EQ sweeping

Jimmy Hardin

Junior
Jan 29, 2013
314
0
16
Ok here is my situation. I did a festival this past weekend and one of the acts told me something like sweep the eq at 600 hz. now I stood there and looked at him like "HUH? How do you do that . so i turned down the 630hz on my eq. now I know i am not as smart as some of if not all of you but I definantly need some help here , What was he talking about and how do i do this? I may be doing it already and just dont know it , but i doubt it very seriously. so if someone could tell me how to sweep i would be so greatful. Oh and Please no Karate kid 3 humor about sweeping. LOL . For those of you that dont know. the student wanted to learn the sweeping technique in karate and the instructor went and got him a broom and showed him how to sweep. LOL :lol::lol::lol:
 
Re: EQ sweeping

Wrong term used by a musician trying to convey what they want, I guess it could happen! My guess is that they wanted less 600hz in something and at one time they had heard the term "sweep EQ".

when he said it I didnt know what he was talking about so i just turned down the 630hz. I guess he was trying to act lilke he knew what he was doing or something.
 
Re: EQ sweeping

I always use the term "sweeping" when referring to moving the center frequency of the EQ or widening or narrowing the "Q" or width. An example would be using a full 15db cut on the toms and sweeping the center frequency between 400hz and 500hz until the drum tone sounds the best.
 
Re: EQ sweeping

when he said it I didnt know what he was talking about so i just turned down the 630hz. I guess he was trying to act lilke he knew what he was doing or something.

I've never known "sweeping" to mean anything other than moving the centre frequency, which would be on a parametric EQ. Though how you "sweep" at a single frequency I don't know...

Chris
 
Re: EQ sweeping

When i setup my eq , the 400 and 500 Hz gets cut all the way off first thing. they have caused me mid trouble in the past so i just made it a habit to cut them off.
 
Re: EQ sweeping

I've never known "sweeping" to mean anything other than moving the centre frequency, which would be on a parametric EQ. Though how you "sweep" at a single frequency I don't know...

Chris

Me either. How would you cut sweep it on your Parametric Eq on the board?
 
Re: EQ sweeping

When i setup my eq , the 400 and 500 Hz gets cut all the way off first thing. they have caused me mid trouble in the past so i just made it a habit to cut them off.

the act might have been wondering why it sounded like a big hole in the low mid...
 
Re: EQ sweeping

Ok here is my situation. I did a festival this past weekend and one of the acts told me something like sweep the eq at 600 hz. now I stood there and looked at him like "HUH? How do you do that . so i turned down the 630hz on my eq. now I know i am not as smart as some of if not all of you but I definantly need some help here , What was he talking about and how do i do this? I may be doing it already and just dont know it , but i doubt it very seriously. so if someone could tell me how to sweep i would be so greatful. Oh and Please no Karate kid 3 humor about sweeping. LOL . For those of you that dont know. the student wanted to learn the sweeping technique in karate and the instructor went and got him a broom and showed him how to sweep. LOL :lol::lol::lol:

Well grassahoppa the talent was probably conflating the name and the action of the control. Likely referring to a mid-sweep channel EQ section, some premium consoles had multiple (hi-mid-low) sweepable EQ sections. Not full parametric but just the center frequency was adjustable.

Wax-on, wax-off.

JR
 
Re: EQ sweeping

Ok here is my situation. I did a festival this past weekend and one of the acts told me something like sweep the eq at 600 hz. now I stood there and looked at him like "HUH? How do you do that . so i turned down the 630hz on my eq. now I know i am not as smart as some of if not all of you but I definantly need some help here , What was he talking about and how do i do this? I may be doing it already and just dont know it , but i doubt it very seriously. so if someone could tell me how to sweep i would be so greatful. Oh and Please no Karate kid 3 humor about sweeping. LOL . For those of you that dont know. the student wanted to learn the sweeping technique in karate and the instructor went and got him a broom and showed him how to sweep. LOL :lol::lol::lol:

Not sure what the context is here. Was the band talking about the FOH mains, or were you working on the monitors at the time? My guess would be monitors, and someone was trying to guess the frequency they didn't like in their wedge. He may have believed there was a problem around 600. As a sound guy, I sometimes get musicians trying to tell me the frequency they think is bad. Sometimes they are close, sometimes not.

