The guys at the Benztownbranding Blog posted a great tip this week about the amount of bass you have in your final mix if you’re an audio producer. Now many of you may not be hands-on audio guys, so maybe skip this post. But for those who are – their blog raised a couple of interesting points. You can read it in full here.

One thing that is definitely key is the amount of bass you have in your final mix. Every piece you add in to a promo or imaging piece will have differing amounts of bass frequency. The more you add, the more is added to your final mix. And of course, the more that happens, the louder it gets and the harder to hear the overall piece clearly.

The key to any piece is using the frequencies to find places for all your elements. Something I was taught by a great producer, Linc Kelly, was how you can easily scoop out a place for your Voiceovers by cleverly scooping out a certain frequency in music to let the VoiceOver cut through more cleanly. Equally, when you come down to the master channel, or maybe the aux that you route each VO into, you need to to ensure that you roll off some of the bass at the lower end (in the frequencies that most normal radio listeners won’t hear). If you find your VO has too little bass, there are plug in such as Waves MaxxBass which add “pseudo bass” without adding much bass to the resulting sound.

One other basic tip (a bit Production 1.01 but relevant nonetheless) is to ensure you are monitoring your final mix through smaller speakers than your huge studio monitors. Either have a smaller pair of monitor speakers that emulate a domestic hifqi, or even , plug in a pair of headphones and listen through them whilst they are lying on your desk turned up – they’ll emulate a small bedside radio. When I first started producing, I’d listen via the monitor speaker on an old Studer Reel to Reel machine – but doubt any studio or radio station even has one of those lying around these days!

I’m no engineer – I’ve picked up my skills through years of doing and reading – but if you’re new to the game, you’ll find loads more tips on the Benztown Branding blog and others beside. Do take a look around – you never know what you might find..

Related articles

• How to EQ Bass Using These Little Known Harmonic Secrets (thepantherlabmusic.wordpress.com)
• Why is this track mixed with the bass out of the left channel, instead of center? (gearslutz.com)