# Big orchestral drums EQ



## Consona (Aug 27, 2014)

I was listening to Guardians of the Galaxy soundtrack and there's this Ronan's Theme track with those nice sounding drums: http://youtu.be/gZYoKL50qbM?t=30s

I was trying to use Albion's II End of Days drums and Heavyocity Damage but I really cannot figure out the EQ curve to achieve that sound. And both of these libraries are top-notch, so I'm just really bad at finding what frequencies have to go. :roll:
(Interesting that strings from Loegria sound exactly like those from the soundtrack without any eq needed.)

Any suggestions? Thank you very much guys.


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## Oliver_Codd (Aug 27, 2014)

I'm pretty sure those drums are actually from Drums of War I by Cinesamples. If not, they sound very very close in timbre. 

http://cinesamples.com/product/drums-of-war


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## Consona (Aug 27, 2014)

Oliver_Codd @ Wed Aug 27 said:


> I'm pretty sure those drums are actually from Drums of War I by Cinesamples. If not, they sound very very close in timbre.
> 
> http://cinesamples.com/product/drums-of-war


 :shock: You mean even without EQ or additional processing?


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## Oliver_Codd (Aug 27, 2014)

If you go watch a video walk though of Drums of War you'll hear how close some of the patches sound to this without additional processing. Quickly listening to the example you posted, it doesn't sound like all that much processing is being applied. Maybe a little EQ to cut out some of the low mids to make it less present in the front. Maybe a little boost in the highs. Nothing fancy that I can pick out anyway. 


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzK3hUG ... -tkZbqBDh4 - you can hear some of the patches here.


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## Consona (Aug 27, 2014)

The thing is, it doesn't sound like there's something special going on about that drum sound, but when you try to emulate it, you find that its harder than it might look at the first glance.

I mean, you could agree that Heavyocity Damage or big Albion drums sound very very similar if not the same, but it is not the case.

When you try to play those library sounds and soundtrack next to each other you can hear that some frequency areas are missing in the soundtrack drum sound, it's much more tighter and cleaner.

And maybe it's partially a reverb thing too.


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## Marius Masalar (Aug 27, 2014)

I feel like you could scope this out yourself—you have an exact recording you want to emulate the sound of and you have a variety of "almost there" libraries.

Pull the audio from the soundtrack into your DAW, load some patches, then pick any EQ that lets you solo bands and just sweep one band around at a time to find the problem areas. My guess would be that the low mids are dipped (bye bye mud), the highs are pushed (hello snap), and the drum's fundamental is tuned to the cue.

Add or remove some compression and reverb to taste, and in the context of a cue you're basically there. It doesn't sound like they're doing anything too wild in the processing, so it's just a matter of picking the right drum and making some adjustments.


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## Consona (Aug 27, 2014)

Mathazzar @ Wed Aug 27 said:


> I feel like you could scope this out yourself—you have an exact recording you want to emulate the sound of and you have a variety of "almost there" libraries.
> 
> Pull the audio from the soundtrack into your DAW, load some patches, then pick any EQ that lets you solo bands and just sweep one band around at a time to find the problem areas. My guess would be that the low mids are dipped (bye bye mud), the highs are pushed (hello snap), and the drum's fundamental is tuned to the cue.
> 
> Add or remove some compression and reverb to taste, and in the context of a cue you're basically there. It doesn't sound like they're doing anything too wild in the processing, so it's just a matter of picking the right drum and making some adjustments.


Exactly my thoughts and what I've tried. And I was able to come very close to that sound, but I can still here that my drum has some frequency baggage and I cannot figure where.


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## Marius Masalar (Aug 27, 2014)

Hmm, ok! Teamwork then.

Can you post an example of what you've managed to get? Maybe fresh ears will help you pick out the differences.


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## Patrick_Gill (Aug 27, 2014)

They do sound very Drums Of War. I hear Damage at 1:43 too.


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## Consona (Aug 27, 2014)

Mathazzar @ Wed Aug 27 said:


> Hmm, ok! Teamwork then.
> 
> Can you post an example of what you've managed to get? Maybe fresh ears will help you pick out the differences.


That's generous, thank you. 

Here it is, don't laugh, their version is so much better. :cry: And it sounds weird alone without rest of the piece playing around. https://soundcloud.com/consona-adversa- ... tg-drum-01

Here is screenshot of effects used (zoom in for better resolution). https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/1007 ... 3919064907



Patrick_Gill @ Wed Aug 27 said:


> They do sound very Drums Of War. I hear Damage at 1:43 too.


I've listened through the whole piece and I think all the drums could be Damage actually.


