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Mastering: The Black Art
I have attempted mastering on iOS with varying levels of success, I have also used online mastering services, also with varying levels of success.
I've read about using reference tracks, about the current trend to get as loud as possible, about how to use compressors, limiters and EQ.
I have the Audio Mastering app made by Igor Vasiliev and where I think I understand what each piece of the app is supposed to do, I am uncertain if I am using them in the correct way, or even if I am following the correct process to master tracks or what measurements/meter readings I am supposed to use and at what stages in order to know that I am doing things right.
I'd like to start at the beginning as i am convinced that mastering does not start with opening the mastering app, so my first questions are
- How do i know that I need to master and why am I doing it ?
- Where do I start ?
- How do I know that my source material is ready for mastering ?
- As the tracks are all going on the same EP do I master each track individually or all together ?
These are quite sweeping questions I suppose so for the purpose of this thread, I have a hypothetical 4 tracks that I want mastering for an EP that will be released as MP3 on iTunes and also on CD.
Each of the tracks is a different style,
- one is classic reggae a la Bob Marley's Stir it up,
- one is a dance track similar to Dreadzone's Captain Dread,
- one is a rock track in the vein of Cream's Sunshine of your love.
- and one is a trip hop track along the lines of Massive Attack's Teardrop.
All tracks have been mixed so that I am happy that I can hear all instruments clearly and am happy with the relative volume levels of each instrument within the tracks, both in my headphones and on my car stereo.
Thanks in advance to those who have already volunteered to take part in this thread 
Comments
Good idea for a thread... Although not sure I can help. Normally i'm left questionion if I have madd things better/worse/had no impact at all. Apart from Limiting - which I get... make it louder, init..
Exactly why I jumped on the opportunity and started this, I am the same, Have I made it better or just made it louder ?
I comment only to say that I really appreciate @AndyPlankton staring this thread and asking these important questions in a simple, direct way, and that I (and, I expect, other mostly-lurkers/novices like me) will be watching this thread very closely, eagerly awaiting some substantive answers. I wish I had something more to contribute.
Nice thread @AndyPlankton I am not a full time mastering engineer, but I do master, my own soundtracks, and most of the times for broadcasting, but I'll try to answer some of those questions
1- when you compare your mixes to other released tracks, you will probably notice a big difference in overall volume, sometimes in clarity and definition of the sound, and some difference in dynamic range. You will also notice that this mastered track is loud, but isn't clipping. For all of those reasons that you need to master
2-I think that the best way to start is with YouTube...hahah....there are a few good tutorial to get you started understanding the process, I believe there are some good manuals at Izotope's site, they talk about their mastering plugin, but most of the concepts you can transfer to other plugins. In terms of how to start a mastering process, it depends on the material you are working on, and where you are releasing it - Youtube, soundcloud, spotify, itunes, Tv, Radio - For Tv there are broadcasting rules regarding overall volume and dynamic ranges, for radio you want as loud as you can, so you better start chaining one compressor after the other and compressing a little each time to get loud without destroing to much of your song, for spotify and iTunes, they follow Loudness standarts too, so your master doesn't need to be so loud, just well balanced and without unnecessary peaks, just compress it carefully, eq, excite, work on the stereo field, (maybe not on that order),and limit, but not to much, you can keep a good dynamic range on Apple music and Spotify
3-I think that it should be well balance in terms of individual volumes and eq, and should not have lots of unnecessary peaks from individual instruments, that will prevent you from reaching more volume on your master
4-You master individually, to try to get them to sund as close as possible to one another, again in terms of volume, overall eq, and dynamic ranges (you don't want the listener to keep reaching the volume of his stereo all the time). To keep everything in check between tracks you use meters for stereo field, dynamic range, phase, frequency analyzer and loudness
I hope this helps a little!
Cheers
Thank you @Rafael_laurenti
Great post.
This: "and should not have lots of unnecessary peaks from individual instruments" - is what I normally end up with. Bass, mids and highs.
I then hack out various frequencies of my track to try and deal with this with EQ, and also mess with compression - and end up feeling that I have somehow taken some of the magic out too. But at least it is now listenable on standard iphone headphones (whereas before it was shrill) and also less boomy on big systems. I then limit it - probably too harshly.
