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Old 12-08-2019, 12:38 PM
AcousticDreams AcousticDreams is offline
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Default Frequencies that make a guitar Stand out in Recording

I find that many modern day Pop recording engineers tend to simplify the recording of an acoustic guitar.
There is some justification for this of course. In a mix where you have Voice, Drums, Bass guitar, Violins, cello & Flute and Acoustic guitar, considerations must be made so that everything is heard in the mix . So instead of capturing the full range of the acoustic guitar, they target the frequencies that make it stand out the most. They do this by boosting or cutting specific frequency ranges.
But now there are so many exotic woods combinations, so many new body & bracing styles. New String technologies. New digital abilities to capture a wider range of dynamics and clarity of frequencies. Some would declare that these new guitars offer More Harmonics, sustain, bloom than there previous factory industry standards.
But many engineers are still locked into the old standards.
This is a very interesting chart put out by sweetwater.

Maybe it is just the terminology..but I am surprised at some of their classifications.
Bloom seems to be in the 50 to 100 hz range
Body is listed in the 200 to 300 Hz range
Presence is of no surprise...listed in the 2k to 5k range.
But there is no mention of Higher frequencies...that might show off the harmonics, sustain, of our modern day Acoustic guitars. I would think would would be very important to acoustic guitar recording.
Especially If Acoustic guitar & Voice were the featured instruments in a pop recording.
What are your thoughts on This charts evaluation of Acoustic Guitar?
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Old 12-08-2019, 02:15 PM
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Bob Womack Bob Womack is offline
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This comes up pretty often when I'm teaching mixing. When a new engineer is learning to mix, he tends to want to make everything sound the best that it can when he listens to it alone on solo. It isn't long before he discovers the limits of spectrum management.

The biggest challenges in ensemble recording are the buildups of frequencies from instruments with overlapping frequency spectra. Reality is reality. Bass, kick drum, piano, guitars, and voice, all fight for the high bass and midrange bands. The snare, hi-hat, cymbals, and acoustic guitar all vie for the same high-frequency bands. It has little to do with "old standards" and a lot to do with available spectra and pile-up.

The only ways to keep the mix from turning into a mush when the ensemble is playing are to carve out the bass and mids in some of the instruments and to geographically isolate the highs. You can partly do the carving with mic selection but you'll probably end up doing it with EQ as well. You do the geographic isolation with panning - putting the hi-hat and guitar on opposite sides of the stereo field, for instance.

What is modern is that automation allows us to dynamically change the EQ between solo section and ensemble sections. I can have a full-voice acoustic guitar when it is predominant or solo and can use various forms of automation in the DAW to have it retreat, not only in volume but in tone and bandwidth, so it meshes with the rest of the ensemble.

By the way, where is the piano in that graphic? Before mic selection and EQ comes duct tape with pianists. You have to duct tape their left hand to the piano bench to make room for the bass guitar.

I hope that helps a wee bit.

Bob
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Old 12-08-2019, 03:55 PM
AcousticDreams AcousticDreams is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bob Womack View Post
This comes up pretty often when I'm teaching mixing. When a new engineer is learning to mix, he tends to want to make everything sound the best that it can when he listens to it alone on solo. It isn't long before he discovers the limits of spectrum management.

The snare, hi-hat, cymbals, and acoustic guitar all vie for the same high-frequency bands.

What is modern is that automation allows us to dynamically change the EQ between solo section and ensemble sections. I can have a full-voice acoustic guitar when it is predominant or solo and can use various forms of automation in the DAW to have it retreat, not only in volume but in tone and bandwidth, so it meshes with the rest of the ensemble.

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I hope that helps a wee bit.

