spent the last 5 mins joining that site (dynamicrange.de) and cant find any free download anywhere, wouldn't mind running it over a few of my tracks out of curiosity

same. Have no clue what's going on in that site.

i ended up grabbing a torrent of it in the end, says something for a website when its easier to get their main free product from a torrent.

although commendable idea i have to say

will report back tomorrow with how my tracks compare

http://drop.io/wc4biid/asset/tt-dynamic ... atform-zip

since it is a free product.

thank you for this thread!

Great thread. I use logic/uad plugs and various outboard gear for my mix bounces/mastering.

Mastering is great for making tracks hit a little harder and giving some polish and shine.
Having a good mix is the best way to produce a great sounding track, one of the hardest (and most rewarding) parts of the creative process is the mixing. Learning how to place sounds in the stereo field to avoid frequency masking and giving everything its "place" (frequency wise, pan wise etc) will (imo) make the biggest difference in the overall sound/quality/kick of your tracks.
Using nice outboard gear (pultecs, fatso, nice tube comps/pres etc) is GREAT to add glue and cohesion to a mix, but it definitely wont save your ass!

Few words of advice (might have already been mentioned)
- Use subtractive EQ rather than additive EQ (mixing)
- Use linear phase EQ for mastering
- Try to perfect mixes so you never have to notch eq while mastering
- ALWAYS check your phase while mixing (flipping your monitors into mono, having a mono reference like auratones/mixcubes or even just checking a phase meter)

Final note on this unorganized mini brain dump:
Frequency masking can sometimes be tough to distinguish (if you are unfamiliar with mixing). Pretty much if two sound sources with similar spectrum/frequency are situated in one space the weaker signal will "disappear". This sucks as its quite obviously inaudible but its making your mix muddy and less defined. This can be resolved in a few ways, either by changing the frequency that one of the sounds is taking up (duh) or by moving the two sounds 60 degrees apart in the panorama spectrum. The weaker signal that disappeared will "reappear" but at a slightly lower volume (not going to go into the science and actual db levels..). This can solve frequency masking. Pretty cool.

*edit*

i had a similar problem for ages....then i got really familiar with hi-pass filters in the mixdown stage
i can't tell blind (deaf?) but it sounds like you're tracks are over bassed and at that point no amount of limiting/maximizing/distressing is going to make them snap the way you want to

however really no way to tell without seeing/hearing


sweet thread

Thx for the post m8, very helpful

a little Mid/Side processing trick i learned this weekend:

in addition to the method dos-ian mentioned above you can also do this:

use four channels of the same track to play with the M/S image.

double your track so its on two channels, each channel panned hard left and hard right.

then do it again and again so that you have four channels, two hard panned left, two hard panned right.

now take a LR pair and flip the phase. this becomes your SIDE pair, while the other is your MID pair.

now you can adjust the volumes of M and S independently, as well as EQ compress whatever each on its own.

if you've got the set up right, as you raise the faders on one pair, the mix will get wider and louder to a point, and then get quieter and quieter.

an interesting technique for widening during mastering, or bringing foreground stuff out a bit more,.... sometimes, but not all the time.

gotta be REALLY subtle with techniques like that as you can totally fuck up the phase coherence.

indeed,.... by this stage, if you're making such massive changes then you might as well go back to your mix and fix it there.

i'm not into dynamic range "systems."

your ears are the best tool in the world.
once trained, they can pick up on details that "meters" will miss.

if you think your tune sounds crushed, it surely is.
or if your tune is too quiet when you're dj'ing, then you gotta crush it a little more.

mastering is a compromise.
you sacrifice details for volume.

then again, i've been mastering breakcore tunes for the last couple years and squashing the fuck out of them. :) so my advice might be total garbage.

i agree with eprom though.
its all about getting your mix to be as perfect as possible and also as loud as possible.

TOO much squish is never good and just hurts your ears to listen to.
However....dubstep/glitch is heavy electronic music, you dont need a huge amount of dynamic range. Its in your face, obnoxious music. partypartyparty

Honestly, fuck getting it loud.

