Proffessional mastering houses...

  • Thread starter Thread starter Uladine
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dobro said:
Making it LOUD isn't the only thing mastering's for, but my question is this: how much of the overall mastering job is MAKING IT LOUD? Is that the main thing mastering does?
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Correct, Making it loud isn't the only thing mastering does.... Mastering also involves eq-ing songs to a rough guidline of industry standard..... and having all the songs on your recording eq'ed to match each other within reason...

In other words.... When you are listening to the radio and you hear a nice decent sounding tune, then the next song is so crisp and low in bass that it is painful to adjust to the change....Is the reason for equing to a standard..... (albeit rough guidlined standard)

Mastering is also the process of arranging the songs on a cd and adding fades and editing.......

Eq and Compression/limiting are very large parts of mastering........

Which squash the variants and make the music as close to the cd's ceiling as possible without distortion.. (2 db below ceiling is a typical number for modern rock.....) (I might be a bit off on that number though....)

Although a good engineer should need very minimal eq at the mastering stage.... Most pros who are well known mixers get the frequencies (eq-ing)close to right in the mix.....

But it's still very common to pull the mix in the right direction in the mastering stage with Eq, even the good mixers need tweaking sometimes....

The biggest part of mastering is paying the studio.... Or you won't get your product.:D


Im fascinated with mastering and can yack about it all day! :)

....Come on guys add some stuff to my explanation..... lets make this thread a 5 pager.....:D
 
Ok so let's say you have a pet project that you've been working on for a couple of years, ten tracks or so. You've done everything your studio is capable of doing to it, compressed lightly, mixed it to your own liking, added all the efects you want everything. You aren't necessarily going to try and market the CD or anything you just want to "put it to bed" in a sense. You love the tracks on there, want to be able to go back ten years later and have it sound as good as possible for your friends and family but mainly for yourself. It obviously doesn't make sense to spend $1000 just for your peace of mind. Do you think a pro-studio not necessarily a mastering house, but just a studio better than yours would, could master it for you for alot cheaper? You think it's worth just saving some money (albeit alot of money) for a mastering house?


Laj
 
Hmmmm

If the music you record is purely for your own enjoyment and it sounds good on your system and on your stereo / friend's stereo / family's stereo then mastering is probably not needed - you don't need to spend the money. It sounds good, spending out at a local studio could make it worse for all you know.

As soon as you're considering releasing anything commercially, then is the time to look to mastering and the experience of a professional.
 
I definitely hear what your saying man. The thing is for one the stuff does mean that much to me, to spend say $300 on it. It's such a representation of an important time in my life: my first experience making music. While I don't really think it has to much commercial appeal, I love it (along with many others mind you) and want to have it be in the best quality possible. And two I've never had anything mastered before (obvious I guess) and am curious as to exactly what it brings to the table. Maybe I'll just buy myself a nice present and have it done right:)


Laj
 
Cool :) Nice to see there are people still passionate about their music.

Couple of tips: Listen to your tracks a few times about a week before the session, make notes as to what you think your mastering guy could do to improve the sound (note: sound, not mix) then don't play them for a few days, rest your ears - you're going to hear enough of the songs at the session as it is anyway.

At the session, let the engineer do his job, again use your ears and if needs be refer to your notes. If it's not sounding better than you remember chat to the engineer and see if you can work it out, after all you are paying for the session and not all engineers are monsters ;)

Have fun at the mastering, hope it comes out good, no actually... GREAT :)
 
Hmmm there's a pretty high smiley rating in my last posting...it was all sincere honest guv!
 
Yeah definitely passionate about my music, makes me happy. Thanks for the tips, probably will be a couple of months before I get the money and find the right place though. Can't wait though! Oh and I'm actually from Portsmouth, NH USA version I guess how's your Portsmouth?


Laj
 
:)

Portsmouth UK is quite frosty at the moment, experiencing some chilly Siberian winds, almost guaranteed white christmas.

The local paper here did an article a while ago comparing Portsmouth US and Portsmouth UK. I think it went along the lines of Portsmouth UK had like 30 suspicious deaths a month, compared to the 1 Portsmouth US had had that year... :| That should give you an idea of what its like here. Where I live, the week I moved in there was a double stabbing at the pub on the corner, almost as bad as L.A.
 
one of the nicest sounding c.d.s i have ever heard was a radio head bootleg....mostly live stuff but it was the two studio out-takes which caught my eye (ear)....these out-takes were recorded during the o.k. computer sessions, you can tell by the style of the songs and the instrument sound continuity...however, these out takes had a much crisper, less compressed and extremely clearer sound than the commercial release...... now, i very much doubt the bootleg was mastered, due to its extraordinarily cheap look, but on my home system the album out takes had a much better sound than the commercial release.... is this the mastering?
 
dr. c,


man I may possibly be the gigggest radiohead fan in this here forum and I caan tell you that Radiohead sound is so pure from the very source, ya know. I saw them live nine times on the East Coast leg of the US tour for amnesiac this summer. It was unbelievable to say the least. My point is that don't doubt that even some obscure bootleg isn't mastered well if it has any ties at all to Radiohead. Even if it's Thome just using a cheapo dat, it has a really vintage sound to it. I'm 20 so to me they're my beatles, my stones, dylan, ya know. I'm just glad that I got me band that, in my humble opinion has earned that status. Anyways, way tooo much drink, need sleeeeep.

Laj
 
laj35 said:

. I saw them live nine times on the East Coast leg of the US tour for amnesiac this summer.
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...???i'm the biggest radiohead fan??????hehehe thats very flattering

btw; just bought "i might be wrong" and it is sweeet
 
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