Har-Bal Users Forum BBS

Hi ,

Last week i spent Ł500 and bought a new mic, the C414 XL. Its great!! I use this mic in my hallway and record acoustic guitars/vocals/etc, since the sound in my hallway has a nice openness with very high celling.

The main problem though is that the recordings are still sounding muddy and im spending lots of time afterwards, correcting and balancing the recordings the recordings.(not enough highs,too much lows)

Is it possible to use harbal to tune my hallway(eq it), then loading in the settings into my external eq for when i record with mics? (eq-TLAUDIO 5013 dual valve). How would i go about this? Ive recorded a minute of atmosphere from the hallway (noone playing/singing) and have loaded the wav into harbal....Now im kinda stuck...Do i just eq to taste or is there a particular way to do this?

thanks

I believe the method would require you to set a monitor out in your hall, generate some pink noise and record that with your mic of choice.

Then by analyzing this recording with Har-Bal, you'd see the overall result. Ideally you are wanting to see a 'flat' line. So, by observing the peaks and dips you'll know where to EQ - in the opposite direction.

I'd imagine you'll need to account for the mic's individual characteristic. You can pick up a Behringer ECM-8000 measurement mic for $50. These are reasonably 'flat'. In fact, I use a pair to record my 'room' when I'm recording drums or other acoustic instruments for the option of mixing the 'room' sound in - if appropriate.

Search the archives, there are some topics/entries concerning doing this 'room tuning with Har-Bal' technique.