New term needed for "DIY Mastering" ?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Bigus Dickus
  • Start date Start date
crosstudio said:
i think master-bating fits best.

if you get to know your um... equipment you can make a quality CD from master-bating.
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LOL - i tried that all day yesterday and my cd still sounds the same!
 
I would have thought mixing was the process of whatever you do in going from multiple tracks to a single stereo track.

I would have thought mastering was anything done to the stereo track after the mixdown. Reverb, compression, EQ, whatever.

I would have thought that without fresh ears and objectivity you just wouldn't do as good of a job of mastering.

But hell... what do I know? Not much. That's why I started this thread... mostly in fun, but also out of curiosity.
 
Proper terminology would be Post-mixing.

Used in context:

"I was playing around with some Postmixes on T-Rax the other night."

"Damn, that Chessrock sure is slick with the postmixes, you'd almost think they'd pass off as real masters." :D

If the project never actually gets sent to a mastering facility, you could even give yourself post-mixing credits:

Produced, Engineered, mixed and postmixed by ______

Postmixing: Mastering for the financially challenged.

OR

The Postmixer: Not your father's mastering engineer.


The Postmixer only rings twice.
 
I think local mastering sounds more professional than home mastering. If you master something yourself, it doesn't necessarily mean your doing it at home (...he says while posting on the HOMErecording.com bbs). . Thats my take on it anyway.
 
While I appreciate that you really shouldn't master your own mix, if only for lack of objectivety let alone lack of experience, proper room acoustics, and equipment, the hard fact is that *real* mastering costs a lot of money, more than a lot of folks can afford. A big part of mastering is arranging the song order and spacing, as well as matching up perceived levels. These functions surely can be done by the mix engineer just as well as a mastering engineer. I also think that a mix engineer, given time away from the mix, and a change of mindset, can hear that there's a radical change in the low freq content from track 7 to track 8, a difference that would easily be missed when mixing each track seperately, and can EQ things to give a more consistant tonality to the project. These things, I think, are legitimate mastering processes that are within the home recordist's grasp. The more advanced can also do a commendable job with a C4 and an L1.
I think when things go wrong with home mastering is when someone starts doing stuff just because they think they should do something, anything, to say they mastered it. That happens all the time. Just send it through T-Racks using a preset, and it's "mastered". There's the Shite factor.
Finally, I believe the correct term for anything we can do at home is "premastering", as actual mastering involves the creation of a glass master, yes? So my vote is for "premastering".
Cheers, RD
 
uhh...wouldn't it be "self produced"? as by controlling the artistic input from start to finish you are acting as the producer

...the producer tells the engineer what to do...the producer tells the mastering engineer what to do... getting the sound you want the way you want is part of being a "producer"

my 2 cents :)

though "master-abating" works too....
 
yep, ass-tering gets the golden award thus far. It was a tough choice between that and master-bating though.
 
Robert D said:

Finally, I believe the correct term for anything we can do at home is "premastering", as actual mastering involves the creation of a glass master, yes? So my vote is for "premastering".
Cheers, RD
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ahh.. but technically thats what a pro mastering engineer does. makes a PMCD. But I like it.

Also.. to Bigus Dickus.. I also used to believe that Mixing ended when you went to 2trk.... but then I started to realise that almost EVERONE I work with puts SOMETHING on the stereo bus.. some post-mixdown effects. I almost always put a low cut and a gain adjustment. So it makes me go hmmm.

Also.. I have had MEs master songs.. and THEN I did the layout of the tracks... also hmmm.

xoxo
 
when i wanted someone to finish my garage and turn it into a gym, i did i myself. i saved money, and it looks great. i was able to do that because my dad taught me how.

i master my own music.

and i'm not going to pay you to do it, because the truth, when you really get down to it, is that i believe i'll do a better job than you, because you don't care about my music.

just like you get screwed by contractors who come to your house and do a shoddy job, you can get screwed by mastering houses.

i've watched so many of my friends go to various mastering houses in DC and NY and get shitted on. no thanks. my CDs sound just as good as theirs because I have learned some of what is necessary to master.

no, I can't stand my mixes up next to Art Official Intelligence Mosaic Thump, but I'm closer than my friends, and my money went into my gear instead of schlepping up to NY.
 
