New to Mastering

lemonwood

New member
Almost finished with my first song. Wondering if there are a couple of tips I can get for clarity, perhaps create more crispness in sound per individual samples as well as creating more headspace. Muddiness is also an issue at this point. I've tried panning but it has been with less success. I use ableton. I'm just getting into music producing so I'm not entirely profficient with the lingo. Would like to learn to master on my own but also debating on simply sending it to a proffessional.
 
It's probably a good idea to send one out to a pro...that way, if you decide to master your own stuff, you will have at least one reference to compare to.
Mastering isn't as simple as just learning some tips...and often it requires more specialized equipment for both mastering and listening.

If you are already identifying issues in your mix...you have a ways to go before it ready for mastering.
Don't expect the mastering to provide some kind of absolute fixes to obvious issues that should be solved during tracking or mixing.
The minute you hears something that doesn't sound right...back-step and find/fix the cause at the source if possible, rather than letting it go downstream and then dealing with it.
 
Just doubling down on Miroslav -- You'll probably find that most engineers don't master their own mixes. Myriad reasons for that. But at this point, it's fairly obvious from what you're saying that you need to work on your general / mixing chops. The previous step is always more important.

You'll find plenty of mastering engineers that would be happy to take your $$$ (heck, I'm one of them). But if you aren't happy with your mix as it is, you probably won't be happy later either. You want to send out a mix that you feel is just right already.
 
yeah I never fully understood the Mastering thing...

reading about the Nashville Bradley Bro studio to Quonset Hut and Columbia....they sent the old golden mixes to California for Mastering back in the late 50's and early 60's up to Columbia buying them out..not sure where they did Mastering but then place shut down in 1982 or sometime around then, now its back open as a studio/college.

just surprised me even the old Mono classics they did in Nashville's beginning, were mentioned to be sent off to Mastering in California.
 
just surprised me even the old Mono classics they did in Nashville's beginning, were mentioned to be sent off to Mastering in California.

That's probably down to that particular record label's disc cutting studio being in California. Back in the old days many labels had their own disc cutting facilities and the mastering was more of a corrective process - essentially just preparing the recordings for production. The settings used would often be written on a piece of paper in the master tape box so that any subsequent cuts would sound the same.
 
I use eMastered and then I try to match the quality by doing it myself. I have been largely unsuccessful thus far. Mastering = Witchcraft in my mind. eMastered it totally worth it. They now do EQ matching so you upload your track and another track that sounds like what you're going for.

What I've learned so far:

- get the mix to sound as professional as you can so mastering is just very subtle enhancements (stereo width, polish, smoothing out peaks, minor sonic enhancement etc)
- do not worry about loudness, aim for 0db on your stereo outputs
- I generally use this chain on my stereo out while in my final mix stage: Slate plugins - virtual console, tape machine, FG compressors and maybe Air EQ or Vitamin (Waves). Sometimes I'll use MaXX Bass from Waves, and then top it off with the limiter in Waves.

Most of my workflow came directly from this vid:

 
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