Thanks man for the break down. It helps with video SEO if people watch the end of the video, and your post helps support my channel by helping people go deeper in. Thank you for that.

Terry Craig .... Haha your awsome

Absolute hero

Hey Ryan I was wondering if you could give some feedback with some of the tracks I've been producing. I really love your channel and I really like how you approach recording and mixing techniques in a scientific and explain it in a way that is easy to understand.

People like you deserve more in life!!!

+MARSHOMEWORLD Thanks man. Great point and very true. This was actually a one shot, one take video. First intro, and didn't quit. No edit at all. I just didn't have time to overproduce this week.

+MARSHOMEWORLD Definitely. But also for #5 composition and arrangement are pretty important. If you throw everything in without thought, its hard to mix, or if everythings playing in the same frequency range without holding any interest.... Mud is also a word used by composers/arrangers, so its not just an effect of mixing!

i have learned this the hard way. i recorded my own band only for about a year, and got decent results... started studying a lot and worked very hard. first two bands were mediocre that came in and they were my first paid jobs... i was frustrated... i couldnt get it to sound good. i was more focused on fixing timing and dynamic issues i couldnt focus on the song as a whole... then a band came in this weekend and nailed it... i went from spending 20 hours on mixing to 5 hours tops... and it sounds amazing. i thought it was me, but it wasnt!!!! it was the musicians.

Before they are ready to record, they should make sure that it's worth recording. Unless it's just evaluating their practice session, which they can do with a handheld zoom/Tascam.

Haha, this is so true. Sad, but true. You can't make chocolate out of shit, said one of my "mentors". Well, nowadays you sometimes can, with drum samples, melodyne and audiowarp, but of course that's a lot of extra work for the mixing engineer.

Except he's talking about the recording process itself: capturing the audio. You're talking about another subject, namely arrangement.

Thanks Dean!

+Sam Lyons Haha, thanks!

+Greg Patterson Thanks. Yeah, I agree totally. I was more referring to the 1-3k range when I said to not EQ the mids. Of coarse, if sounds didn't need EQ in the first place, that would be amazing.

What about a slight boost around 5K is that good to do?

Thanks man!

Thanks! I hope you've been well!

Snare drum!

+Smile Always Thanks!

+Gregor Bajc Yeah, those curves are good to know, but many engineers wouldn't draw those conclusions. Your right in that certain freqs would have to be boosted to be perceived the same as 1k, but many professionals before me say that 83dB is about right, and maybe lower in order to decrease the illusions that happen to our ears at high volumes. Volume is just a tool, meaning that we use loud and soft volumes of the monitors to help get the job done.

Thanks!

I thinks the D190E.

Yeah D190E that's the one! What do you think its best for recording in your studio?

It's kinda mid range heavy. I haven't used it that much but I remember it sounded a little less bass than a 421.

Me too! Nice mic.

+powerinformation Yes, I like the sm7b for it's mids. I also like the nt2000, and the r84 (angled down slightly and 12 inches out) for it's mids.

Thanks a lot your videos are great, I watched a bunch more after this comment, two mics that I've become interested in from watching more of your lessons are the electrovoice 635a and the neumann km184

Yeah that's the AKG D190e I think.

+blood lord (Chaotic Sonics) Haha yeah, I'm always like "Serious, who does eq like that!".

Yeah, I would take it on up to about 5k. So anything between 500 to 5k is where I try to be real easy on EQ. From there I try to take some off the lows or highs to shape sounds. When using outboard it's more forgiving, and I've learned you can take things a lot further and it doesn't sound bad. For me when I'm recording, I listen to sounds at a low volume. I use mics that are not too crazy and pick up sounds from the perspective of getting good mids. So a 414, ribbon, or even something like a sm7 or sm57 would be a mic I'm really confortable with and you can use mic positioning to get sounds. I listen a low volume to make sure I like it, and always consider how it will be used in the mix to help determine the sound I want in the first place. In my mix challenge, most students would have made better mixes by not EQing at all. Most over EQed the mixes which led to problems. For me I learned by mastering one or two mics, and then slowly building the collection. That was my roots on how to record. Get out of my chair and fix it at the mic. I think if you cut there in the mids, that's better than boosting in that area. There are times where I cut in the mids, like for snare, or a very cutting 3k in a guitar, but mostly I try to leave it alone as much as possible. Sometimes for vocal I'll do a very small bump at 3k using the UAD 1073 just to help it cut through the mix.

I liked your metaphors from BBQ to paintings. I will focus on midrange and thanks for your help with my learning curve.

Yeah, by all means use EQ when needed. The better EQ that you have, the more you can use it and still get good results.

Thanks, real glad to have you here!

+creativesoundlab you're welcome bro. hope to learn a lot from you and your channel ☺

+Alva Goldbook Yeah, it's amazing how one piece of gear can make a big difference like that. I think of it like a journey, the more I use my gear, the more I can hear a different when I switch something out like the converters, pres, or microphone.

creativesoundlab I got a little lucky piecing together my budget studio. I managed to find an old Sound Craft mixing board from the 90's that had been unused. The master section on it is pretty lousy sounding, but each channel sounds pretty nice, and works well as a nice mic pre and EQ. I send out from each channel to the presonus. A have a few other mic pres like a UA LA-610 MkII, which I really like for using on bass. That board and the presonus made a world of difference in the quality of my recordings.

+Alva Goldbook That's cool. I had a friend lend me his Sound Craft Spirit Studio for a while. The pre amps in it sounded a lot different than the ones I was used to using and I was really surprised at the different sonic quality. For me, they were missing the low and low mids, and I didn't want such a curve ball. Not in a bad way, but I would have taken time to adjust to the new vibe when I already had a "sound" of my own engineering.

creativesoundlab cool. Mine's a Delta SR. I do prefer to use it on vocals, and guitars, especially distorted guitars. I've found it a bit lacking on drums, but I'm forced to work in a really horrible room. The ceiling is only 7 feet 6 inches high!

+Alva Goldbook Very cool. I think whatever gear and situation you have, you'll learn to make it work. Sometimes your sound and style will shape around what limitations you have, but this is also apart of how creativity works too. I guess you saw my episode about the small drum room mixing? That was about your same ceiling height.

+Kevin Kelly Haha, yes. There are so many things we can compare food to audio.

+Travis Thomas Thanks!

Tom Doeven You've literally made the same point he made in this video, except you've pulled out one specific comment in relation to expensive microphones and disregarded everything else. He's saying it's easier to get good results with higher-end gear, but it's not impossible if you have lower end equipment to get good results too. In my experience, the correct microphone for the task is more important than how much it costs undoubtedly, but he is talking about his experience, not mine... The overall point though, was you shouldn't be held back by chasing better gear, because there are things you can adjust with what you have to get similar results.