• Audio
  • Video
  • About
  • Blog
    • Published Work
    • Instructional Stuff
      • Audio Instruction
      • Music Business
      • Music Instruments
      • Music Genres
      • Programming And Such
    • Music Thoughts, Rants, Randomness
    • Production And Song Stories
  • Store
  • Contact
  •  

Mixing In Headphones – Is It Possible?

December 27, 2022 by Aaron Audio Instruction, Carvin Amps and Audio, Instructional Stuff, Published Work aaron trumm, can you mix with headphones, carvin, carvin amps and audio, diy mixing, home recording, home studio, home studio mixing, mixing, mixing in headphones, music, music tips, stage

This article was written originally for the blog at Carvin Amps and Audio. I repost it here, and encourage you to check out Carvin’s amazing line of products!

The days of every record being made in a commercial studio are long gone. In fact, some producers weren’t even born in those days. Now, productions are made everywhere from multi-million dollar studios to bedrooms to airplanes. With so many people making recordings on laptops and without high dollar monitors or proper acoustic treatment, it makes sense that more and more mixing is being done on headphones.

Twenty years ago, though, suggesting headphones as a viable alternative to a traditional monitoring environment would have been blasphemy. So, is it still improper? Or can you expect to get a great mix in the cans?

Lost In Translation

The main goal in the mix stage of a production is to make a mix that sounds great (whatever that means for you and the song) across different platforms. Granted, a song is not going to sound the same on an iPhone as it does in Wembley Stadium, but it should still sound “right”. In theory, it doesn’t matter how you get there. In fact, the most tried and true way of achieving great translation is to check mixes on various listening systems – including headphones.

What’s The Difference, Anyway?

In years past, it was considered a no-no to mix in headphones because of a few key differences in the way headphones and speakers deliver sound to your ears.

Crosstalk

The main difference here is something called “acoustic crosstalk”. Said simply, when you listen to a mix on a set of monitors, both ears hear both speakers. Because there’s a difference in timing between when sound from one speaker arrives at one ear versus the other, your brain can locate elements in the stereo image simply based on a volume difference between the left and right channels. This doesn’t happen in headphones, as each ear only hears its own channel.

So, one of the key problems with mixing in headphones is stereo imaging, which can sound very different on the different mediums. There are a few ways technology attempts to make up for this, like HRTF (head related transfer function) processing and binaural recording, to name a couple, but nothing to date quite measures up to a real live set of speakers.

Of course, this stereo “illusion” created by acoustic crosstalk is affected by reflections off nearby surfaces such as walls, ceilings, and even the desk. This is why most mixing rooms try to create a reflection free zone (RFZ) around the monitors and mix position.

If treating a room properly isn’t an option, creating a stereo image can prove even more difficult, and headphones may actually be the better option.

Minute Detail

Here’s a fact not often admitted by purists: we’ve always used headphones in the mix process (just not exclusively). The reason for that is you can certainly hear minute details in the mix better in a set of cans. The two best examples of this are edit points and reverbs.

Edit transitions quite often sound perfect in the room monitors and glaringly obvious in headphones. It’s always a good idea to check and get edits tight using headphones. Reverb levels, meanwhile, can be much easier to dial in using headphones. A common technique for subtle reverb sends on vocals that you want to sound natural is to put on the headphones, and dial back the reverb level until you can’t hear its there unless you turn it off. In the cans, turning the reverb off will be obvious, and now you’ve found your sweet spot.

Yes, It’s Possible

Without putting too fine a point on it, yes it is possible to achieve a great mix using headphones, even if headphones is all you have. You may need to adjust your technique a little, but it’s doable. A few things you may want to keep in mind for best success:

  • Use headphones that are designed for monitoring and have a flat response – preferably open backed.
  • Familiarize yourself with the sound of your headphones by listening to reference tracks.
  • Check mixes elsewhere – your car, your phone, earbuds, a friend’s studio, a boom box.
  • Mix at low volumes. This is true for traditional monitoring as well.
  • Try a frequency compensation plugin like SonarWorks Reference 4 or IK Multimedia ARC – just be sure to apply the plugins to your reference tracks as well.
  • Try acoustic simulation software such as Waves NX or a crossfeed plugin like Crossfeed EQ.

Just as in traditional mix monitoring, the main factor to consider is you. Practice, practice, practice and don’t give up until it’s great!


If you have questions or want to talk, just hit me up on Facebook @AaronJTrumm – or email me aaron @ aarontrumm.com

Back

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Latest Posts

  • 13 Books Every Musician Should Read Yesterday
  • The Abbey Road Trick and Friends
  • Start With the Drums: Cleaning Up Your Stage Sound from the Ground Up
  • 6 Tips for Audio Mixing on the Go
  • The Value of Real Musical Instruments in the Time of Computer Magic

Archives

  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • May 2022
  • February 2022
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • May 2020
  • March 2020
  • November 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • February 2018
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • October 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • February 2016
  • November 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • March 2009
  • February 2009
  • January 2009
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • July 2008
  • June 2008
  • May 2008
  • November 2006

Follow and Listen

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

2022 © Copyright @ NQuit Music –  All Rights Reserved – Website by nquit.com