Mastering recommendations?

[symphonious7]

Are you referencing mastering as - taking the stereo two track and tweaking it with EQ and compression?  Or are you looking for a multitrack DAW (digital audio workstation) like Audacity to address individual tracks and mix them into a 2 track stereo mix.

Sorry if this seems self evident but the term mastering has been misused a lot lately?

 

or are you looking for a plugin to use to do mastering (as in the first option)

as far as I know, mixing is what I do in studio one, where you effect the volumes and balance of each individual instrument and mastering is what you do after you have what you consider a decent mix, meaning you dump it into a program like audacity and then add compression to the mix as a whole and boost the highs and lows.  And frankly, audacity would work just fine for me if you could hear more than 5 seconds of audio and make changes to settings as the track played.  But the fact that I have to listen in 5 second snippets is so difficult to do anything with.  

[dnafe]

Mastering can be done inside Studio one....you will need a really transparent stereo EQ, multiband stereo compressor and  stereo limiter

 

A program like iZotope Ozone will do the job all on its own as a plugin

 

Just render your mix to a stereo track...bring that track up into a new project in studio one then apply EQ / Compression and Limiting to it and you are mastering.  Once you're happy with what you've done test your stereo masters on a few different systems like a car stereo / iPod / home stereo / computer etc and see how it sounds. When it translates well on every system you're done.

Enjoy

 

[symphonious7]

Mastering can be done inside Studio one....you will need a really transparent stereo EQ, multiband stereo compressor and  stereo limiter

 

A program like iZotope Ozone will do the job all on its own as a plugin

 

Just render your mix to a stereo track...bring that track up into a new project in studio one then apply EQ / Compression and Limiting to it and you are mastering.  Once you're happy with what you've done test your stereo masters on a few different systems like a car stereo / iPod / home stereo / computer etc and see how it sounds. When it translates well on every system you're done.

Enjoy

 

Dude.  How did I not think of that myself.  *facepalm*  THANK YOU

[dnafe]

It happens...forest / trees  hehehe

 

Best of luck

[dnafe]

DifferentRobot - I checked out your songs on Soundcloud and my only comment is the mixes are a little narrow.

To give you an example of what I'm talking about, check out this track

https://soundcloud.com/tmr-productions/mars-wide-a-b-c-justin-holness

It's an A/B of a widened stereo backing track I did for a client....the only downside was losing the centre snare/clap to the sides but the client said he could live with it....with some radical treatment I might have been able to put the snare / clap back in the middle but time is money and the client had only so much to spend on his backing track

 

Either way this is the kind of space you should be aiming for.

Also you might try being a little more aggressive with your sounds in terms of EQ.

just my $0.02 CAD

 

Edited March 13, 2014 by dnafe

[dnafe]

Thanks for the compliment Rob

BTW I have a final mix for you that's a bit more aggressive if you're interested...just need your email addy

[Wanweird]

I have used Nathan Allan (Lastdropmastering.com) for about 7 years now, always gives a sterling product; such a talented engineer. Also, the mastering is affordable on a budget with different options and packages. They also give a free sample so you can see if you like their work on your track.

[starise]

This is an old thread but I'll give my .002 worth.

 

Ozone has come a long long way since 2005. Now in version 7 it's probably what any independent mastering engineer with not enough money for hardware is using. It has presets that work fine in many situations meaning if you're a complete novice you can sound better using it. It can also be tweaked to your liking.You can even use other plug-ins inside it. If you have a favorite plug-in chances are you can put it in the chain inside of Ozone. 

 

For those who don't know, one of the improvements are stand alone use. You can now put all of your album tracks in it stand alone at once and master the whole thing together to get the album glued together, although from the info I'm getting we are going to the single more and more in the music business..still you'll need an album to use CD Baby or the like. 

 

If you are an independent soul you could do much worse than buy and learn to use Ozone.

 

Some DAW software makers are adding additional mastering support right into the DAW. Cakewalk Sonar now has a LANDR download that integrates into it.

I'll admit I bucked the addition of LANDR into Sonar as did many others, but as a beginners tool it's hard to beat. I wouldn't personally take it further than that.

LANDR is a set of software mastering algorithims that you can select for hard medium or soft and apply them to your mix for a small fee. LANDR is a separate mastering service and may be used by anyone.

 

Personally I would stay with something like Ozone over LANDR, but that's me. I don't like the idea of a robot mastering my mix

 

FWIW we just had a blind mastering test  at Cakewalk to compare LANDR. Several racks were " LANDRED" and a few were mixed right inside  Sonar by Cake people. One track was mastered by a pro mixing house. I correctly picked the track that was pro mastered, but a few picked the tracks mastered by LANDR. The LANDR tracks weren't bad either. The final results were. 1st place- The pro mix 2nd place- Tracks mixed my the Cakwalk team- Third place- LANDR

 

And here's the thing. Mastering will always be subjective. Not everyone likes the same things in a master. 

[starise]

Hi Hobo!

 

They call it something different. It's called the "dynamics" section which is a nice multi band compressor. They also have a hybrid kinda thing there called a dynamic EQ which is  eq with compression built in. Really cool tool that lets you shape frequency bands and add compression in those spots. Great for stubborn drum hits and bad rooms!

 

If you buy the basic version there's usually always a sale around the holidays where they offer a huge discount on the upgrade to the advanced version. I got the advanced version for what the basic version usually costs. We kept riding Izotope about over pricing the advanced version and i think they finally heard us, but it's only when they have the incentive sales.

Edited April 2, 2016 by starise

[Prometheus]

On 3/2/2014 at 11:24 PM, dnafe said:

Once you're happy with what you've done test your stereo masters on a few different systems like a car stereo / iPod / home stereo / computer etc and see how it sounds. When it translates well on every system you're done.

 

That's the answer... ^^

 

You don't have to be a demigod to do your own masters, you have to educate yourself, practice and make well thought out pragmatic decisions.

 

I would say this to anyone who is thinking of handing over exorbitant sums of money to a mastering engineer.  Recording an album takes weeks.  Mixing it takes days.  Mastering it takes hours.  Anyone who already knows how to mix to a professional standard already has the necessary attributes to do the mastering if they just do some homework.

Re-mastering an old reel of tape with oxide shed from the binder is very hard, sometimes impossible.  Mastering a broadcast quality product that was mixed by a professional engineer is not hard.

Edited July 3, 2016 by Prometheus