seems like 313 has become a gear list latly. i think
that off-topic mails
(including this one) are 85% of the discussion this
last weeks.. : ]
----- Original Message -----
From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <313@hyperreal.org>
Sent: Friday, December 06, 2002 11:48 AM
Subject: (313) headphones for monitoring?
On Fri, 06 Dec 2002, Simon M Pascoe wrote:
does anyone have any recommendations for quality
headphones for monitoring (ie; not DJ headphones)
please ?
sImon Pascoe
***Simon: Sony's MDR-V600 are good headphones,
and
thus good for any type of listening. But, I would
strongly caution you against producing only with
headphones. If you produce with just headphones,
your
brain and your ears will work together to make
things
sound better than they really are and
psychoacoustically fill in the sonic holes. Then
when
you play something on a speaker system that you've
produced while monitoring on headphones, you will
find
that your balances will be off (too much/too
little of
different frequencies). I broke this rule a month
or
so back and it was obvious: I had been working on
a
remix for Tristan (Phonopsia) and decided to play
with
my rough version during a live PA. All was
sounding
great till I dropped in the bassline I had created
and--even over the club's system--it just wasn't
cutting it. Turned out that I had done the
bassline
one night while my girlfriend was over; she was
really
tired and had gone to bed, and I was working on
headphones so as not to disturb her. So the rest
of
the remix, that which had been done on monitors,
was
fine, but the balance, because I had done it on
headphones, wasn't all that it was cracked up to
be
because my ears and my brain had made it sound
better
and more "right" than it really was. (Over the
headphones, it was like "wow, this is a sweet
bassline"; over the club speakers--and mind you,
everything else sounded great--it was like "uh,
what
the hell is this?") Note to Tristan: Don't
worry,
I'll be fixing this! :) So, if you want to get a
bit
of work done--say late at night--and don't want to
disturb room mates/partners with your work, use
the
headphones to get some rough work done (editing
sounds,
things like that that aren't frequency and
balance-based) and not disturb them, but it is
best to
use monitors and headphones when getting into
EQing,
mixdowns, mastering, etc-- monitors to get the
balances
right, and then headphones later to listen to the
quieter and more detailed parts, fade outs, listen
for
unwanted clicks, errors, etc, and fine tune 'em.
Hope
this helps. Take care. Andrew
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