From the course: Audio Foundations: EQ and Filters

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What is an equalizer?

What is an equalizer?

From the course: Audio Foundations: EQ and Filters

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What is an equalizer?

Even if you don't know it, you've probably used an equalizer or EQ at some point in your life, probably on a car stereo, boom box, or home theater system. I like to think of EQ as frequency-specific level control. While a typical volume or level control in your mixer allows you to increase or decrease the amplitude of an entire channel's signal uniformly, an EQ allows you to increase or decrease the amplitude of a specific range of frequencies relative to everything else in the sound or instrument that you apply it to. Want more bass? Boost the low frequencies. Too much top end? Cut the treble or high frequencies. Sounds simple? In many ways it really is. In audio recording EQs, or filters as some engineers prefer to call them, are most often used to improve a sound's balance or tone, either by itself or in the context of other sounds in a mix. EQ is used to fix sound problems as well as shape or creatively change a sound's tone in wild and unique ways. We often refer to EQs as…

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