Mixing White Noise FX?

[Phatscout]

So, as with most other producers I tend to use white noise risers, impacts and other "swooshes" to "fill out" a track. However, I can't seem to find a way to mix these types of sounds in so they don't overpower everything else or sound really damn harsh while still having a audible effect on the track? Anyone have any tips on mixing this kinda stuff?

[PillowFight]

So, as with most other producers I tend to use white noise risers, impacts and other "swooshes" to "fill out" a track. However, I can't seem to find a way to mix these types of sounds in so they don't overpower everything else or sound really damn harsh while still having a audible effect on the track? Anyone have any tips on mixing this kinda stuff?

hi pass, mid cut, pan, delay, reverb, lower the volume, compress, side chain to any other element you want to stick out more, etc. etc. etc.

[titchbit]

There are no secrets. It just comes down to proper gain staging. I don't usually use straight up white noise, but I have used massive's noise generator thing in a few tracks. It's pretty cool actually. I side chain compressed it to a triplet kick pattern and used ableton's auto-filter to add some resonance while sweeping up with a LPF.

[Sure_Fire]

Fl's 3xosc has an awesome noise osc, I use that for all my noise fx with a bandpass. I cut out the very top of the spectrum as well as a very flat lp starting at about 200 ish hz. I never compress it, or use any other fx on it.

[mthrfnk]

De-Ess

[Coolschmid]

If I just lowpass the noise and raise the cutoff I find that its too messy , try using a bandpass, and moderate amount of resonance.

[titchbit]

To add onto what he ^ said, if I were making a white noise FX track, I would have several things going on. First and foremost, highpass at about 100-200 hz. No need for the noise to fuck around with your (sub) bass. I would also high pass at like 15,000 hz. In my experience, high frequency white noise will pierce your ears and be very annoying and distracting to the listener. Those high frequencies aren't adding much to the track anyway IMO. That would all be in one EQ instance.

Then I would take another lowpass or bandpass filter (Ableton's auto-filter) and automate that for the sweep effect. Give it some resonance, but like he said, not too much. You don't want it to pierce the listener's ears. This is just supposed to add some quiet background ambience to your track so that it doesn't sound dead silent during the parts of the song that don't have much going on.

Then add whatever other effects you want. Maybe some sidechain compression to give it some rhythm. I've never done this but I've heard of people using chorus, flanger, and shit like that to give it some character.

If I have an ambient, minimal track I'm working on, I would rather use a long vinyl sample loop that I created for this purpose (check out the Mad EP vinyl sample thread), but to each their own I suppose. If you are working on a brostep track, there's really no need for this IMO. Maybe during intro/outro/break sections, but using pads should solve the issue.

[Add9]

I've had better results with phaser on white noise than flanger or chorus but any of those could work in moderate amounts. Also white noise doesn't have to be that loud to have its effect heard, I usually keep it pretty low in the mix and combine it with other effects like cutoff automation on synths, pitch rises, etc to get a build up effect.

What everyone else is saying is true as well in regards to hi-passing the white noise. I usually high pass it at 500 hz minimum, usually higher than that like around 1k. Then it often is useful to cut a little bit at 2-5k if you're dealing with basic white noise because that's where the ear is most sensitive, and roll off the very top end a little as well.

[mromgwtf]

I would also high pass at like 15,000 hz.

Good idea bro

[PillowFight]

I would also high pass at like 15,000 hz.

Good idea bro

hi passes at 15khz, deal with it

[titchbit]

LoL I obviously meant low pass