Difficulty in changing tone of guitar pickup

[Wayne27]

Which is harder to do, making the tone of the pickup sound brighter to darker?

 

[Chistopher]

Electrically you can passively remove frequencies very easily, you can't make a pickup brighter without boosting frequencies.

But for me, it's easier to brighten a pickup with my picking dynamics than to make it darker.

 

[Seashore]

Much easier to make it darker (in a natural-sounding way). You can always shave off the top. If you want something brighter, it gets more complicated. Take all the pots out of the circuit (blower switch); metal saddles, aluminum bridges if you're playing a TOM; brighter strings; a well-cut bone nut; using denser/harder picks with sharper edges, playing closer to the bridge, or plucking with more of a "snap" as Chistopher alludes to; or an active EQ solution, which usually doesn't quite sound natural enough on guitar to my ears, but can work if it's just a smidge in the right spot.

If you want to darken your sound with picking alone, play with your fingers or the blunter point of a pick, try a felt pick, move farther up towards the neck or even just over the fingerboard, play softer with less plucking.

 

[freefrog]

+1. Darkening a passive PU is easier than brigthening it. Passive brightening solutions exist but they have relative downsides.

 

[Mincer]

Swapping out the magnet can do either just as easily.

 

[AdrianSD]

Which is harder to do, making the tone of the pickup sound brighter to darker?

Is there a particular problem you're trying to solve?

 

[Wayne27]

Is there a particular problem you're trying to solve?

No just curious

 

[GuitarStv]

Darkening is easier. That's why guitar tone controls usually just bleed treble away.