keilson
New member
Is it possible without purchasing extra plugins?
Chris Shaeffer
Peavey ROCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Possible, yes. Good quality? No.
Most of the plugs that come with cubase are kinda bland. They work OK for mixing (except the verbs- you almost have to use both of them to get a half-decent sound) but I wouldn't run my mixes through them and expect them to sound good.
That said, I'd play around with it and see what you think. Its fun to do and its a good idea to get a sense for how those plugs respond to a whole mix. My opinion is that beyond playing and learning, its a waste of time.
Chris
Most of the plugs that come with cubase are kinda bland. They work OK for mixing (except the verbs- you almost have to use both of them to get a half-decent sound) but I wouldn't run my mixes through them and expect them to sound good.
That said, I'd play around with it and see what you think. Its fun to do and its a good idea to get a sense for how those plugs respond to a whole mix. My opinion is that beyond playing and learning, its a waste of time.
Chris
Bass Master "K"
New member
Chris is right...if you want good results you'll want another program like Soundforge or Wavelab, or even sending it out to a mastering house.
That said, your needs may not be that high so play with it and see if your happy with the results you get from Cubase.
That said, your needs may not be that high so play with it and see if your happy with the results you get from Cubase.
keilson
New member
i didn't know sound forge was good for mastering. I have sound forge. Are you talking with extra plugins or just sound forge alone?
Alejo
New member
Hello again,
This is a question that I wanted to ask long time ago. I hope it is not far away from the purpose of this thread. It is reliable to buy external hardware for "basic" FX´s such as reverb, compression and delay? Is the overall sound going to be much more improved? Could this plug-ins do the same job?. I mean, under a home recording environment and doing basic audio and midi recordings.
I have seen a nice and cheap module for this FX´s (plus de-esser) under 300 euros. This would also relieve my pc from extra loads coming from plug-ins. It is worthy?
And the other big question is about Mastering and Mixing. Sorry for being so naif, but don´t you use the same resources for both? or there are some kind of special EQ´s, FX´s and plug-ins for MASTERING?
When you guys talk about sending the project to another program or even to a professional studio is because of the poor quality of the plug-ins or because you need to do special tasks that Cubase is unable to do?
Thank you in advance and best regards,
Alejo.
This is a question that I wanted to ask long time ago. I hope it is not far away from the purpose of this thread. It is reliable to buy external hardware for "basic" FX´s such as reverb, compression and delay? Is the overall sound going to be much more improved? Could this plug-ins do the same job?. I mean, under a home recording environment and doing basic audio and midi recordings.
I have seen a nice and cheap module for this FX´s (plus de-esser) under 300 euros. This would also relieve my pc from extra loads coming from plug-ins. It is worthy?
And the other big question is about Mastering and Mixing. Sorry for being so naif, but don´t you use the same resources for both? or there are some kind of special EQ´s, FX´s and plug-ins for MASTERING?
When you guys talk about sending the project to another program or even to a professional studio is because of the poor quality of the plug-ins or because you need to do special tasks that Cubase is unable to do?
Thank you in advance and best regards,
Alejo.
keilson
New member
the plugins that come with cubase do an adequate job for me mixing wise. Usually in mastering studios they have either expensive plugins or expensive outboard gear. Since I am doing homerecording I tend to stick with plugins. And usually the less expensive one's. I don't have "mastering" plugins. But there are plenty of great plugins out there. I was just hoping I could get a decent master for cubase or soundforge with whatever comes with the programs. This may not be possible. In which case I better start saving. Pluguins do not usually degrade quality. But they may tie up computer resources. Alejo, when you leave the computer analog and go to an effect and then return you are degrading quality. Keeping it all digital would be a better idea. And I think what they meant by sending the project to another program was that once you mix the program and mix down to stereo tracks then you can bring to another program to master. I should experiment with this.
Bass Master "K"
New member
keilson said:
I'm not sure about previous versions, but in my SoundForge 6.0 there is a mastering plug-in called WaveHammer, I use that along with the EQ's and get good results.
My cousin used to use T-Rax or T-Rex or something like that and it was a pretty good mastering program too, although I have heard some people that weren't real crazy about it but we used it on my bands last demo and it came out real nice.
dafduc
New member
Another advantage of Sound Forge is that they have a batch function, which will apply the same sets of actions to a group of files. This is helpful for getting that all-mastered-the-same-way feel that you get on a good CD.
But --- most pro studio guys here (I'm not one) will tell you that the most important thing about the mastering process is to (a) have someone with a really good set of ears do it, and (b) it better be a different set of ears than whoever worked on the mixing process. Plus the mastering houses have the high end listening rooms and gear.