This is the extent of my DIY mastering to be honest... Sometimes it improves, sometimes i'm not sure it does - it just takes ages running between different speakers/headphones and i'd have been better off just uploading the pre-mastered version to SoundCloud (always my destination). By the end of the process I also normally hate the track
(which normally wears after a few weeks of leaving it alone).
So for my 4 tracks, I should get the released versions of the track it is similar too, compare the two and try to spot differences ? I guess overall volume is easier to spot than the others and it is seemingly more obvious what to do to get the volume up, but what about clarity, if my track does not sound as clear as the mastered reference track, what should I be doing to make it sound more clear ?
>
OK, so I need to know what my destination is and the rules, if any, for that destination. Is there somewhere I can find out these rules ?
To get as loud as you can you say chain compressors, why do that as opposed to using a single compressor and compressing the signal in one go ?
OK I get this one
Are you saying that when I master each track I should be aiming to get the same readings on the meters in each one, unless say in one track the stereo field goes mono for artistic effect to make it sound aged for example ?
Is there a phase meter in the Audio Mastering app, and what does a phase meter show me ?
Are there generic 'sweet spots' for the readings on meters I should be aiming for ?
Thanks very much for getting involved
I feel this is the beginning of an interesting and informative journey for me
I’ve got a fairly simplistic view of what mastering is. In the true sense of the word, the “master” should be as neutral and uncommitted to usage as possible. What most people seem to think mastering is is to get ready for a cutting lathe or cassette duplication, or ready for radio broadcast, or some other actual specific usage. In my view, that’s not mastering. That’s already having a master, and doing further processing from it.
This sounds like a very familiar story
Are you EQ'ing and compressing your tracks in your mix, or just trying to do it afterwards in mastering ? I used to do this until i learnt about proper gain staging, this helped me a lot with my mixing. A simple explanation of it is set all faders on your mixer to the default position, there is usually a marker on the mixer for this, then adjust the input to the fader for each track so that it is peaking just below the top of the fader button, once you have done this the peak should follow the fader as you move it up and down. The idea is to then use EQ and compressoin to get the quiet sounds to cut through more while keeping the meter peaking at the same point. If you boost your track by 2db then lower the fader by 2db, if you cut then raise it.
Do you boost or cut ? Cut is generally better and cut narrow. So if your bass is quiet, find the dominant frequencies in the bass and then cut them from other tracks that are competing for that same frequency, your bass will magically sound louder when in fact it isn't. I learnt a lot of this from the recording revolution vids on youtube.
Working like this has made my mixes sound so much clearer and they transported across different speakers much better.
I am now trying to use mastering to make two tracks play after one another without them sounding massively different in terms of volume, stereo width etc. All the things that @Rafael_laurenti mentioned.
I guess in the older days when everything went to vinyl having a single master for cutting made sense, but nowadays with so many destination media and platforms the same isn't true anymore.
So a good question raised here, do you process your mix to produce a 'Master Master' from which you will produce your master for each destination platform, or do you process the mix each time ?
People seem to confuse a lot the later stages of mixing, where you apply effects to your mixbus or even to the bounced track, for sound shaping purposes, and the mastering process proper, which aims to get a coherent listening experience (no steep volume or EQ differences between songs with minimum loss or of the character of the sound of the mixes themselves) .
That seems to be because most are releasing songs and not full albums or even EPs, where proper mastering is absolutely essential, also because it recently became a habit to apply further sound process at mastering facilities (limiting for a spl level that "stands to the competition", EQing to "fit in the genre" etc), even if at the expense of the work of the mixing engineer.
I myself always master my own songs aiming for coherence with other songs of mine that are conceptualy similar, so they get along fine if I decide to make an album of them, doing lots of critical A/B listening between them. Even so, I try to get as close as possible to a particular sound character in the mixing stage, so I'd usually end up doing little more than raising the song's volume and correcting any perceptive deviations it does from the sound I am aiming for. When I master the work of others, I apply the same philosophy: usually mastering several songs as an album, and if it's a single song, I master very conservatively (unless I'm asked for a "mix rescue").
In iOS, it's better to stay away from the so-called mastering apps, and rely in Auria's top-notch FF plug-ins, since they have advanced and reliable meters, and monitor through hi-end phones and check it in a properly treated room with good non-holed speakers and perhaps a SW if possible, but any reasonable flat headphones will help if you do lots of A/B comparison (better done in the mixing stage as well) and also take a look at the FF meters.
By the way, RIM (if you read this thrad): what about an advanced meter for auria, perhaps with LUFS?
