Monitoring Headphones
There's so many variables to this questions its not even funny. Professionals use both. Your seriously limiting yourself if you ONLY use monitors. Also, monitors create whats called Crosstalk, which isn't something headphones do. Cross talk, speaker placement, head shadowing and many other things can "color" your mix so that your not accurately hearing things. That's when the headphones come into play. While, headphones aren't the best for accurately setting up your reverbs and effects and things like this (false sense of audible amount of effects, and stereo image), they are good for hearing small minute details in frequency, performance, as well as many other things that I'm not even going to go into now. Too much too mention.
Just remember the Fletcher and munson curves. Our ears give the flatest response at 80-90db SPL, Which is about 83db SPL avg for everyone. So, if you want to mix as accurate as possible, you need to be monitoring through your headphones and your speakers at that level. Which i think plays a big part in the posters question. Read more here -- http://www.webervst.com/fm.htm
All in all though.. Practice makes perfect. Once your used to the sound of your monitors and headphones and how your mixes translate on other systems, you can get around flaws off headphones and monitors. Like for example, Ive come to know that on my sony headphones are a little bass light. Ive come to learn over experience that if the bass sounds low in the headphones, then its just right on my monitors, and vise versa. If the bass feels right to me in the headphones, i know its too much in reality.
Use the tools you have to do what you need. And a set of headphones should be apart of those tools. In the end its all music, and no one is ever going to know what tools you used to make what you make. Bottom line.
Just remember the Fletcher and munson curves. Our ears give the flatest response at 80-90db SPL, Which is about 83db SPL avg for everyone. So, if you want to mix as accurate as possible, you need to be monitoring through your headphones and your speakers at that level. Which i think plays a big part in the posters question. Read more here -- http://www.webervst.com/fm.htm
All in all though.. Practice makes perfect. Once your used to the sound of your monitors and headphones and how your mixes translate on other systems, you can get around flaws off headphones and monitors. Like for example, Ive come to know that on my sony headphones are a little bass light. Ive come to learn over experience that if the bass sounds low in the headphones, then its just right on my monitors, and vise versa. If the bass feels right to me in the headphones, i know its too much in reality.
Use the tools you have to do what you need. And a set of headphones should be apart of those tools. In the end its all music, and no one is ever going to know what tools you used to make what you make. Bottom line.
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fishmonkey
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- Joined: Wed Oct 24, 2007 4:50 am