No Andy, it's called ability, training and talent 'grin'.
Just like people can see colors and differences, ;your ear can hear
different frequencies, or some folks can.
If you have any ability there, you can train ;your ears by practice
to hear them.
Working with a parametric and or graphic eq, you can find offending
frequencies and taylor them to fit better, or enhance others to be
more prominent, etc.
This is what an engineer does, and your exactly right, making
instruments and vocals sit in a mix with proper eq is one of the very
fundamentals of getting a great sound.
I'll give you a hint.
Equalizers work better on cut than boost, that is they are better at
pulling out too much of a bad frequency than they are at boosting not
enough of frequencies you want.
so when you are first using an eq, you should do as much as you can
to eliminate the bad stuff.
Try first with a simple tool like a 10 band graphic, rather than a
parametric, parametrics can be tricky, and are more advanced,
but take a broad band signal like a full mix or even just a vocal and
pull down different bands, and see what effect it has on them.
here are more hints, and we'll ;use a vocal for an example because
it's one of the most troublesome things to eq right.
Most anything below 100 hertz on a vocal won't be heard, maybe some
subtle harmonic re-enforcement but that's all, and probably a lot of
noise down there, depending on your gear and room.
From 100 to 350 are your low mids, the warmth in your vocal,
but can also be where the mud is, so cutting this down can make your
vocal stand out more, from 500 to 2k is the mid band, that's your
telephone effect, but also some of your mid band clarity, and needs
special attention.
From 3k to 6 k is your vocal definition and clarity, but can also
make it harsh,
and also have some sibalance s sounds, especially around the 6k
range, so using a d s compressor can help a lot, I like a bright
vocal to stand out in a mix, but then when i get it bright enough, i
get too much sibalance, so the d s procesing fixes it.
An;ything above 8k is what we call air, or high shimmer, and can make
a vocal sound bigger and more full, open, but can also add hiss, and
also in the lower range of the 8 to 10k is also where some s
sibalance lives too, so care must be taken.
A basic 10 band graphic eq will give you a basic handle on these
frequencies and what they do, then ;you can get in to the wonder full
world of parametric eq and deal with q or width, shelves, peak dip or
band pass, and high pass and low pass and all those
goodies, you really get to do microscopic surgery then 'grin'.
I of course am available for low priced friendly tutoring any time,
I'm jus the guy for good value for not so deep pockets, and nothing
beats years of experience and lots of great mixes under the belt.
At 03:59 PM 7/9/2010, you wrote:
Hi.
I am reading a book that mentions that different types of audio,
mainly musical instruments and vocals sit in a particular frequency
range on an eq band. My question is: How do you tell what the actual
frequency range of an audio clip is in? I.E. I drop an audio
clip/track into Sonar (8.5.3). Now, before I change the frequency
ranges on it, how can I tell what its actual range happens to be? Or
is this just some guesswork?
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