BR Mastering Steps

[Dumby]

After bouncing everything on my BR studio...It's time to master. I go into the mastering mode. So far so good. Being relatively new to mastering I want to use one of the preset patches. Here's where I get confused...Do I have to do a playback like in the bouncing mode to apply the sound of the patch to my song?
Or if I just select it will it be done when I burn a CD? Right now I just bounce everything and burn it onto a cd from there but it's a bit too quitet that way. I hope that wasn't too confusing...it's hard to explain something when you don't get it to begin with!

If someone can post step by step how they do it (mastering) that would be great!
Since BOSS manual sucks!
Thanks!

[Gorty]

Hey Dumby,

Once you have bounced down, have a listen and if you are happy with the mix, save it!...........You must save it before mastering!

1. Select the Mastering Tool kit......Press rec mode until MASTERING indicator lights up.

2. Move the cursor to the Mastering Tool Kit Patch Number.

3. Select a Mastering Tool Kit Patch that sounds best for your tune using the Time/Value dial. (After becoming familiar you can adjust all settings in the Mastering Kits!)

4. Press play and listen to the tracks 9/10 and set the volume level for tracks 9/10 just below the setting which causes deflection.....ie around 0db.

5. Use the Master fader and set the overall volume similar to track 9/10.

6. Set the song position back to the beginning of the song.

7. Use the cursor and Time/Value dial to choose the V-tracks to be used as the source=from and the destination=to.

8. Press record.

9. Press Play.

10. When the song finishes press stop.

11. Start playback and listen to the Mastered track.

12. If happy...save the track by holding down the STOP and pressing RECORD.

13. Now burn to CD.



Kev

[Gorty]

Originally Posted by Dumby

After bouncing everything on my BR studio...It's time to master. I go into the mastering mode. So far so good. Being relatively new to mastering I want to use one of the preset patches. Here's where I get confused...Do I have to do a playback like in the bouncing mode to apply the sound of the patch to my song?
Or if I just select it will it be done when I burn a CD? Right now I just bounce everything and burn it onto a cd from there but it's a bit too quitet that way. I hope that wasn't too confusing...it's hard to explain something when you don't get it to begin with!

If someone can post step by step how they do it (mastering) that would be great!
Since BOSS manual sucks!
Thanks!

Yes you have to playback to Master!

[Dumby]

I'm now doing all that no problem...I've used the first patch P01 and I"ve started to modify it and resaving it time after time to get the best sound I can out of my board. I"m getting more and more critical though, the better I do the more I stay up late...losing lots of sleep1! THANKS!
P.S. It would be so nice to sit down with someone who has done this and could help me in my own living room for ten minutes...or ten beers whatever!

[Dumby]

After mastering my recording still seems a bit quiet. I have the in level on the mastering edit chain on full 6db's I think and likewise on the out box of the edit chain?

I do keep my input level fairly low on the face of the board, say at about nine o'clock on most instruments....I do that to keep the distortion down on my drums and then the guitars and bass follow so that I can maintain unity gain. That would'nt be my problem would it or is there something else I can fiddle with to add overall volume to my finished CD?

[FunkDaddy]

Hmmm if the levels of the instruments coming in are low (9 o'clock for me would make most of it inaudible, especially guitar, though I use the direct input) then you will end up with a quiet song I think, regardless of how much you jack it up in the mastering process (btw, I've found that the increasing the overall levels in the mastering toolkit adds a LOT of distortion to my mixes, even if I increase it by 1 or 2 db's). I'd prefer to have a loud, harsh mix going into the mastering process and let it do it's job to even things out.

I'm confused by what you mean when you say "unity gain"? Do you mean an even sound? That's what mixing is for! I understand you want to keep the distortion down but you can push the BR unit pretty hard imo without clipping.