Bob
Great info Bob. A whole lot more than a wee bit..I especially like the info about Automation and being able to bring up the desired instrument during solo's.
As you know...all of us at the AGF are probably a bit biased towards acoustic guitar, and therefore want as much of out it as we can. In so many pop recordings...Acoustic guitar is not much more than a wonderful Rhythm section.
On occasion though, there are those tunes where the acoustic guitar is every bit as important as the vocals. In fact The song is defined not only by the melody and vocals..but by the acoustic guitar. Usually those songs have Lots of breathing time for the acoustic. What I mean by this..is Drums and bass are either limited...or they come in heavier at different times...leaving room for the Acoustic guitar to shine. As just one example might be "Behind Blue Eyes" And in yesteryear other artists like CSTNY where the guitar took on a character of a symphony in some instances.
These would be the kind of songs I am asking about. Where there is room for all of the frequencies at given points...to shine because of the way the song is written.
In this regards Bob, do you feel like the Chart is complete on Acoustic guitar? I think I am starting to understand..the Chart is just mean to give us an indication of what are the most important-influencial frequencies. Not all the frequencies...but just what is considered the most important frequencies to be heard in the mix.
As I mentioned before...Today modern Acoustics-new strings might have a bit more on the top end than in yesteryear.
I have heard over and over again..engineers talk about AIR on vocals. Obviously this is important as once again the chart does confirm this. Just hard to believe that there is not some Air with acoustic guitar as well.
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Old 12-08-2019, 04:08 PM
runamuck runamuck is offline
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If it's finger style guitar you're referring to, James Taylor's recording are good examples of excellently mixed recordings, in my opinion. Their success is due to both how he plays in different parts of a song as well as, I would guess, automated volume and EQ. At times the guitar is front and center and at others, hard to hear his guitar at all.
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Old 12-08-2019, 06:24 PM
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When I am looking for air on an acoustic I'll gently lift the upper frequencies with a shelf EQ rather than a peak/dip EQ. The turn point might be around 7.5k but I do my EQ pretty nearly intuitively, not really watching the numbers.

Bob
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Old 12-08-2019, 06:47 PM
Scott Whigham Scott Whigham is offline
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Funny. I was just thinking about this exact thing today. I love charts and mnemonic devices that simplify complex topics like this one. Thanks for sharing.

My pre has a four band EQ and today I spent a few hours w closed back headphones auditioning best sounding mic positions and possible EQ choices for tracking. I was pretty surprised at a few freqs - adding dB made the solo instrumental guitar push way forward vs subtracting them made it sound much farther away. 3k, 800k, and 400k were big difference makers for me. It’s a new pre/EQ so I’m afraid I did a poor job of remembering specifics though. I plan on spending a ton of time over next few weeks just trying to understand this exact topic because to my ears “forward in the mix” is exactly what I prefer.
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Old 12-08-2019, 09:43 PM
AcousticDreams AcousticDreams is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Scott Whigham View Post
Funny. I was just thinking about this exact thing today. I love charts and mnemonic devices that simplify complex topics like this one. Thanks for sharing.

My pre has a four band EQ and today I spent a few hours w closed back headphones auditioning best sounding mic positions and possible EQ choices for tracking. I was pretty surprised at a few freqs - adding dB made the solo instrumental guitar push way forward vs subtracting them made it sound much farther away. 3k, 800k, and 400k were big difference makers for me. It’s a new pre/EQ so I’m afraid I did a poor job of remembering specifics though. I plan on spending a ton of time over next few weeks just trying to understand this exact topic because to my ears “forward in the mix” is exactly what I prefer.
Look forward to hearing your final Thoughts-Results.
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Old 12-09-2019, 08:01 AM
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As counter intuitive as it may sound and somewhat related to what Bob mentioned

Cutting the lows with a high pass somewhere from 150 - 50 hz can often help clear up mix , and make the acoustic a bit more detailed , whether a big mix or just a voice and guitar
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Old 12-09-2019, 08:37 AM
MikeBmusic MikeBmusic is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Scott Whigham View Post
Funny. I was just thinking about this exact thing today. I love charts and mnemonic devices that simplify complex topics like this one. Thanks for sharing.

My pre has a four band EQ and today I spent a few hours w closed back headphones auditioning best sounding mic positions and possible EQ choices for tracking. I was pretty surprised at a few freqs - adding dB made the solo instrumental guitar push way forward vs subtracting them made it sound much farther away. 3k, 800k, and 400k were big difference makers for me. It’s a new pre/EQ so I’m afraid I did a poor job of remembering specifics though. I plan on spending a ton of time over next few weeks just trying to understand this exact topic because to my ears “forward in the mix” is exactly what I prefer.
Wondering what you meant by '800k' and '400k' (800,000Hz and 400,000Hz? Even dogs don't hear that high!)
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