19th January 2012
|
#1 | | Gear Head
Joined: Sep 2011
Posts: 40
Thread Starter | Reduced 19 and 20k frequencies in Serban Ghenea mixed tracks
I thought I would analyse the EQ of the chorus for three Dr Luke records which are all mixed by Serban Ghenea and compare them to mine. I noticed that all three records seem to have no or very little 19 and 20k frequency as can be seen in the attached screenshot.
When mastering my records should I shelve the highest frequencies as these appear to have been?
| 
|  | |
19th January 2012
|
#2 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2008 Location: NYC
Posts: 888
|
are these mp3/m4a/some other compressed format? or full quality wave files?
| |
| | |
19th January 2012
|
#3 | | Gear Head
Joined: Sep 2011
Posts: 40
Thread Starter |
They are all mp3 files downloaded from Amazon. Is that likely to be the reason? When the songs are converted to mp3 does it remove 19 and 20k frequency? I wondered if reducing the 19 and 20k frequencies was a trick mastering engineers were doing to give them more headroom to enable them to boost the loudness?
| |
| | |
19th January 2012
|
#4 | | Gear Head
Joined: Apr 2011 Location: London I think...
Posts: 43
| Quote:
Originally Posted by Ed Smith  They are all mp3 files downloaded from Amazon. Is that likely to be the reason? |  | |
| | |
19th January 2012
|
#5 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Mar 2008 Location: 3rd Stone From The Sun
Posts: 3,139
Verified Member  | Quote:
Originally Posted by Ed Smith When the songs are converted to mp3 does it remove 19 and 20k frequency? | 256 - 320 kbps typically can cut off around 19k
128 - 192 kbps around 15 - 16K
| |
| | |
19th January 2012
|
#6 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2005 Location: São Paulo/NYC |
sorry, i know we all have to learn that at some point...
reminds me of a client that was complaining about a mastering engineer - client was listening on his ipod, everything was converted to mp3
what's worse is that when i tried to explain, he thought i was giving him the runaround, just standing up for a colleague | |
| | |
19th January 2012
|
#7 | | Gear Head
Joined: Sep 2011
Posts: 40
Thread Starter | Quote:
Originally Posted by Waltz Mastering 256 - 320 kbps typically can cut off around 19k
128 - 192 kbps around 15 - 16K | Ah that would explain it then. Thanks for the info.
| |
| | |
19th January 2012
|
#8 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Aug 2003 Location: Hollywood CA
Posts: 3,010
Verified Member | Quote:
Originally Posted by Waltz Mastering 256 - 320 kbps typically can cut off around 19k
128 - 192 kbps around 15 - 16K | Looks like more RTA haters from here.
DC
| |
| | |
19th January 2012
|
#9 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Aug 2010 Location: New Jersey, USA
Posts: 1,508
|
thanks for the insight.
| |
| | |
19th January 2012
|
#10 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jan 2003 Location: Brooklyn
Posts: 1,113
Verified Member  |
A more interesting question is whether you see the same thing on a full resolution file.
| |
| | |
20th January 2012
|
#11 | | Gear maniac
Joined: Jun 2007 Location: Las Vegas
Posts: 277
|
you don't want anything going on up there, ideally. as far as i understand digital theory, frequencies close to 22khz can cause inharmonic distortion but after mixdown, most of the damage is already done. you should be able to minimize further distortion by applying an LPF before an ITB signal chain though.
| |
| | |
20th January 2012
|
#12 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Aug 2003 Location: Hollywood CA
Posts: 3,010
Verified Member | Quote:
Originally Posted by quantumpsych you don't want anything going on up there, ideally. as far as i understand digital theory, frequencies close to 22khz can cause inharmonic distortion but after mixdown, most of the damage is already done. you should be able to minimize further distortion by applying an LPF before an ITB signal chain though. | First, what frequencies are "allowed" is totally dictated by the sampling rate and second we don't just go around low-passing based on the analyzer picture.
DC
| |
| | |
20th January 2012
|
#13 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Mar 2006 Location: New York City | Quote:
Originally Posted by dcollins First, what frequencies are "allowed" is totally dictated by the sampling rate and second we don't just go around low-passing based on the analyzer picture.
DC | Agreed...although this is not what you're saying, it seems like to me ever since CD's there's far less scrutiny when it comes to pushing eq in mastering. I remembered watching a mastering engineer and he was pushing .5 dB at 56hz. For some reason i was surprised and asked why, he said because it sounds good, lesson learned.
| |
| | |
20th January 2012
|
#14 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jan 2007 Location: Melbourne - Australia's music capital. Verified Member | Quote:
Originally Posted by engmix I remembered watching a mastering engineer and he was pushing .5 dB at 56hz. For some reason i was surprised and asked why, he said because it sounds good, lesson learned. | If it's the unit I'm thinking of which includes a 56Hz setting then yes, I concur it often can (sound very good).
| |
| | |
31st January 2012
|
#15 | | Gear Head
Joined: Oct 2007 Location: Moscow |
He he!
Seems like that mixes was mastered with plugins that use antialias filtering. Earlier Softube plugs, Abbey Road Softube Plugs maybe...
