Preparing for Mastering - General Guidelines?

dewhitt

dewhitt

Dave DeWhitt
Hi All,

I apologize if this topic has already been covered here, but I've skimmed through the threads and didn't see anything that directly answered some of my questions, so I figured I'd start a new one.

Mainly, I'm just trying to figure out if there are any mixing guidelines that are helpful to follow when you are putting mixes together for a mastering engineer. I've seen the high level advice, like don't put processors on the stereo mix bus, and leave room for dynamics and compression, but I think I'm looking for more specifics. For instance, is there a recommended level that mixes should be peaking at? Is it ok to peak at 0dB once in awhile, or does that cause issues? Or, should I be worried more about average mix level and looking at RMS meters or something? Also, does the different between RMS and peak matter at all? For example, is it bad if my RMS level on the meters is at about -20 and the peak is around -5?

Sorry if these are complete noob questions, and maybe I'm on the wrong track altogether, but any guidance would be greatly appreciated!

Best,

Dave DeWhitt
SoundClick artist: Dave DeWhitt - page with MP3 music downloads
 
dewhitt said:
Is it ok to peak at 0dB once in awhile, or does that cause issues?
Click to expand...

I believe most mastering guys would say give them some more room...and -6 dBFS ends up being the "number" most often used as the top limit (though lower is OK too).
IOW...don't let anything go over that, so the mastering has some headroom for any processes that may be needed.
Other than that...yeah, it's best to confer with the mastering guy you will work with.
 
The main objective is to make sure that nothing is clipping any of your plug-ins, individual channels and/or busses.

Beyond that it's important to know that there is "tons" of headroom available and dynamic range in a 24 bit system so peaking anywhere close to - 10 dBfs is never a problem.

One reason most ME's like to see the program material peaking around -6 to -10
is this is close to a level that is good for them to send to analog chain.

If your files are peaking around -1 dBfs when the ME is using an analog chain this level will have to be attenuated anyway.

This picture refers to sine wave. You would base this on how the converters are calibrated.

The column on the left is an RMS column, the column on the right is a PEAK column.Analogue - Digital scale.JPG

Other than that..make sure you are satisfied with the sound of your mixes.. Check them on several systems and phones when possible.
 
ok, cool...thanks, guys, these responses make perfect sense and help a lot.

Tom, for another dumb question....I'm thinking about that diagram above (which is great by the way, thanks for sharing that!) from right to left. In other words, I'm mixing in Logic and trying to get my meters to peak at around -6 to -10 dBFS (right-most column) so that when an ME gets it and sends it to their analog gear it's right around where they need it to be (left-most column). However, I still have two questions about that...1) isn't -6 dBFS going to still be really high on the analog meters to the far left? I'm probably thinking about this incorrectly, but going from right to left, it's -6 dbFS --> +14 dBU and then it seems like it would be pegging the Console VU meter. Or...is that just crazy talk and I'm thinking about it the wrong way? And 2) I still don't think I'm understanding the RMS vs. Peak thing...what I've done in Logic is to throw a meter plugin on my stereo output and it's showing me peaks at around -5 dBFS or so but RMS down at around -10. Is that too much of a gap between them? Again, I'm probably really not understanding this and making something out of nothing, but just curious.

Thanks very much for taking the time to answer.

Best,

Dave DeWhitt
 
dewhitt said:
isn't -6 dBFS going to still be really high on the analog meters to the far left? I'm probably thinking about this incorrectly, but going from right to left, it's -6 dbFS --> +14 dBU and then it seems like it would be pegging the Console VU meter. Or...is that just crazy talk and I'm thinking about it the wrong way? And 2) I still don't think I'm understanding the RMS vs. Peak thing...what I've done in Logic is to throw a meter plugin on my stereo output and it's showing me peaks at around -5 dBFS or so but RMS down at around -10. Is that too much of a gap between them? Again, I'm probably really not understanding this and making something out of nothing, but just curious.
Click to expand...

One thing to take into account is that in the analog world there can be up to.. sometimes 24 dB of headroom above 0 dB VU...and in the digital world there can be tons of head room below 0 dBFS.

So these can be "general" guidelines to take into account. With analog gear it's good to get some experience with knowing how far individual pieces can be pushed before you start to hear diminishing returns.. There is usually quite a bit of room to play... just finding the sweet spot or nice range in any particular box takes the time to mess around with it a bit.
 
Thanks, Tom. I appreciate you sharing your knowledge and experience on this!

Best Regards,

Dave DeWhitt
 
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