audio engineering
the primary DAW we edit in is REAPER
-- vocal fx --
⭐ DE-NOISING
ideally, there is minimal noise when recording (e.g., a treated vocal booth). however, minor noise can be treated with limited distortion and degradation of audio quality.
in REAPER, the ReaFIR plugin allows for simple de-noising (see tutorial)
⭐ EQUALIZATION (EQ)
vocal eq can help improve the tonal quality and make voices sound clearer -- especially relative to the rest of the audio mix. frequencies can be boosted or cut out to make vocals sound less muddy, harsh, or distracting.
what we typically do is something roughly along the lines of the following:
60-80 Hz high pass to cut out any low-end frequencies
250 Hz band (-3 db) to reduce any muddiness
800 Hz band (+2 db) to slightly boost core vocals
5 kHz high self (+4db) to add some air to the vocals while cutting
18 kHz low pass to cut extreme frequencies
however, it's important to keep in mind that each voice (and often different recordings) is different and vocal quality is also impacted by microphone placement
helpful resources:
- direct guide to vocal eq - helpful step-by-step walkthrough of how to eq your vocals, though you should tweak this to sound good for your own voice
- vocal eq cheat sheet - explains the eq regions & recommendations to fix recording mistakes (e.g., sibilance, nasal tone, etc.)
- vocal eq problems - describes "flaws" that you can listen for in your audios and where they may show up in your eq
- ultimate guide to vocal eq - goes in depth about vocal eq with examples