Logic Pro 8 Getting Rid of Heavy Bass Bias in Logic

mmp

Logician
Hello everyone - I'm having a frustrating time getting a good treble / bass balance with Logic. I'm recording mainly piano settings with strings and the program seems VERY biased to a thick bass range making the piano to sound chunky and cheap. The string patches also seem biased this way.

I'm using headphones, ( I don't have monitors) and I've tried to correct for them, but E-Quing doesn't seem to take care of it much. I've been working with the Steinway patches as they seem to have the best sounds - but they're ALWAYS thick and heavy in the bass. On the side, the Yamaha and Bosendorfers, are too thin and tinny.

-Any suggestions how to correct for this?

THanks,
-Mark
 
Well, you might want to buy the new Focusrite headphone device that mimics the sound of many different speakers.( http://www.focusrite.com/vrm/ ) That should help you get a more realistic idea of the sound. Like ANY monitors, it is always good to reference to something you know and love to get some idea of how the phones really sound (they may well be what is making the piano sound bad).

As for EQ, try a high pass filter at about 120 hz, with a 6 or 12 db shelf. That should take any deep stuff and settle it down. You can also try this: take a parametric eq, and then take the Q, and make it very sharp. Then take the frequency and sweep it up and down until you find the tone you don;t want, and then by opening up the Q, and make it wider, then remove the frequency that is causing the boominess you don't want. Works great.

All that said, I have never noticed the bass being particularly boomy or heavy myself...
 
Upvote 0
Suggestion: burn a CD so you can audition the sound on car players, boom boxes and home audio systems. Go to a music store or home audio shop if you don't have any friends who have machines you can use.

You may have headphones that emphasize bass and low mids. The Steinway piano is well balanced. I use Sony's 7506 headphones, which are relatively flat, but room acoustics affect the sound. Sooner or later, you will need to check your mix in its intended listening space.
 
Upvote 0
You definitely need to reference your stuff to commercial recordings. If the commercial stuff is also bass heavy then you know it's your headphones. If the commercial stuff sounds "right" then you can try to mimic it in your recordings. Most closed back headphones are kind of bass/low mid heavy. An open back design will yield better results. I use AKG k702's and a benchmark dac1 d/a converter.
 
Upvote 0
Back
Top