[Dumby]

I've cranked everything everything almost to twelve, except my bass I still carry around nine o'clock (which I plug in direct) so that it's not overwhemingly loud. What monitors do you use? I Find that when I'm playing my mix back I have to make sure the drums are real loud and that the guitars and bass are way down? Do you find things to be similar with yours? I did'nt have that problem when I used the internal drums...
Your observations are appreciated! Thanks
mike

[FunkDaddy]

I follow the instruction manual when setting up my input levels. It says the red light should flicker when the instrument is played loudly. That usually takes me to 2 or 3 o'clock for my DI guitar. Same for my vocals (though I use a dynamic mic at the moment which sucks)

I'm also mixing with headphones at the moment, I still am pretty hit and miss with my mixes. Some are really good, some not so much. Would help a lot if I had monitors haha.

[Dumby]

I'm gonna do a one minute song tomorrow nite mastered and burned to CD doing it with the light flickering...I'm really affraid that everytime it peaks too much I'll hear clipping or distortion on my final mix. I'll let you know and thanks for your input

[FunkDaddy]

If you don't hear distortion when you're tracking, I wouldn't worry much about it

[Dumby]

Everything is sounding pretty good now up to the bouncing stage. I'm on that normalizing stump now. I think I'm better off leaving that step out.

[Gorty]

Originally Posted by Dumby

Everything is sounding pretty good now up to the bouncing stage. I'm on that normalizing stump now. I think I'm better off leaving that step out.

If everything is sounding sweet without any major fluctuations, I will leave the Normalizing stage out!

I prefer to get more consistent takes down!

[Dumby]

I"m still not consistent enough with my mixdowns...I'm always leaving the drums too quiet , when I get it right they seem so loud through my monitors but normal on a cd??? Anyone else notice this?

[Gorty]

Originally Posted by Dumby

I"m still not consistent enough with my mixdowns...I'm always leaving the drums too quiet , when I get it right they seem so loud through my monitors but normal on a cd??? Anyone else notice this?

This is where room treatments come into the equation!

this link is brilliant!.....http://www.ethanwiner.com/acoustics.html

[Dumby]

That link is very good indeed thank you

[metalj]

Has anyone found the mastering tool kit that useful ????

I'm wondering if it(the mastering tool kit) is a fail safe for inexperienced users that record at too low of a volume to begin with and are still experimenting on getting a good recording.

Not that im anything special, but i alway find that the mastering part ruins my final mix.

Am I missing something ???? Maybe I havent spent enough time with it.

Will that tool kit really take an already great and balanced mix to another level ?? Im sure in the realm of a pro studio it would make a big difference, but the one built into the BR's im not so sure.

[Dumby]

Yes the mastering tool kit is very useful in enhacing your tracks. Start off with one matering patch you think sounds ok, then burn a CD with it. Listen to it here and there. Make multiple copies of your song using the song copy function. Afterwards using the same mix, start making different copies of the same song using different mastering pacthes or just tweaking it to improve it...there's lots of room for that with mastering patches. If you have no comparison points you'll never know what's good and what isn't. Listen to the tone of the overall album onRide the Lightning and compare it the Black album.... you know what I"m saying??? Just an opinion.

Here's a different perspective, when you buy subs and a sound system for your car, do you leave all the settings at zero the way it came in the box??? Or do you play with the EQ's and what not ti'll it's a little more tasteful? That what using a preset patch is like but it's nice to have a basic platform for starting out.

[metalj]

Originally Posted by Dumby

Yes the mastering tool kit is very useful in enhacing your tracks. Start off with one matering patch you think sounds ok, then burn a CD with it. Listen to it here and there. Make multiple copies of your song using the song copy function. Afterwards using the same mix, start making different copies of the same song using different mastering pacthes or just tweaking it to improve it...there's lots of room for that with mastering patches. If you have no comparison points you'll never know what's good and what isn't. Listen to the tone of the overall album onRide the Lightning and compare it the Black album.... you know what I"m saying??? Just an opinion.