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## Oliver_Codd (Aug 27, 2014)

Those drums are not damage, they are DOW! I recognized the sound immediately. Why do you think you're having so much trouble replicating the sound? It's not a matter of processing technique, but of source material. Albion perc, damage, and DOW all sound very different and distinct. You won't succeed in making one sound like the other, no matter how hard you try I'm afraid.


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## Marius Masalar (Aug 27, 2014)

Okay, well a few thoughts...

First of all, I think the source sound isn't right—to my ears, the original sounds like a combination of some dhol (8Dio's Epic Dhol library would be perfect for this) with a nice emphasized stick hit and a lot of the low end scooped away, taikos for a round bottom end, then layered with basses playing col legno fairly softly. Maybe there's a patch for that in a specific library, but I went ahead and did it the old fashioned way.

Something like this (very quickly done): http://d.pr/a/KbYZ

It's the wrong sticks, but I didn't have time to hunt for the specific clack I'm hearing in the original. I'm sure it's covered in one of the many percussion libraries out there. Basically my example is the combo I described above, run through Softube's FET compressor and EQ'd to bring out the tonal frequencies (approximately 'D', in my case, which is what the basses are playing).


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## Den (Aug 27, 2014)

From tomorrow will look like this:






http://www.fabfilter.com/help/pro-q/


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## Marius Masalar (Aug 27, 2014)

Heh yup, can't wait! :D


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## Consona (Aug 27, 2014)

Thank you guys for responses! I still have long way to go with my mixing but your input is really helpful.



Oliver_Codd @ Wed Aug 27 said:


> Those drums are not damage, they are DOW! I recognized the sound immediately. Why do you think you're having so much trouble replicating the sound? It's not a matter of processing technique, but of source material. Albion perc, damage, and DOW all sound very different and distinct. You won't succeed in making one sound like the other, no matter how hard you try I'm afraid.


You are right, without the same sound source it's impossible, I just wanted to get close to see how it's done.



Mathazzar @ Wed Aug 27 said:


> Okay, well a few thoughts...
> 
> First of all, I think the source sound isn't right—to my ears, the original sounds like a combination of some dhol (8Dio's Epic Dhol library would be perfect for this) with a nice emphasized stick hit and a lot of the low end scooped away, taikos for a round bottom end, then layered with basses playing col legno fairly softly. Maybe there's a patch for that in a specific library, but I went ahead and did it the old fashioned way.
> 
> ...


Very nice, thank you! I cannot believe the eq curve. :D Such a boost at 2k usually hurts my ears when used on big drums, but it works very well in your example. Mixing music is like alchemy to me.


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## Marius Masalar (Aug 28, 2014)

I know, right? If it were a real cue I'd've probably EQ'd only a few of the drum layers individually rather than the whole bus (doesn't do good things to the basses, I'm afraid), but overall it's always just about using your ears...sometimes the weirdest things end up sounding perfect.


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## Consona (Aug 28, 2014)

Mathazzar @ Thu Aug 28 said:


> but overall it's always just about using your ears





Mathazzar @ Thu Aug 28 said:


> sometimes the weirdest things end up sounding perfect.


Those two things are just what bothers me the most. :lol:


I really like some guidelines to know what to listen for. But in the end there is no universal rule to apply when it comes to mix as a whole. :-/ It is an art and composing too and we have to be able to manage both of them.  But I like that process, sometimes it's stressful but in the end it is rewarding. 

One more question, how much reverb have you used? It sounds nice and not too wet. Thx.


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## Marius Masalar (Aug 28, 2014)

There's actually no reverb at all beyond what's baked into the samples (the epic dhols are quite wet) and some basic SPAT positioning for the VSL.


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## Soundmagic (Sep 23, 2014)

I would suggest you try this EQ, it is easy and just fit for your case I think
http://www.supremepiano.com/product/neoeq.html


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## waveheavy (Sep 26, 2014)

Consona @ 27/8/2014 said:


> I was listening to Guardians of the Galaxy soundtrack and there's this Ronan's Theme track with those nice sounding drums: http://youtu.be/gZYoKL50qbM?t=30s
> 
> I was trying to use Albion's II End of Days drums and Heavyocity Damage but I really cannot figure out the EQ curve to achieve that sound. And both of these libraries are top-notch, so I'm just really bad at finding what frequencies have to go. :roll:
> (Interesting that strings from Loegria sound exactly like those from the soundtrack without any eq needed.)
> ...



If you haven't done it yet, I suggest isolating the drum sound you want to mimic, and then look at its frequencies in a spectral analyzer, and go from there with your own EQ manipulation.

Low bass drums usually have their most important peaks around 60Hz, then around 3.6kHz for the beater or stick to strike them with, and then with most of their low-mids to mids cut down (like around 260Hz).


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