__________________ Maxim Komov Producer, Mixing Engineer, Mastering
www.maxkomov.com
Skype: maxkomov
Facebook
Tel: +79057170009 | |
| | |
31st January 2012
|
#16 | | Lives for gear
Joined: May 2006 Location: Yaroslavl, Russia
Posts: 1,558
|
0.5 db still seems to be more of a placebo. if not, incredible monitoring chain accuracy
| |
| | |
4th February 2012
|
#17 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jan 2007 Location: Melbourne - Australia's music capital. Verified Member | Quote:
Originally Posted by DAH 0.5 db still seems to be more of a placebo. if not, incredible monitoring chain accuracy | At what bandwidth or Q factor?
| |
| | |
4th February 2012
|
#18 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Mar 2003 Location: Kuhmoinen, Finland
Posts: 788
Verified Member | Quote:
Originally Posted by DAH 0.5 db still seems to be more of a placebo. if not, incredible monitoring chain accuracy | 0.25dB is very audible here. But whether it, or 0,5dB is really needed, that's another story.
| |
| | |
6th February 2012
|
#19 | | Gear Head
Joined: Jan 2012
Posts: 57
|
To answer the actual question by the original poster. I know for a fact that in a lot of dance/ club music, the mastering engineer will low pass filter the high freq's so they drop off sharply after 18khz.
The point of this is to cut off frequencies that don't actually add anything to your mix. Chances are that the 18-20khz range will be spikey, just hiss or inaudible to most people and can therefore be taken away.
To all the guys who are saying that mp3's are cut off after x frequency. This was true, but the latest mp3 encoders write 320k so the frequencies go up to 22khz in the top end so don't be so quick to facepalm the guy.
| |
| | |
6th February 2012
|
#20 | | Gear nut
Joined: Sep 2010 Location: Basque Country, Spain
Posts: 116
| Quote:
Originally Posted by ZED Sounds To all the guys who are saying that mp3's are cut off after x frequency. This was true, but the latest mp3 encoders write 320k so the frequencies go up to 22khz in the top end so don't be so quick to facepalm the guy. | Abslutely.
Attached a 20kHz sine MP3 created directly from Reaper.
--
| |
| | |
20th August 2012
|
#21 | | Gear addict
Joined: Jun 2009 Location: Virginia
Posts: 323
|
dang it, i just recently figured out hi pass filtering on the master.. sucks that i didnt read this thread earlier. but it is pretty important in my opinion, without shelving the hi freqs, some things tend to get so sharp on different systems it knifes your ear drums.. ow i say..
__________________
MichaelKhan.com
| |
| | |
20th August 2012
|
#22 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Aug 2004 Location: Brooklyn, New York
Posts: 3,834
Verified Member |
Play some tones at 19kHz and 20kHz at 0dBVU for your system - and then tell me how important what you played just sounded to you. 
Best regards,
Steve Berson
| |
| | |
22nd August 2012
|
#23 | | Gear addict
Joined: Oct 2010 Location: Bucharest, Romania
Posts: 315
| Quote:
Originally Posted by Cellotron Play some tones at 19kHz and 20kHz at 0dBVU for your system - and then tell me how important what you played just sounded to you. | It'll sound important when they realize their tweeters have just blown.  | |
| | |
22nd August 2012
|
#24 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Aug 2010 Location: New Jersey, USA
Posts: 1,508
|
Ouch..
hey Th3_uN1Qu3 (whatever that stands for)
The same dracula "Romania"?
I'm getting ascared......
Vlad was locked in a dungeon for years.......wondering if he was thinking about frequencies while he was torturing cockroaches and mice.
| |
| | |
22nd August 2012
|
#25 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Dec 2008 Location: Nottingham
Posts: 1,397
Verified Member |
I have a 10Hz bandpass on this EQ in front of me, what do I win!??!
I also work exclusively in clicks of 0.5 and 0.25. Pretty standard in mastering.  | |
| | |
22nd August 2012
|
#26 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Aug 2010 Location: New Jersey, USA
Posts: 1,508
| | |
| | |
22nd August 2012
|
#27 | | Gear addict
Joined: Nov 2011 Location: Ohio
Posts: 446
| Quote:
Originally Posted by DAH 0.5 db still seems to be more of a placebo. if not, incredible monitoring chain accuracy | Definitely not a placebo. It may seem that way when boosting or cutting only one band of EQ, but when you make 3+ EQ changes of 0.5dB, it makes a noticeable difference. I actually find myself EQing less than 0.5dB at times.
Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk
| |
| | |
23rd August 2012
|
#28 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Aug 2004 Location: Brooklyn, New York
Posts: 3,834
Verified Member | Quote:
Originally Posted by Th3_uN1Qu3 It'll sound important when they realize their tweeters have just blown. | Nah - you can potentially smoke a cutter head doing that - but unless it's a p.o.s. tweeter that's destined to bust anyway - playing 20kHz tones at what should be in fact be amplitudes well in its tolerances shouldn't hurt a tweeter at all.
Best regards,
Steve Berson
| |
| | | |
New Reply 
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
