Re: Adjusting Peak, Average, Mean Curves -- Har-Bal Tech Tips and Suggestions

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Subject: Re: Adjusting Peak, Average, Mean Curves

Author:
Har-Bal

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Date Posted: 05:25:11 09/03/03 Wed
In reply to: kylen 's message, "Re: Adjusting Peak, Average, Mean Curves" on 12:12:47 09/02/03 Tue

>>I'm still learning how to
>>do that - front ending a multiband limiter (gain
>>reduction 1 or 2 dB) with a great parametric EQ (gain
>>reduction 1 or 2 dBb) like Har-Bal.
>
>Ooops, sorry about the typo - I meant dB, not dBb (not
>talking about 'B' weighting here - even though that's
>dBB I guess).
>
>Another thing about dynamics and peaks too. For my
>ears an offensive peak also depends on the ramp
>up/down times. Some fast peaks (some of these being
>referred to as transients) I wouldn't care about I'm
>sure. Some of the longer duration peaks do matter
>that's why I use an RTA with a 1 second average time
>and a 5 second decay time. I'm trying to better
>characterize these. Mindlessly pushing down a peak (
>on the Peak curve) is something I'm trying to avoid so
>I figure if I can hear something offensive and see it
>I'll push down on the peak (using EQ, dynamics
>processor, or both).

Well, there is one thing you should possibly bare in mind. If you have a large high Q peak in a spectrum it will be indicative of a resonance that lasts a long time. Likewise something more transient in nature will have a broad spectrum (low Q). So if you're adjusting out a sharp peak in the spectrum it is unlikely to be a transient.

What you should think about is what type of instruments you have in your recording and what there characteristics are. For instance, cymbals have a long decay time so will exhibit strong narrow resonances at the high end of the spectrum. If you try and flatten these out then you're effectively putting a dampener on the cymbal, which will ruin it's quality.

My piece of advice would be this. Peakiness is not a problem as such and you should only attempt to address narrow peaks if there is something obviously problematic in the recording when you listen to it. Only if it clearly sticks out in the spectrum and you can hear a problem should you try to control it.

Also, if there are few instruments in the mix be more conservative about what you change because it is highly likely that there will be holes in the spectrum simply due to a lack of instruments. Attempting to fill these is likely to destroy the character of the instruments.

Extending on this line of thinking you can see that you should be careful about how you use Har-Bal if you are using it to fix up tracks prior to mix down. This version of Har-Bal has been designed for the mastering phase. The optimum tool for your virtual mixing desk would need to be quite different.

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