Mix it down real good, squash maybe 3 dB on the heavy hits with a real good limiter and gain it a bit when you play it live.

If the sound system has any balls at all it'll sound real loud and retain it's dynamic.

If the sound system sucks...find a new promoter. lol.

Had to quote this too...
At the end of the day, IMO, mixdown is everything.

You can fix almost any problem before you let it get to the mastering stage.

Use bussing to groups, subtle compression/limiting in more than one stage, hi-pass/low-pass and subtractive eq. Most of your problems should be gone long before you try to master a track.

I usually just gain 'em a little bit, add a tiny stereo spread above 2.5k, and possibly some harmonic excite where it needs it...

the rest of the work should be done already...

Oh i agree. However, most people dont think like that. Most people say "wtf, my track isnt as loud as x's, so it obviously doesnt sound as good!"

eprom, this might be the most useful post I've seen on this forum hands down. thanks.

eprom, the purpose of using mastering reverb is not to obtain an audible reverb. this reverb is more related to the feel of the sound. it provides a uniformity between your individual pieces within a track as well as between tracks. cheers

I know none of you know me, but honestly, there is a lot of bad advice in this thread already.

Mastering is NOT a sacrifice of detail for loudness. If it is, you're mastering wrong.

A VERY BIG PART of mastering is the ability to separate your mindset from the mixing stage. It is a completely different ballpark. Mastering is about optimizing a song for playback across a wide range of sound systems. This CAN be accomplished with mixing, but not everyone knows how to mix and a mastering engineer has the job of fixing playback issues that may arise. Mixing is about optimizing individual elements of a song to be heard across multiple sound systems. The goal of a mastering engineer is to do as LITTLE AS POSSIBLE to the track as to not change the artistic presentation of the song. Integrity is EVERYTHING. Avoid using multiband compressors unless the song specifically calls for it. Avoid using harmonic excitation if the track doesn't need it. Being an ME requires a VERY critical ear and you have to understand when you are causing problems with a track and when you are helping a track. TOO MUCH IS TOO MUCH. Barely anything can often do the trick. And again, fixing it "in the mix" is often a better solution. One thing to try to accomplish is HARMONIC BALANCING in your mix. Make sure everything is mixing to a generally flat eq curve, but have the bass hit a bit higher on the eq than everything else... maybe 3-5db louder than anything else. Sometimes you want your lead sounds to be the same volume as the bass. A good way to check your EQ curve is to get a spectrometer thing a ma bob like Stillwell Audio's Schope First thing to do as a ME is to balance the EQ harmonically so all elements of the song can be heard equally, or well, or however you want.

One big thing to understand is perceived volume vs actual volume. Which is basically the battle between RMS and PEAK volume levels. Compression plays a big role in this. For mastering you DON'T WANT TO USE A LIMITER TO ACHIEVE PERCEIVED VOLUME. Limiters are for catching peaks and not squashing a mix for perceived volume. You will RUIN your track by doing this. What is good to learn though, is how to properly use a compressor to reduce your dynamic range. A good mastering compressor will be TRANSPARENT, you don't want to hear it working. Mastering compressors usually go for a pretty penny in the hardware arena, but you can get a nice (and new!) digital mastering compressor from Stillwell Audio called Bombadier. You want to affect the RMS of the track and raise it to an acceptable level. One of the most important parts of this is to know how Metering works. You want your master volume meter to stay at a high level while peaks and valleys are reduced. I personally like using compression to reduce my dynamic range to 5db or so, with peaks hitting around 0 to -1db and bass and stuff riding around -4 to -6 db. But realize this, dynamic range is dependent on the program material. If you want more space and whatnot, you need to have a higher dynamic range, if you want more of a wall of sound thing going on, you need a lower dynamic range. I only use a limiter to catch errant (often random) peaks that you do not hear in the music but are happening in the waveform. My limiting will rarely kick at more than -4db of gain reduction. And that will be but for an INSTANT.

