Sonarworks | headphone calibration profiles added

bitflipper
A while back I painstakingly created an EQ preset for my own everyday headphones (ATH-M50) based on published frequency response curves. These are the settings if anybody's interested:
 
Freq    Gain    Q
45Hz   -4dB    3
120Hz -5dB    3
3KHz   +5dB   8
9KHz   -4dB    10
14.5KHz (high shelf) +4dB   0.7
 
However, after going to that trouble I don't actually use these corrections anymore. They don't make that much difference, and even if they did I simply won't make EQ decisions in headphones. Doing so only yields a mix that sounds good in those headphones, but probably won't translate well to other systems.
 
Now, I realize that some folks have no choice but to mix with headphones. They live in an apartment, like to work late at night when the significant other is sleeping, can't afford good speakers, or have a severely acoustically-challenged room. Maybe all of the above. For them, it makes sense to try and improve their headphones to the extent that it's possible.
 
However, I would suggest that when you demo this software be sure to perform a blind A/B test to verify that the difference is significant enough to justify the hassle. By hassle, I mean when you inevitably forget to bypass the correction before exporting and then wonder why your tune sounds so weird in the car. Don't forget to volume-adjust your A/B test, since the correction will almost certainly involve some boosts.
 
 
 
 

bitflipper
I put the headphone correction on the master bus as the last thing in the chain, to keep it simple.
 
Alternatively, you could dedicate a separate bus just for headphone monitoring, assuming your audio interface gives you that kind of flexibility. That's more of a hassle, but it has the advantage that you don't need to remember to bypass the EQ before exporting.
 
Ultimately, though, the best strategy is to simply train your ears to a particular set of headphones or speakers. It's not hard, it just takes time. I've been using the ATH-M50's for so many years that their quirks and nonlinearities are etched into my subconscious. That's why if they ever died on me I'd buy the same model again rather than upgrade to better headphones, which would require starting the ear training all over again.
 

carl
This is working well with my ATH-M50's which I never cared for mixing anyway. It makes them bearable over longer periods of time, more importantly  better overall mix choices.

mrneil2
"For these problems you need something like the VRM box which simulates the experience of listening through speakers with headphones on. However I wonder if the combination of this plus the VRM box would be a match made in heaven, because the VRM box becomes more useful the flatter your headphones are." (post #10)
Sharke, have you tried this yet?  If so what were your impressions?
Has anybody else tried this with the VRM box?

sharke
I would say the VRM box is going to make a lot more difference than calibrating your headphones, as long as your headphones are good quality. I think the point to remember about the VRM box is not that it's a 100% perfect simulation of the monitors it claims to simulate, but that it offers you multiple speaker simulations. If you can get your mix sounding good on all of them, there's a good chance you've created a translatable mix. 

interpolated
This begs the question that if you need two run your headphones through a correctional equaliser to flatten them enough to emulate the sound in another environment, whether mastering/reference headphones are fit for purpose?
 
In the immortal words of Manuel from Fawlty Towers, "¿Que".