Here's a different perspective, when you buy subs and a sound system for your car, do you leave all the settings at zero the way it came in the box??? Or do you play with the EQ's and what not ti'll it's a little more tasteful? That what using a preset patch is like but it's nice to have a basic platform for starting out.

yeah, i hear what your saying. I do make several mixes and listen on different stereos to get a "close enough" final mix that i feel sounds good on all stereo systems from car to boom box to computers.

All Im saying is it seems like the tool kit is just rehashing the same tools you use before going to the mastering stage.

Example.
you use Eq, compression, and overall track volume when doing your mixing stage. then I do several bounces of each individual intrument all the while using all the above tools in each bounce, so when i get to my final bounce which would go to track 9/10 with every component of the song(bass,drums,vocals,guitars) being mixed and bounced several times then all blended together to the final stereo track i feel like there is nothing else that can be done to it. The mastering stage is just that, more Compressing, eqing, limiting, the same stuff only more of what ive already done.

my levels are close to maxed out, so what more could be done to it other than adding a few more dbs to make the final mix a little louder if needed.

Ive tried running a finished mix through all those presets and found that they dont make it sound any better. Maybe i could cut a little bottom end out once in a while but its not that big of a deal.

the car stereo analogy is a good one, but if i bought a new car stereo and i could not do any adjusting to make it sound better, then i would just leave it alone.

just trying to learn. so if im missing something please let me know.

[metalj]

Hey here is a good idea.

here is a link of a band i've recorded doing Metallica. Listen to it and tell me if you think the mastering tool kit would improve upon it. This is just a close to final mix that has not been mastered.

My thinking is the vocal track may be to loud. So is that something you would fix with the mastering tool kit, or would you just go back and re bounce it with the vocal track not as loud, or eqed differently??

good learning oportunity for us all here.

my opology for jacking this thread, but it was a good subject, and i though it may help anyone that is watching. It also was originaly posted in Jan, so the thread is kinda old too.

here is the link.

thanks for listening and shareing your thoughts.

http://metaljohnson.com/Sandman.wma

[Dumby]

K, I did this in ten minutes earlier and I didn't take too much time to mix it down but to get a genereal idea of the minimum sound quality I'm getting.

I did this one for you with a mastering patch and all though.

[Dumby]

Dude, I have my song in the computer but the attach function says I have an invalid file??? Do you know what's up?
I used Windows media to rip it.

[metalj]

Originally Posted by Dumby

Dude, I have my song in the computer but the attach function says I have an invalid file??? Do you know what's up?
I used Windows media to rip it.

not sure what to do. just make sure that it is either a mp3 or a wma file.

thats all i can think of. maybe try uploading it again a see what happens.

did you see my previous post with the metallica tune i recorded ??

later

[Dumby]

I made one with real drums, full solos but no vocals and I will attach it next thread for ya as soon as I know how, my drums are a bit quiet but they sound nice, I did a live take with my TD-3's...CHeck again in a couple days maybe I'll have it figured out...take care

[Dumby]

This is what the attach window says;

Valid file extensions: bmp doc gif jpe jpeg jpg pdf png psd txt zip




This is what I have;

Sandmansoundtest.wma
Invalid File Type


How the heck do I convert it?!?!?!?!??!?!?

Again, I ripped it using windows media.

[Dumby]

My mastering patch still sucks, but only some days, I'm recording everything at the same levels which are fairly low but I'm hearing so much static in my playback once it's mastered. Feels like I"m back at square one after I thought I had all that crap solved.

Here's the specs on my patch tell me what you would change under general rules. The tune I posted below is done using this patch.

-EQ is off
-Limiter is off
-Cut off Freq. 20hz
-Enhancer On
sensivity 0
Freq. 1.0khz
mix level 0
-Exp is off
-Compressor is on
threhold -9db
ratio 1:3.20
attack 30ms
release 690ms

-mixer 3db
3db
3db

-output 6db
soft clip on
dither is off

Let me know it there are general corrections that seem really odd and obvious nono's