MIXING ON
HEADPHONES
A question that I often get from a lot my students is
whether they can mix on headphones. While monitors
have their own advantages, my answer is yes. There is
no hard and fast rule and as long as you understand and
recognise the frequency response of your headphones,
mixing on them can give you really good results, be it an
entire song, a voice-over or even some basic two track
effects laying. The cost effectiveness involved in mixing
with using headphones is also another important factor
to consider. The main aspects that you’ll have to consider
while mixing on headphones are
1. Portability
Well, many of us cannot afford to buy a pair of studio
monitors or have the appropriate space to accommodate
a pair at our home studio setup. As a result, investing
money in a trusty pair of headphones is the most logical
and, almost always, the cheapest solution to the problem.
Having a pair of headphones also allows you to mix and
produce on the go.
2. Being able to work, irrespective of the environment
Headphones are ideal for working in a scenario where
your room isn’t necessarily acoustically treated and/or
for working in a noisy environment. This gives you the
liberty to set up camp pretty much anywhere and start
working.
Here are some headphones that I would strongly
recommend for mixing and production purposes.
For recording or tracking, I’d highly recommend the
Sennheiser HD 280 Pro. Since they are closed back
headphones, they won’t bleed into your recording
microphone. Your other options are the KRS KNS 6400,
the legendary SONY MDR 7506, Extreme Isolation EX-29,
to name a few.
The Beyerdynamic 770 Pro will cost twice as when
compared to these other models but are
definitely worth the investment. They have a sound
isolation of up to 35db which makes them very good even
for a drummer. Another important factor to look for is
the frequency response range of the headphones. If you
have a wider range of frequency response, then y ou’ll be
able to make a better judgement while mixing. A pair of
headphones with a flat frequency response is preferred
so you can hear exactly what changes you are making to
your mix.
A lot of the cheaper headphones out there are often
heavily coloured, i.e may have a boost in the lows or a
scoop in the mids. An alternate solution for this is to
use headphone calibration softwares, like the one by
Sonarworks, which calibrates your headphones to give
you a rich frequency response for mixing.
Mixing on headphones might not be for everybody as it
purely depends on how you perceive the sound in your
headphones and how familiar you are with them. What
I have done is in the past 15 years is try a lot of mixes
on my headphones and playing it on different system
like my car, home music system or even a cellphone.
By doing this, you will surely find and understand
your headphones and how they respond to your mix.
This is the best course of action to get used to mixing
on headphones. And always remember to mix at lower
volumes so that your ears don’t get fatigued.
Author: Baba.L.Prasad. He is the owner and chief Sound/Mix and Mastering Engineer at Digi Sound Studio. He also teaches
Sound Engineering and Music Production courses. For more details, visit www.digisoundacademy.com
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