Taboo Subject (home mastering!)

[Mountainmirrors]

Ebay

 

[SOUND DIAGNOSIS]

I believe in home mastering....to a limit. Most noobs have no idea what to listen FOR and what to do to FIX it. Money is spent on and wasted on the "magic bullet" instead of training one's ears to hear the direction to go. A good audio editor and a few plug ins will get you 95-100% "there". It ain't the gear, It's the "ear" for the most part.

 

[masteringhouse]

What have you used that you like the sound of?
What order do you place your compressor, limiter and EQ in the chain - and what settings and particular tools did you use to do it?

And most importantly - do you have the songs online for the rest of us to hear? (I know...MP3s are not a great representation, but...)

Waves make some of the best plug-ins available IMHO. One piece of gear that is pretty essential and is used by most mastering engineers is the Waves L2. While many MEs use the dedicated hardware unit, null test have shown that the plug-in produces the same results as the hardware.

Depending on your budget, The Waves Mastering Bundle is a good way to combine the L2 with some great EQs and a multiband compressor. The Waves Restoration bundle is also a good choice. One of the things that I like about the Wave plugs is the ability to dither each one separately on output. This is important in order to help prevent quantization errors from accumulating from one plug to another.

My favorite plug-in lately is the Crane Song Phoenix which does a good job of reproducing the characteristics of various tape machines. This is similar to the HEDD unit used by many top MEs. Unfortunately this is only available for Pro Tools users.

Another important aspect of mastering that is often overlooked on the board is good metering. I use the spectrafoo metering plug-ins, Waves and others have good plugs as well.

In regards to the order of processing, it depends on what you want to accomplish but I would say that the "usual" chain is
EQ->Compressor(s)->Limiter (with dither). The reason being that if there are frequencies that need to be removed (for example too much bottom end on a kick) you don't want the compressor to change the overall volume of a mix based on a frequency that isn't going to be there in the final mix. A multiband compressor on the other hand may precede the EQ to remove the same problem, so it depends on why your compressing (de-essing is another example).


If you would like to hear some of my work, you can check out:

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Listings also on:

All Music Guide

 

[tonyA]

Re: while we're in the same arena

is there a better way to mix down going from 24bit to 16 bit without losing alot of sound quality? as in are there standalone programs like a nero wave editor? or is that part of the mastering software

Using a computer, convert the sound to a wave file using software like musicmatch because wave does not compress like the MP3's. Then burn it with Nero. Nero Burns CD's of course at natural 44.1/16.

 

[distortedrumble]

ok so i can still export the song to a wave file at 24/96 and nero will make it 44.1?

 

[tonyA]

Yes, it will converted to 44.1/16. But all CD's are like that and all CD players uses that standard. But at least you will retain some detail or (hate to use this word) "warmth". No, not in the bits, but in the translation from 24/96 to 16/44.1. But really, can anyone really hear the difference between a 24/96 to 16/44.1? I know, I know...but is it really that obvious?

 

[distortedrumble]

not if i havent heard the 24/96 version.... plus it really does depend on what your playing the song through.....car stereo testing is a good quickie and i get enjoyable results there....i hate hearing it through some computer media players...havent tested the home system floor standing speakers yet. if its anything like the car system then I'll be a happy man