given by headphones.

I would very much like to see evidence supporting this.

[laputa_sync]

Second, Reverse Engineer, laputa_sync's original empty post was annoying enough; what was the point of quoting it?

[JeffreyCreel]

I would very much like to see evidence supporting this.

Yes, so would I. Unfortunately, I've spent so much of this thread merely defending the fact that the position I've outlined CONSTITUTES an internally consistent opinion, that I'm WAY too fatigued by the topic to actually do any hard RESEARCH to support that opinion. At this point, I'm willing to concede pretty much any point to anyone who so much as asks.

Which makes sense, considering I started this thread with a question, not a statement.

I just can't stand for the things I say to be attacked semantically rather than based on the content. I really hope what I'm saying is coming through clearly. an "opinion" as I've voiced it is merely a point of view that, given the proper evidential conditions, is a PLAUSIBLE account of reality.

I'm glad at least though that you recognize that what I've said is plausible or in some way defensible.

[lonewolf]

Have u guys seen the cm masterclass feat mistabishi, he composes and mixes nice drum'n'bass with the beyerdynamic headphones. so if he can achieve a good club banger on phones then y cant anyone else eh? any system has its downfalls at the end of the day, and also in my case it is unfeasable to blast music thru monitors for hours due to neighbours and what not. well thats my 2 cents anyway

[bduffy]

Wow, I still had a job when this thread was last posted in!