Worship Musician Church Video + Streaming Handbook | Page 14

recording studios, in mono, through the smallest the center image, sounds that weren’t already on large systems with ample subwoofers—
and most lo-fi speaker in the facility. Crazy right? competing for the limelight simply lose the battle actually sound quiet on normal and small
But, what we discovered was that, if we could for attention. Most sound operators who record system. When your mix plays alongside another
get the mix to sound fantastic on that single their band and come up with a fantastic stereo mix and it sounds quiet, it also sounds weak,
little speaker, it almost always sounded great mix, know the shear agony of playing their thin, dull, and gutless—an experience worth
on the big speakers. It didn’t work the other great new mix back for the band over a mono fighting to avoid.
way, though. When the mix is created in stereo live sound system and hearing a hollow, weak and then summed to the Auratone, the mono sound that is devoid of the monstrous stereo When creating a mix for streaming, it’s a good
mix was rarely—okay, never—satisfying. There guitar sound you spent all day setting up (yeah, idea to use a high-pass filter (HPF) on low-
are too many things that combine together in that’s personal pain you’re hearing). Avoid that frequency instruments and filter out the lows
odd phase relationships or that might even pain and the pain of something disappearing below about 60–80 Hz. Boomy kick drums and
disappear in the mono mix. in your streamed audio by keeping everything bass guitars that are often boosted in those low
panned closer to center. frequencies for the FOH mix, don’t transfer well
THAT CONCEPT APPLIES DIRECTLY TO OUR
to the live stream unless the watcher/listener
STREAMING NEEDS. It’s nice to open up a little bit of the center is playing the stream over a large hi-fi music
Always do a test run with both the video and position for vocals so they can be better heard playback system.
audio feeds. Listen and watch on the worst and understood, but you’ll be happier with smartphone or tablet in the room. Most your streamed audio if you keep instrument Anyone listening on a smartphone, tablet, or
smartphones still only playback in mono and pan controls between about 11:00 and 1:00, typical small earbuds won’t hear the sub-bass
a large percentage of your audience will get or maybe 10:00 and 2:00. Stereo reverb frequencies below 60 Hz any way so it’s best
that very experience. Make adjustments to algorithms and delay effects are usually to avoids them in the mix. Even those listening
the live feed to help make the streamed audio designed to collapse well to mono, so it works on normal headphones or high-quality earbuds
better. On small devices, balance problems are well to pan them hard left and right to help are unlikely to get the sub-bass experience, so
most common. Depending on the singer, the provide a sense of space. clean up the low end and focus on getting a
vocals might be much louder or quieter on the
full but clean sound that really communicates
streamed audio, so keep that in your mental log EQ the lyrics and harmonic instruments. It’s okay
and adjust the level accordingly. If you can do a Low frequencies contain the most energy to include a solid low end, but created the
couple tests, you can usually find the balances (amplitude). They drive the overall mix level, low frequency content with the sub-bass
that work well in your headphones—also a so mixes that are overly aggressive in the low frequencies below 60 Hz filtered out.
likely end-user experience—and the streamed frequencies—though they might sound good
audio from a small phone. During the stream,
I always keep an iPad logged into the stream
with headphones connected so that I can jump
from the live audio to the streamed audio.
Even though it’s several seconds late, I can still
confirm that the mix is translating well to the
streaming process.
PANNING
When a mix needs to transfer well between
stereo and mono, hard left-right panning is ill-
advised. Anything that’s panned hard to either
side is very visible (in an aural way). If you
love the sound of the acoustic guitar or some
percussion part panned hard right or left, that
sound will probably be lost in the pile of music
that is called, “mono.”
Once all of the channels bunch together in
14
SPECIAL EDITION
Subscribe for Free...