"A distance grows around our bodies"

[Taff]

Ok good kind folk, how do we make notes/lines/melodies sound distant or far back in a mix?

Playing them quieter, is obvious, but most of the time, that just makes them sound ..errrr... quieter....

Any hints ,tips or tricks greatly welcomed.






Who knows/can guess the song the thread title is from? (No googling!)

[Peter]

You can play the notes loud and then just bring the level down.

Try reverb and also filtering the high frequencies.

[Taff]

cheers mate!

[Taff]

O, and wanting to take this a little further, with the forbearance of the site members.

I have a piano part, which I'd like to sound as if it was playing a way off, down a dusty long room.

Any tips?

[LABONERECORDINGS]

Try the reverb method as mentioned, but scoop out the lows and the highs the further away. Aim so between 3k and 5k is the key 'listening' area as that's where us humans here more pronounced (to do with our hearing voices constantly day in day out so we're more sensitive to those areas). When something is further away, we have more trouble hearing the low end and high end, so if you are wanting something really far, you'll need to think of the room itself, allow for a couple of echos from the walls (and ceiling perhaps) before it hits your ears.

[slightlyprog]

It depends a bit on how busy the mix is, how well you can hear whatever effect or treatment you do to the sound you want to put at a distance. If the mix is fairly sparse then a room reverb might be all it needs. Another thing you can do is add a touch of slapback echo as it's more obvious in a mix.

I try to create the impression of a space for lots of instruments and my favourite method is just using the RV7000 with a room impulse and play around with the dry/wet ratio.

Sometimes it's almost subliminal, you may not hear the 'space' but you'd notice imediately if you switched it off.

[riemac]

A very importand factor beside EQing the highs and reverb for the impression, that something is in the distance is the attack or transient of the sound.
Sounds with a sharp transient are perceived more up front. So make sure, that you soften the transient of the sound with a little higher attack of the envelope or a compressor set with a very fast attack to catch the transient. Combine that with EQ and reverb and you should be fine.

[Pete B]

Something that hasn't been mentioned so far is the early reflections of the reverb - reducing them should make the piano sound further away.