So DIY mastering, by definition, will fall short of what you can get for a mastering house.
Daf
But --- most pro studio guys here (I'm not one) will tell you that the most important thing about the mastering process is to (a) have someone with a really good set of ears do it, and (b) it better be a different set of ears than whoever worked on the mixing process. Plus the mastering houses have the high end listening rooms and gear.
So DIY mastering, by definition, will fall short of what you can get for a mastering house.
Daf
Bass Master "K"
New member
Alejo said:
Hey Alejo, good questions and I actually just got my new TC Electronic M300 hooked up to my DAW so I can give you a few answers.
keilson is right that when you leave the digital domain your signal passes through analog/digital converters. You will get a degradation of sound. How noticable depends on the quality of the converters. High quality converters are supposed to be not noticable and is what big studios will use.
For me, I wanted better reverbs for vocals and some more options, not really to free up system resources because my computer runs very smoothly. In my situation I track in SX, move it to Soundforge for mastering, then bring it back to SX for dithering. Since I never left the digital domain and I thought it might be silly to do it for just one processor, I decided to go with the M300 because I had heard great things about it and TC Electronic, along with Lexicon had good reps for their verbs. What sold me on the M300 was that it has SPDIF ins and outs and so I could hook it up to my Aardvark Q-10 and use the effects without ever leaving the digital domain at all! In addition it's a dual engine effects uint, one dedicated to reverbs, the other to effects. The lexicon equivielnt didn't have that feature so I was sold on it. I have only played with it a few days but so far it's really good!
That said, it's not like one unit can give you 50 different reverbs and other effects all at once. If you want to add the effects you have to either keep it at one thing if your doing it "live", or else press the effects in the tracking stage, or to go back after tracking dry and send the signal through the effects unit and add effects to the tracks you want them on in a "one at a time" format (unless your grouping, like sending all the drum tracks to the same reverb). This is as far as I've gotten but the unit sounds real clean and nice. Very lush verbs that seem to outperform the stock SX ones (at least for vox which is all I've used it on so far).
Hope this answers your questions.
dafduc
New member
dafduc said:
Sorry, FROM. FROM a mastering house.
More coffee, that's it. Must have more coffee...
Bass Master "K"
New member
Hey Alejo, I had to give some music lessons and couldn't finish with your questions. Regarding mastering houses vs. do it at home:
In general, mastering houses have the high end gear and the engineers who really know how to make stuff shine and sound polished. They do it for a living and know their gear well (usually).
On the other end, when my first band recorded our first album at a large studio here in PDX, our engineers were telling us who to avoid at certain mastering houses because these people had "killed" previous projects that they had recorded and mixed for other clients, so there are obviously cases where just because it is a mastering house doesn't mean it's going to be the best option, or is a gauranteed hit-maker for your tunes. Different mastering houses will give you different results.
I would guess the type of music would also have an effect on what kind of mastering you want.
But in general I think that high end equipment and the people who know how to run it, is hard to beat in most peoples home studio environment.
In general, mastering houses have the high end gear and the engineers who really know how to make stuff shine and sound polished. They do it for a living and know their gear well (usually).
On the other end, when my first band recorded our first album at a large studio here in PDX, our engineers were telling us who to avoid at certain mastering houses because these people had "killed" previous projects that they had recorded and mixed for other clients, so there are obviously cases where just because it is a mastering house doesn't mean it's going to be the best option, or is a gauranteed hit-maker for your tunes. Different mastering houses will give you different results.
I would guess the type of music would also have an effect on what kind of mastering you want.
But in general I think that high end equipment and the people who know how to run it, is hard to beat in most peoples home studio environment.
Alejo
New member
Finally this people in here gave me some minutes to thank you guys for your fast and precise explanations.
keilson. your recommendation for keeping all in digital makes a lot of sense and is really worthy for me. I never though about it.
Bass master, what to say... thank you again and again for you help.
I will go deeper i with plug-ins, searching for the right one i need. So far I cannot get good results with the SX reverb and compressor plugins (one compressor gave me headaches time ago, still waiting for confirmation to see if it is "corrupted" or it is only my PC). That´s why I thought an external gear was going to be the solution. But you´ve showed me this is a question of checking and testing different plugins.
Regarding to the mastering issue, I am not yet at that point (I wish),but I think the decision of sending your project to an external house must be hard and meditated. I mean, you send your songs to be mastered under the interpretation of somebody that was not there during inspiration, conception, hands-on, mixing...