All the best!
+1 on a meter with LUFS - short term, long term, dynamic range, calibrated on EBU-128 on Auria....it's everything that I wish...haha
@u0421793 A few years ago I would completely agree with you, but nowadays, when you have to do a mastering for broadcast with teh EBU specs, it's better to have a completely uncompressed mix instead of a master that is already compressed and too loud, the same goes for the new standarts that Apple Music and Spotify follows, it's better to work from a uncompressed mix
**Before I start, let me just preface this by stating that my opinions on the subject are just that, my opinions. Despite mastering other people's music for roughly 16 years now, there's more than one way to approach "the dark art of mastering". (spoiler, it's not dark art, just experience and the ability to be unbiased). You should always take advice like this with a grain of skeptism, and don't be afraid to follow your gut if you're getting results you're happy with a different way.
Also I am of the firm belief that a lot of what people think of as modern day mastering was largely pushed on us from manufacturers trying to make their products seem indepensible. There's no reason ANYONE needs to stress over what dither they use, and if you ask most professional M.E.'s (mastering engineers), they very, very rarely use tools like multi-band compression.
Right, let's dive in then
**
**To me, mastering is at it's core about getting someone with more experience than you, in a listening environment more accurate than your's, to bring their expertise to your projects. Nice gear helps obviously, but an experienced mastering engineer will likely get better results using crap gear than an unexperienced person will with $40k of dedicated high end gear. Luckily, these days there's very little crap gear, even the most basic tools we might have on iOS are more than up to the task.
Of course the question was what to do if you're mastering your own music, thereby negating the main benefit of going to a dedicated mastering engineer. This leads us to....**
**Simply. Before you start applying loads of processing to your mixdown, ask yourself WHY are you applying them. NEVER slap a plug on your master channel unless you HEAR an actual need for it. If you're working on your own material, most of the time you can more accurately and cleanly solve any issues you hear by dealing with directly in the mixdown. Too much bass? Turn down the bassline, or EQ just enough low end out of it. Not enough width in the song? Go back and pan some instruments to spread things out more, or apply some widening to just a couple instruments.
By far the biggest issue I hear when people master their own songs is that they apply a bunch of processing because they read that someone else did that, or they feel they were supposed to for reasons they don't understand. In that sort of midset it's way too easy to interpret any change they apply as being better, instead of just being different. Be objective, and fix issue you hear, not imaginary ones.
More detailed thoughts on this here:
http://innerportalstudio.com/articles/Mastering.pdf**
When you're happy with the mixdown, and there's nothing else you feel it needs.
**Whenever you're going to have such wide ranging styles of music on the same release, it's always about compromise. You want each song to have it's own killer sound, but if the goal is to have a killer cohesive album, sometimes you need to make compromises to achieve that. Personally, I tend to master each track on it's own first, I fix and enhance each one as subtly as possible. Then I'll take those masters and line them up in a DAW (Auria, Triumph in my case, etc) and I'll basically "needle drop" through them. Playing short bits of each so I can get an overall feel for how they sound back to back and in relation to each other.
In your example above, maybe the rock track sounds awesome on it's own, but compared with the other songs that are in much more bass-heavy genres, it sounds too light. So maybe I go back and add more bass than I might have on it's own, so that it's not glaringly different when you hear the album. As an ME I'm listening not just for tonal balances like bass, treble, mids, etc, but also stereo spread, overall volume, depth of soundfield, etc. That's when I go back to the individual masters and make any tweaks to make everything sound more cohesive.
This applies to processing too. Maybe I'd normally use a certain EQ on the raggae song on it's own, as that what fits it best in isolation. But for the sake of cohesion of the album, I instead choose to use the same EQ for all the songs. Things like that. **
**These days the VAST majority of releases are online or for CD, so the requirements for those platforms are the same. Mastering for vinyl is different since you don't want to deliver a very hot master to the cutting engineer, it restricts how loud they can get it on the record. So I might use the same EQ processing as the online version, but i don't limit it at all for volume, since the cutting engineer can do that better than I based on their lathe.
