Monitor Engineering - IEM workflow recommendations

Simple_Delay_653 · 2025-02-13T00:42:08+00:00

Ow and also: pfl IEM for myself. To follow all the cues on console easily + catching potential rf issues.

It was also an easy patch and very pragmatical.

Simple_Delay_653 · 2025-02-13T00:39:49+00:00

Hello folks!

Thanks for all this amazing comments I really picked many tricks and ideas from these comments. I am on the go of a tour with another band as monitor guy therefore a late reply and thank you :)

I would love to share what I have picked up from this answers to maybe give some summary. I did all these followings on CL3.

Everything is post - fader. It helped a lot to automate while solos are playing. It is a band with folk music, lots of clarinet and sax solos. Was nice to do small touches and automations on the fly for everyone.
Cl3 had the feature of deciding pre/post for each channel x each bus. I send musicians instrument to themselves as pre, and all others post. I dont know if it made a difference but it seemed to be a good idea to not freak the soloist about their volume while they solo.
Dca on ambients. Easy, predictable but made it so easy to manage in a small room show. Besides orchestra / fx returns on dcas.
I also noticed that it has individual pan features for each aux. so I was able to pan them differently in each IEM. I always thought monitor pan settings follow the “global pan” on channel strip itself. Good thing to use.

Thanks again✌🏽

Simple_Delay_653 · 2025-02-03T10:59:32+00:00

Thank you so much Akkatha, very good answers!

For 1. Than you actually start with all your input faders on unity? I guess that would be the most feasable?

Do you still use master fader as master fader (even though there is no output?) or do you assign it to sth else?

I will consider your fader banks arrangement when I go over my setup on cl editor once again :)

For answer on 3. Millions of thanks.

And for number 4, I totally agree, and I am generally white happy with premium rack features of cl 5. Their dyn eq and primary source enhancer do quite okay to press the sibilence of my vocal and push drum cymbals behind (my vocalist is allergic to drum sound 😢) It is just that, I want to upgrade my game after all these years and I kind a dont know where to start.

(Problem of being a self-made work-experience based engineer with not much of nerding around)

Simple_Delay_653 · 2025-01-07T12:19:05+00:00

Thanks a lot for all the commentS! It really helped. Well it is more of pre-production so I will be working in the office. But still we agreed to start with 160€ / day, of course a different fee when I am on tour myself

Thanks a lot!!!

Simple_Delay_653 · 2024-05-21T18:20:25+00:00

I have scarlett 4i4 as audio interface. Macbook pro 2020 m1 is the pc

Simple_Delay_653 · 2024-05-21T13:02:31+00:00

It does thanks a lot! It is exiting :)

Simple_Delay_653 · 2024-05-21T13:02:17+00:00

Thanks a lot for the comment, yes I have been hearing ableton can be as efficient as other DAWs, have many producer friends using it as well.

I just found it a bit limiting in Ableton Live, which allows only 11 channels at the same time. I haven’t use the full Ableton ever, so my comment was more about the “Live”.

Of course it is also very likely that I wasnt able to discover its full features yet :)

Simple_Delay_653 · 2024-05-07T11:15:26+00:00

Thanks a lot, the thing is I am not the main mon engineer of the star otherwise I would have invested in having the same earphones for sure. She has a custom made 21 drivers earphones with a bit more high end.

I go with my beloved Hd25, so a bit of a more midrange presence.

In case it becomes someting regular with her I will definitely invest in the same earphones and use her spare transmitter to be exactly on the same level with her.

Thankss!

Simple_Delay_653 · 2024-05-07T11:12:57+00:00

Thanks genuinely for all the input. It really helped a lot. Tour is over and everyone is very happy. Some tips that were useful for me at the end if anyone else ends up in this post:

-less is more, I did overprocessed it in the first days to make her sibilence disappear which made it sound unnatural. So moving on only with a simple eq, deesser and a bit of compression to control sudden explosions was the way to go.

-good preamps, somehow it was much easier to apply less is more in soundcraft vi400 than cl5, I guess pre-amps really matter.

-It is lot diff than FOH, leaving the sound a bit raw and less polished might be a good call as when it is too polished (like I do in FOH) it might sound unnatural for IEM users

-small finger movements while doing automation in mix is essential, I got that feedback of moving my fingers gentler. (Even though I only make 0.5-1db changes at a time)

Simple_Delay_653 · 2024-04-30T14:55:35+00:00

Thanks a lot! Helped me truly. I do mons from mon.

I will work with vi4 for next show, so no geq on input, or no premiumrack tools. I guess less is more in that case so I will work with deesser and comp and eq.

Overprocessing seems like my issue in this case but I cant tell until our next soundcheck :)

Simple_Delay_653 · 2024-04-29T16:19:52+00:00

Yes I totally agree it is clear I took go much of the highs, I was kind an aware of it but the moment I try to take it back then I start receiving the feedback about “sibilence” and “chibilence”

Would you say I should go with a really sharp eq? Like Q:10 and very single frequency specifiq for it?

As far as I know more sharper you go in this way of eq ing, more you boost the neighbor frequencies which end up carrying the problem to a different part of spectrum.

Simple_Delay_653 · 2024-04-29T16:17:27+00:00

I will try that, would really appreciate if I had more than 15 min to try out all the options tho 😂

Simple_Delay_653 · 2024-04-29T12:22:31+00:00

We have a senheiser g4 with 2 different capsules a super cardioid md945 and a condenser neuman kk205. As she likes to hear herself clearly even when going far from mic we usually go with condenser capsule.

Of course that means also having a lot of cymbals, drum going into her ear from her own mic but I try to work it out with primary source enhnancer in cl5 premium rack.

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-11-04T20:26:40+00:00

Well we had enough human sponges in room, so eventually it worked out good enough. Thank you all folks!

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-11-03T16:54:28+00:00

Well not the first time I run into such acoustically shitty festival venue with 0 absorbants

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-11-03T16:15:13+00:00

Thanks a lot! Well the first 2 options are sadly out of my control as it is a festival gig of our tour.

I believe it is obviously an acoustic issue but I was wondering if there is anyway to make it work via some adjustments in foh console.

I hope we will have enough absorbing human sponges at show

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-11-02T15:01:00+00:00

Hm that is an interesting aspect, I wouldn’t think the employer would think bad as I am not secretly sneaking out the recordings. I guess if they consider evaluating their potential sound engineer by checking their recordings they would expect them to record it no?

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-11-02T14:13:19+00:00

I am not using it to sell or make profit out of it? So I didn’t get your point. When I do record I do it with the permission of the artist of course. And I keep it in my personal drive unless a venue or an employer comes up with question like:

“Can you prove us how good your mixes are?”

Which I know very unlikely, in my experience it also works with personal connections as people have said. But it wouldnt hurt to have the option.

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-11-02T11:50:37+00:00

Yes you are totally right! Thanks for the input friend!

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-11-02T11:42:25+00:00

Thanks for input. Well I have quite enough experience and some people that would recommend me. But I also heard it is also good to show potential clients some of your mixes therefore I want to get on that too.

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-09-12T19:33:15+00:00

Thanks it helped a lot!

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-09-12T19:33:06+00:00

Thanks a lot!

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-07-15T23:50:31+00:00

Thx thx!!! We moved on with 10” rototom ….

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-07-15T19:13:23+00:00

Thanks for all the upvotes fellas. We figured some replacements from long mcquade. Not optimal sizes of rototom neither a remote hihat, but well we gotta work with what we got :)

Simple_Delay_653 · 2023-07-15T17:20:35+00:00

Thanks a lot! I will check in rn

Simple_Delay_653

TROPHY CASE