Hmmmmmmm, I didn't look at "it" in that light before, crosstudio.
 
Hey ... this is from another forum... I thought is was really close to home here... we were discussing mastering with Wavelab.

----------------
quote PoopStorage

"TWB: I think that you may be moving toward mastering a little prematurely. When finished with a mix, everything should sound finished. The goal is to give your project to a mastering engineer and have them say "you don't need me, it's perfect".
You mention the stereo expander. This is your biggest hint that the mix isn't quite finished.
I also noticed that you already have set preferences for the compressor, and a multi-band at that. This is basically like relying on a preset. If you find yourself reaching for the same settings every time, you might be best to go back to the mix and figure out what is going on in your mixing habits that forces this action.

This is a big reason why mastering should be done by someone else, or at least in a different room with different monitors. If you can use the same room and monitors for mastering that you used for mixing, than you could accomplish the same results during the mixing process.
This is how things used to be done, when records were golden. I can't wait for the day that it comes back around, if it ever does."

--------------------------------

xoxoxo
 
camn said:
Hey ... this is from another forum... I thought is was really close to home here... we were discussing mastering with Wavelab.

----------------
quote PoopStorage

"TWB: I think that you may be moving toward mastering a little prematurely. When finished with a mix, everything should sound finished. The goal is to give your project to a mastering engineer and have them say "you don't need me, it's perfect".
You mention the stereo expander. This is your biggest hint that the mix isn't quite finished.
I also noticed that you already have set preferences for the compressor, and a multi-band at that. This is basically like relying on a preset. If you find yourself reaching for the same settings every time, you might be best to go back to the mix and figure out what is going on in your mixing habits that forces this action.

This is a big reason why mastering should be done by someone else, or at least in a different room with different monitors. If you can use the same room and monitors for mastering that you used for mixing, than you could accomplish the same results during the mixing process.
This is how things used to be done, when records were golden. I can't wait for the day that it comes back around, if it ever does."

--------------------------------

xoxoxo
Click to expand...

But the guy's name is PoopStorage - he's full of bull.;) (Sorry about that)

That's actually the best I've heard it spelled out. Still won't stop me from mastering at home.
 
crosstudio said:
when i wanted someone to finish my garage and turn it into a gym, i did i myself. i saved money, and it looks great. i was able to do that because my dad taught me how.

i master my own music.

and i'm not going to pay you to do it, because the truth, when you really get down to it, is that i believe i'll do a better job than you, because you don't care about my music.

just like you get screwed by contractors who come to your house and do a shoddy job, you can get screwed by mastering houses.

i've watched so many of my friends go to various mastering houses in DC and NY and get shitted on. no thanks. my CDs sound just as good as theirs because I have learned some of what is necessary to master.

no, I can't stand my mixes up next to Art Official Intelligence Mosaic Thump, but I'm closer than my friends, and my money went into my gear instead of schlepping up to NY.
Click to expand...

Wow! It's like pissing into the wind around here sometimes....

OK, for the umpteenth time... Yes, you need to audition a mastering engineer just as much as you need to audition a lead vocalist to determine they are right for your music so you don't end up with a shitty meastering job. But whether you get a project professionally mastered has NOTHING to do with you being more committed to or more in touch with your music than some anonymous mastering engineer. Who says that you can't be just as involved in the creative decision-making in the mastering studio as in yur own mixing room???

I strongly recommend my clients use local mastering houses for just that reason - they can go and sit in and be part of the process. The key here is that you go to the mastering room and YOU hear stuff you never heard on your own speakers, and YOU make creative judgements with the help and guidance of the mastering engineer.

Let's say you have a mix and you really like it. When you get to the mastering house the engineer says to you: "I think I'd like to cut a little at 80 Hz and 420 Hz, and add a little high shelf at 11k. Then let me add a hair more compression."

"Now, here is how it sounds after i make the changes: (plays music), and here is how it sounds before: (plays music). What do you think?"

So, please explain to me how that is giving up control of the creative process? Or how you think that it would ever occur to you to try the same tweaks since you already had completed the mix to the best of your ability? Or how subtleties that would only show up in the mastering room's quality speakers and acoustics would ever be otherwise apparent?
 
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