I humbly think mastering is almost everything. What makes Coldplay -for example- so great is because of the sad and dark "textures" they applied during mastering; the instruments, notes and voices are pretty "standard". The Velvet Underground was so great also because they created a special texture with a shitty mastering. I repeat I love both groups and I love to learn from them.
Who is behind the group maybe is the one who "makes" the group. And from 20 years to now this is becoming more and more true, I believe.
Anyway I think is important to send the mixdown to be mastered by another person, because I am sure it is going to be impossible for me to do a Zoom OUT from my project and listen to it with virgin ears, in order to choose the final sound.
But the decision is going to be painful too.
Thanks again and Best Regards,
alejo.
keilson. your recommendation for keeping all in digital makes a lot of sense and is really worthy for me. I never though about it.
Bass master, what to say... thank you again and again for you help.
I will go deeper i with plug-ins, searching for the right one i need. So far I cannot get good results with the SX reverb and compressor plugins (one compressor gave me headaches time ago, still waiting for confirmation to see if it is "corrupted" or it is only my PC). That´s why I thought an external gear was going to be the solution. But you´ve showed me this is a question of checking and testing different plugins.
Regarding to the mastering issue, I am not yet at that point (I wish),but I think the decision of sending your project to an external house must be hard and meditated. I mean, you send your songs to be mastered under the interpretation of somebody that was not there during inspiration, conception, hands-on, mixing...
I humbly think mastering is almost everything. What makes Coldplay -for example- so great is because of the sad and dark "textures" they applied during mastering; the instruments, notes and voices are pretty "standard". The Velvet Underground was so great also because they created a special texture with a shitty mastering. I repeat I love both groups and I love to learn from them.
Who is behind the group maybe is the one who "makes" the group. And from 20 years to now this is becoming more and more true, I believe.
Anyway I think is important to send the mixdown to be mastered by another person, because I am sure it is going to be impossible for me to do a Zoom OUT from my project and listen to it with virgin ears, in order to choose the final sound.
But the decision is going to be painful too.
Thanks again and Best Regards,
alejo.
Bass Master "K"
New member
Glad to help Alejo, here's a bit more to consider regarding mastering if/when it's time to send your project out if you want to use a mastering house.
I have seen a few ads in music/recording trade mags where someone will offer to actually master one song for free for you to show you what they can do. I am guessing that these are more "up and coming" mastering houses than established ones, because established ones live off their rep and don't need to solicit business like that. But that is one thing to look at.
Another suggestion is to call up local studios of the medium to large variety and ask them who they are curently sending their projects to for mastering. Ask them if they have used anyone local.
If it is a local company, (from what I understand) they usually will let you sit in on the mastering session. My buddy did this, and while he pretty much kept out of the way and let the pros do their job he did offer up a few suggestions as to general characteristics of the sound ("....could I hear what it would sound like with maybe a hair more around the 500hz level if that's cool" and stuff like that). He came out with a product he was really happy with and he didn't irritate them to the point where they wouldn't let him come back.
I have seen a few ads in music/recording trade mags where someone will offer to actually master one song for free for you to show you what they can do. I am guessing that these are more "up and coming" mastering houses than established ones, because established ones live off their rep and don't need to solicit business like that. But that is one thing to look at.
Another suggestion is to call up local studios of the medium to large variety and ask them who they are curently sending their projects to for mastering. Ask them if they have used anyone local.
If it is a local company, (from what I understand) they usually will let you sit in on the mastering session. My buddy did this, and while he pretty much kept out of the way and let the pros do their job he did offer up a few suggestions as to general characteristics of the sound ("....could I hear what it would sound like with maybe a hair more around the 500hz level if that's cool" and stuff like that). He came out with a product he was really happy with and he didn't irritate them to the point where they wouldn't let him come back.
keilson
New member
I actually tried one of the house's that offered one song free mastered. Good thing they had that cause it came out horrible. I forgot what studio it was, but I don't even think they listened to it. I think they probably just put it through whatever and figured it was fine. So it is a good idea to try that. Or if they have samples of some stuff they have mastered. Some even have before and after tracks for you to compare.
Alejo
New member
I am afraid in this part of the Alps is going to be impossible to get those deals, guys. 
So, I can do two things: either I see if the guy who mastered "The Sound of Music" is still alive -and wants to do it for free -. or I go back to the beginning of this thread and smash my head until I find the right plugin or program for mastering and I learn how to use them properly.
Txs again, guys.
So, I can do two things: either I see if the guy who mastered "The Sound of Music" is still alive -and wants to do it for free -. or I go back to the beginning of this thread and smash my head until I find the right plugin or program for mastering and I learn how to use them properly.Txs again, guys.