In a festival situation, you would normally have the monitors already set and dialed in to sound good. After that, major changes would normally not be done. As others have posted, 'sweeping' means starting at a certain frequency, boosting or cutting it, and then moving the frequency up / down near the starting point until you find the desired frequency that sounds best when cut or boosted.
 
Re: EQ sweeping

Not sure what the context is here. Was the band talking about the FOH mains, or were you working on the monitors at the time? My guess would be monitors, and someone was trying to guess the frequency they didn't like in their wedge. He may have believed there was a problem around 600. As a sound guy, I sometimes get musicians trying to tell me the frequency they think is bad. Sometimes they are close, sometimes not.

In a festival situation, you would normally have the monitors already set and dialed in to sound good. After that, major changes would normally not be done. As others have posted, 'sweeping' means starting at a certain frequency, boosting or cutting it, and then moving the frequency up / down near the starting point until you find the desired frequency that sounds best when cut or boosted.

yes it was a festival situation , i had everything dialed in and it sounded really good and no one was complaining about anything there. he was the only one that said anything about it.
 
Re: EQ sweeping

yes it was a festival situation , i had everything dialed in and it sounded really good and no one was complaining about anything there. he was the only one that said anything about it.
Often musicians will "say things" to make them feel as if they actually know something. It doesn't matter what you do-but they made you do "something" so they feel better about it.
 
Re: EQ sweeping

Often musicians will "say things" to make them feel as if they actually know something. It doesn't matter what you do-but they made you do "something" so they feel better about it.

I can Believe that. Thats what it felt like he was doing when he said it.
 
Re: EQ sweeping

yes it was a festival situation , i had everything dialed in and it sounded really good and no one was complaining about anything there. he was the only one that said anything about it.

this statement should have been in your first post

i would guess you are not 55 nor have you been at this
most of 4 decades...


guys like that get my undivided attention for
about 30 seconds [this is important]

couple of knob hovers while exhibiting your best
sound guy concentration face
bump the volume audibly [couple db, dont sting him... yet]
then look up with full focus on the muso
[you didn know you had to be a psychology major i guess]

when he says it's better take half your headroom back

you'r now a audio god

ultimately
if you only have one grief guy in a marathon day

...you win

fwiw
 
Re: EQ sweeping

When i setup my eq , the 400 and 500 Hz gets cut all the way off first thing. they have caused me mid trouble in the past so i just made it a habit to cut them off.

The issue there is most likely not a house EQ problem but rather a channel strip EQ problem. All kinds of nasty things tend to stack up in that range. Just about every mic on stage is picking up stage slosh in that range for starters. The next fact is almost every instrument has a fundamental tone or at least a harmonic in that range. Messy messy and that is before we factor in the Fletcher–Munson curve of human hearing boost in that range. The one thing you really don't want to do is cut those frequencies out of the lead vocal, that is where much of the fullness and body is. Pull it out of everything else if you do any cutting.

For starters pull out ALL of that range on the tom mics and everything below 10k on any drum overheads or hi hat mics you are using. This alone will clean up a noticeable amount of garbage in your mix. Ease a few db out of the snare drum at around 400hz until you are happy with the sound. This will leave the crack of the top and the body of the bottom intact and tend to step on the vocal less.

You can scoop out a few db on the guitars for vocal clarity in that range but I usually center the frequency for that between 500hz and 800hz depending on the guitar tone.

For kik drum I usually make the really deep cut somewhere centered around 240hz (which will reach up a little to the 400hz range depending on the Q). You are trying to get rid of the mud and flop just below that and the cardboard sound just above that while leaving the fullness and the attack.

These are just some starters that will help you clean up the mix a bit without putting a hole in the midrange. If you system is just hot at 400hz and 500hz then never mind.