I need help High Passing

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Scodiddly
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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by Scodiddly » Thu Nov 05, 2020 6:51 pm

floid wrote:
Thu Nov 05, 2020 10:19 am
But I've always had the impression that judicious/conservative hp during tracking was a good thing, and plenty of preamp manufacturers seem to think so... I wonder if there might be a difference between working to tape vs digital? As in, unnecessary lows having an effect on gain staging to tape?
I'm reasonably sure that most preamp manufacturers put one in because they need to check that box in the feature list.

And it can help with situations where there's too much LF for some reason or another, like not-quite breath pops in a vocal mic or a synth with way too much infrasonic output.

The Hamptone JFET pre I built recently doesn't have one, and I haven't missed it much. I did use a different preamp (one with phantom power!) on acoustic guitar and used the high pass to lighten up the guitar a little. For both I used a high pass when mixing, though.

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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by vvv » Thu Nov 05, 2020 8:09 pm

IME, pre-amp and even mic HPF's are good on vocals, esp. intimate vocals.

Both my UA's, my Summit and my Eureka have 'em.

Various FET and even tube mic's have 'em.

Old EV's, RE320, MD421's, SM7b ...

I use the pre HPF's first, sometimes also use the mic's when there is a choice.
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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by Scodiddly » Fri Nov 06, 2020 5:21 am

vvv wrote:
Thu Nov 05, 2020 8:09 pm
Various FET and even tube mic's have 'em.

Old EV's, RE320, MD421's, SM7b ...
Remember when mixing consoles *didn't* have high pass filters?

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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by vvv » Fri Nov 06, 2020 9:46 am

I've done 4-5 studio demos as a band member, auditioned or jammed in a recording studio mebbe 10 times.

I've been home-recording since mebbe '86 or '87, from Porta 2 to 238 to Br8 to DAW and R16.

But - no hands-on experience with mixing consoles other than the Alesis 1622 I had with the 238. It's still out in the garage (both) but I don't need to look to say it didn't have pass filters.
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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by chrisinthewest » Sat Nov 07, 2020 6:05 pm

markjazzbassist wrote:
Tue Nov 03, 2020 2:06 pm
In an effort to give the drums and bass more room in the mix and to help other instruments to have their space i bought a high pass filter to use. I've got some basic questions and would love to hear how you people high pass. Specifically:

Electric Piano - Rhodes, Wurly, Pianet, etc. I'm at a crossroads here because i feel like that low end is part of the inherent tone of the instrument. but then again i don't want it to steal space from my sacred bass. do you high pass this? If not why? if so what is a good frequency? 80HZ or 120hZ? or more like 30 or 50 just get rid of rumble?

Organ - Pretty much the same as above, i feel that low end is part of the tone. Do you high pass? If not why? If so what frequency are you finding to work?

Electric Guitar - I understand the need to high pass this, but i'm more looking for what's a good frequency.

Horns - I"m talking specifically about Tenor sax, which again low end is part of the gig. should i high pass? what freq? do you?

General - what is an general high pass frequency you use for lead work (synth, guitar)? is there a standard high pass you put on close to everything?


any and all comments are appreciated.
I’m someone who will high pass with dramatic intention when I want to have fun or chase a certain tone. I don’t fear the highest settings, 300 on a 1073 is so gorgeous to me sometimes, esp vocals. The wonderful thing for me, it allows the use very heavy low shelf boosts. The sound isn’t gone, it’s just rolled off. The boost of a low shelf can bring back the missing stuff but sound better than the original. And also a peak EQ can bring specific parts, so each track can judiciously be shaped around each other.

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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by Brian » Mon Dec 14, 2020 9:39 am

Scodiddly wrote:
Fri Nov 06, 2020 5:21 am
vvv wrote:
Thu Nov 05, 2020 8:09 pm
Various FET and even tube mic's have 'em.

Old EV's, RE320, MD421's, SM7b ...
Remember when mixing consoles *didn't* have high pass filters?
I do, and thats because either the mics did, or, you used an inline pad/filter, but, it was found to be much better to have pads and filters at or in the console where you could build a better circuit and the mic cord run was terminated, better high passing everything that came down the wire, lowering the noise floor for everything “0ut there, where the mf buffalo roam”.
Harumph!

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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by vvv » Mon Dec 14, 2020 9:51 am

I'm such a big fan of high-pass filters that I recently bought one for my bass board, which filter of course, I haven't had use for as I haven't used my 500w. 2x12"+ live bass rig in months. Now I think of it, I have never used the 2x12" Neo cab I bought in December last year, at all. :evil:
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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by permanent hearing damage » Mon Dec 14, 2020 4:08 pm

Phobos wrote:
Wed Nov 04, 2020 10:19 am
Does anybody high pass toms? 80 Hz? Maybe not the floor tom?
always. rack toms usually 60-70Hz ish. floor toms often around 50-60Hz. i am usually working with toms that are tuned pretty low.

i literally high pass everything except the kick drum on like 95% of my mixes. most things don't get cuts above like 70-80Hz, but (as always) that depends.

