Sub bass

[Derpageddon]

At least im pretty sure that is what this is. How do you make that really heavy low sound like this guy did on this song?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06DEROK5 ... page#t=82s

[Andanté]

Simple. Get a sine wave, move it down two octaves so its frequency is <200 Hz, boost the volume so it's prominent but not overpowering, and sterio seperate/shape it so that it has a large sterio effect and sounds really powerful. You can even throw in a bit of distortion and a tiny hint of filtered noise (I go to town on my massive sub basses and do all sort of crazy shit) to make it seem more natural and to make it fit in more with the song.

The top thing is to get the volume mixing right. EQ doesn't really matter, since a sine wave is just one tone, so it's all above making sure the low sin wave doesn't overpower the rest of the song, but still sounds really powerful.

[Whitetail]

You should never
Put stereo widening on a sub bass.

If your sub bass is anything other than mono you're doing something wrong, keep it as centered as possible.

What you're hearing there isn't sub bass anyways, youtube always cuts out sub bass a bit - that low rumbling sound is still in the normal bass range (sounds like he took a normal moving bass sound and put a lowpass filter over it) - I'm sure he layered a sub bass in there but the point is sub bass is something you feel more than you hear, it shouldn't have any specefic defining characteristics of it's own sound other than the fact that it's low, hence why you use either a sine or triangle wave for it.

(Though he is right in that some distortion can help give it more harmonics and thus come through in the mix more, thing is you only go lightly with distortion on it - if it sounds distorted you've gone too far)

[the4thImpulse]

Simple. Get a sine wave, move it down two octaves so its frequency is <200 Hz, boost the volume so it's prominent but not overpowering, and sterio seperate/shape it so that it has a large sterio effect and sounds really powerful. You can even throw in a bit of distortion and a tiny hint of filtered noise (I go to town on my massive sub basses and do all sort of crazy shit) to make it seem more natural and to make it fit in more with the song.

The top thing is to get the volume mixing right. EQ doesn't really matter, since a sine wave is just one tone, so it's all above making sure the low sin wave doesn't overpower the rest of the song, but still sounds really powerful.

No no no..

Low bass/sub sounds should be at the very center of the mix, 100% mono. You will run into problems like phasing and it will be awkaward to listen too if its at all panned or widened.

EQ doesn't matter if its a pure and perfect sine wave but if you do distort (or do any waveshaping effect) it you may want to EQ out the higher frequencies that will likely hiss at you otherwise.

Mixing it in right is quite difficult with even proper studio headphones, A pair of monitors would provide a much better listening experience when it comes to >40Hz. A sub bass should sit at 30-70 Hz higher and it will compete with the bass.

[SpyPie]

I was curious about this too, my music will eventually need lots of Sub and even more bass, thank god I found this thread.