EQ is a VERY powerful tool in the mastering stage and should not be neglected unless the song itself has no issues. Most of the time, you will be doing subtractive EQ to fix problems. Sometimes, but not not often, additive (better hope you have a VERY nice EQ for this). Most EQ changes will be no more than -3db. If there are, then something needs to be fixed in the mix, if thats not possible (say the mixing engineer is of town or something), you have to do what you can. Again, better hope you have a NICE EQ. Linear phase EQs are great, but sometimes Minimum Phase EQs are nice too (specifically on high frequencies, linear phase is better for Bass frequencies) Try this: 12db Highpass filter set at 30hz. This will often clear up rumble issues and bass that overpowers your mix. Cut 3db at 18khz and 11khz to make things smoother. Sibilance issues can be cleared up in the 3-11khz range.

M/S processing CAN be done in the mixing process and more often than not, its a better idea than having the ME go ahead and try to create more Side gain out of what is there. This can lead to phasing issues and its only necessary to add M/S processing if the track is lacking "width" or "space". You can often create a bigger sounding track with M/S processing, but if its done in the mix, you don't have to do it in mastering. (I personally do a lot of M/S with my lead synths and upper freqs of my basslines)... try M/S in your mix, you can come up with neat effects and if you know what you are doing M/S also has the ability to create perceived front to back placement. With delays and M/S you caqn also create sounds that move forward and back (around? ). I will sometimes reinforce the Mid and Side if a track needs it. Most of the time Side needs some addition. (But with the way I mix my music OWN music, I rarely need to mess with M/S in mastering)

The best way I have found to approach mastering endeavors is to take it one song at a time, learn how to make one song sound good on multiple sound systems (reference tracks ftw). Once you can do this, it opens the doors to mastering other material.

I can go on about each of these subjects, but honestly, everything is program dependent. Whatever the song you're working with needs, it needs. If it doesn't, DON'T TOUCH IT!

If someone would be so kind to offer a track for me to master, I can go ahead and do it, and then tell you guys the steps I went through to optimize it for playback.

(and if anyone doesn't trust my statements, I've had my music played over a $20k sound system and been told it sounded amazing, not gloating, just stating a fact)

A good resource for mastering information is http://www.gearslutz.com. They have their own dedicated mastering forum where such names as Bob Katz and Robert Babicz often stop by to help out. (If you don't know those names, you BEST be googling them right now!)

P.S. I really don't like Ozone. Its EQ sounds terrible, its harmonic excitation is only applicable in some cases, its limiter sounds terrible, and the rest of that stuff I don't use. The only thing I like is Ozones masterful approach to controlling the stereo spectrum. I have used it enough to know I don't like it and have my own specific way of mastering that utilizes different plug-ins and different techniques. I DO NOT USE MULTIBAND COMPRESSORS really ever...

http://www.solidstatelogic.com/music/se ... ug-ins.asp

the x-ism is pretty useful

come on with the tips! thanks for all the info ppl.

Superchibisan: I agree with a lot of what you've said...... buut in electronic music (especially a young genre with a lot of new producers) the people mixing the tracks ARE NOT mix engineers. Its an unfortunately fact, but a fact nonetheless. This (in my experience) has meant that you really have to squish the tracks a lot more and limit kicks and do a little more radical EQ'ing (especially on the highs as i find SO many people mix their hihats/cymbals in waay too loud).

You said that good mastering gear needs to be very transparent..... im going have to agree and disagree with you on this. (Of course you dont want to hear a compressor pumping....). If you look at top mastering gear its a pretty even split between coloured and uncoloured. Example... GML 8200 is INSANE and VERY clinical and transparent whereas a massive passive is a colour monster. Same with the vari mu, slam, stc8 and zener...

Also, you said you generally have 5db of dynamic range.. thats pretty dam squashed (like emalkay squashed in main, heavy, bassy sections). 5db isnt enough range to give a good sense of dynamics..... sounds like like loudness race range!

Not trying to attack in anyway (because i've squished the shit out of tracks just as much), just putting my opinion out there

Also, welcome to the board