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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by drumsound » Mon Dec 14, 2020 9:21 pm

permanent hearing damage wrote:
Mon Dec 14, 2020 4:08 pm
Phobos wrote:
Wed Nov 04, 2020 10:19 am
Does anybody high pass toms? 80 Hz? Maybe not the floor tom?
always. rack toms usually 60-70Hz ish. floor toms often around 50-60Hz. i am usually working with toms that are tuned pretty low.

i literally high pass everything except the kick drum on like 95% of my mixes. most things don't get cuts above like 70-80Hz, but (as always) that depends.
I don't think I've even done more than a slight lo shelf cut on toms, and that is not often.

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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by losthighway » Tue Dec 15, 2020 6:43 am

I might high pass way down there on toms. The sub frequencies don't usually do much for a rack tom (it's mostly kick bleed), and occasionally it can focus a floor.

The main thing to me about toms is that depending on tuning they tend to resonate with the kick and/or snare a lot. Once in a while that really adds something nice, but in a busy rock mix with a deluge of racket coming out of lots of drums and cymbals I more frequently do volume edits and just get the toms out of the way when they aren't being played.

What about when you can hear the snare wires on the kick hits? Kind of cool sometimes right? Oh wait, we're talking about high passing.

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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by vvv » Tue Dec 15, 2020 10:15 am

losthighway wrote:
Tue Dec 15, 2020 6:43 am
What about when you can hear the snare wires on the kick hits? Kind of cool sometimes right? Oh wait, we're talking about high passing.
I was inspired to write about that here.
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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by drumsound » Wed Dec 16, 2020 11:43 am

losthighway wrote:
Tue Dec 15, 2020 6:43 am
I might high pass way down there on toms. The sub frequencies don't usually do much for a rack tom (it's mostly kick bleed), and occasionally it can focus a floor.

The main thing to me about toms is that depending on tuning they tend to resonate with the kick and/or snare a lot. Once in a while that really adds something nice, but in a busy rock mix with a deluge of racket coming out of lots of drums and cymbals I more frequently do volume edits and just get the toms out of the way when they aren't being played.

What about when you can hear the snare wires on the kick hits? Kind of cool sometimes right? Oh wait, we're talking about high passing.
I personally feel like the snare tone is better 99% of the time because of the tom mics.

Snare rattle drives me nuts. On gigs if I have more than 2 beats of not playing, I usually turn them off so there isn't rattle. On the other hand a buddy of mine in LA will sometimes up a snare IN the BD to get that sounds.

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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by losthighway » Wed Dec 16, 2020 11:53 am

drumsound wrote:
Wed Dec 16, 2020 11:43 am

I personally feel like the snare tone is better 99% of the time because of the tom mics.
I get that, especially when you're thinking about it as a couple of resonators that are subtly adding a little more of another frequency in sympathy with the snare hits. I think it's probably about cymbal wash management more than anything else for me. I record a lot of bashers.

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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by Nick Sevilla » Wed Dec 16, 2020 6:50 pm

floid wrote:
Thu Nov 05, 2020 10:19 am
But I've always had the impression that judicious/conservative hp during tracking was a good thing, and plenty of preamp manufacturers seem to think so... I wonder if there might be a difference between working to tape vs digital? As in, unnecessary lows having an effect on gain staging to tape?
Tape v. Digital, re: HiPass filtering.

Yes. With tape, we always had to watch our levels, on all frequencies, but especially the lows and highs. Because they can overload parts of the tape signal path in an unflattering manner, and ruin a recording.

You all need to remember that nearly all tape machines have solid state signal paths. Which can be easily mangled. when I was recording only to tape, the effort was to try to get a FAITHFUL recording, i.e. as accurate as possible. That meant filtering stuff out always, when it was not a part of the instrument's frequency range. That meant filtering out lows on everything except bass guitar / upright / cello (I would still use a 27Hz filter, only if they were never going to play down there), and kick drum. And even on some kick drums which were awful sounding, then yes, filter some out, and make it up later with a MAXXBASS or some other sub bass generator, from one and two octaves above what we got rid of.

You'd be surprised at the number of albums on vinyl that have all sorts of low end taken off, both during the mix, and/or the mastering.

With digital, it is more about the sound, but also the electronics. They too can get mangled by too much low or high stuff hitting them. Take care of your little bitty circuits...
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Re: I need help High Passing

Post by losthighway » Wed Dec 16, 2020 7:57 pm

Nick Sevilla wrote:
Wed Dec 16, 2020 6:50 pm


You'd be surprised at the number of albums on vinyl that have all sorts of low end taken off, both during the mix, and/or the mastering.
Totally. Listening critically to classic rock and roll and soul recordings from the 60's and 70's it's weird how things sound 'huge' but then you realize there's barely bass in the kick and bass guitar, it's more low mid, and the guitars have none of the girth of modern big rhythm guitars. It's like all of the space had to be shared in a narrower bandwidth, and they did it so well.

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