Mastered for iTunes is another example like this, if a client needs an MFiT version, I'll likely give them a much less limited version that conforms to those standards. More about MFiT here:
http://innerportalstudio.com/mastered-for-itunes/
If you're just making music to post on soundcloud, your own website, YouTube, etc, then for now a single master for all of those will work fine. This might change in the future as more online streaming services start following variants of the LUFS (loudness units full scale) but for now one master will work for most situations.**
@AndyPlankton I'll try to answer thise new questions as best as I can...haha
2.I saw an article not so long ago about the standarts that are followed by spotify and Apple music, I'll look for it and post the link, for broadcast, just look for EBU-128 broadcast on google, you should find the specs. For cd mastering, just import the audio from your favorite albums and check how the meters respond to them...it's loudness war there....hahaha
You chain compressors and compress only 1 or 2 dB each time, instead of just compressing a lot with one because it usually sounds better and more natural, but I really suggest that you do the exercise of trying both things, you will notice the difference
Again, a good way to find the sweet spots is to importing some songs that you like how they sound and look at the meters, try to get close with your songs, it will be a good exercise
I am you and you are me, dude.
Mastered for iTunes is another example like this, if a client needs an MFiT version, I'll likely give them a much less limited version that conforms to those standards. More about MFiT here:
http://innerportalstudio.com/mastered-for-itunes/
Great article! Thanks!
Not to totally disagree, but I just wanted to point out to others that a linear phase phase EQ is not inherently better than a minimum phase EQ. Nor is it something preferred by most mastering engineers that I've talked to. Useful in some cases, but with linear phase EQs you have to worry about pre-ringing, which can introduce a whole other set of issues depending on the sparseness of the mix and the transients in it. Not a bad tool to have at your disposal, but it's not "better" or "for mastering".
Thanks for the info @Tarekith , I didn't know about that, will research more on this
https://www.gearslutz.com/board/mastering-forum/569408-linear-phase-versus-minimum-phase-eqs.html
Thanks for the very useful tips @AndyPlankton
Great topic....it is a black-art!
Said that, I tell you my key points in brief which I learned around the studios:
1- EQ most important part of mastering; decide if you wanna give "a color " or the clear the better ... A reference track @ min 320 can help. EQ type, linear non linear, according to taste.
2- Compression, same as above, there many great compressor that give "a color", some other no.....As a rule of thumb, the less you use the compressor the better, with small ratio such as 1:2; what I find useful (depending on the type of track) is the Multiband Compressor to treat frequencies in a different way.
3- Limiter, don't make it to loud....the Loudness trend is changing, many clubs are going toward the "quality" of the sound rather than the power on mono PA.
4- check for any clips, phase issues, Dinamic Range, peaks level on different passages....actually these things should have been point 1!!!
5- when mastered, listen the track on different media....MP3 player, phone, car hifi, home hifi....it should be pleasant always!!!
For a safe mastering they say "lower the Low, increase the High....but the Middle frequencies are the focus, and there you have to pay attention.....the majority of people listen to music with low quality headphones which anyway cut the accuracy on the two ends of the spectrum "
6- in conclusion, considering that most of the mastering is done at the mixing stage....the less the better, after that you have checked for any issues.
7- last advice, avoid preset in mastering, use your hears.
Great! Changing my mastering eq's list from now on
WOW some great insights here, it will take me some time to digest everything. Massive thanks to all who have contributed so far. No doubt more questions will be asked as my understanding increases and more How do you recognise an issue type questions.
Since we are on the eq subject @Tarekith , I usually use 2 eqs, one linear phase (until now..hehe) to cut specific frequencies with narrower Q's, and when I want to boost something, I use analog emulation eqs (usually Waves, AbbeyRoads or SlateDigital or the free Luftikus) that are harmonically richer to boost, with broader Qs, do you have any considerations on this approach? Or am I just using more eq's that I need?
Yes, rule no.1 always start with init, innit?
Isit?
I think in the mastering stage there's probably not a lot of reasons to go with more than one EQ, but as with everything music that depends on what you're trying to do. I usually just use a single stereo EQ myself, but sometimes I'll also use an EQ in mid-side mode too. Say I want to boost the crack of a snare that's inbetween both channels, or reduce some mud on the guitars that are panned very wide.
Personally I swear by DMG's Equilibrium EQ for mastering, because I can swap out EQ emulations on a per band basis. Maybe I want a nice clean EQ for the lower mids, but for the highs I want something a bit more harmonically complex as you say.
This seem like a very good Eq, loads of resources, I'll try the demo, thanks!
The thing I’ve always been afraid of in mastering is too many phase alterations brought about by too many shifts in eq (and by extension, compression, which can alter the phase relationships in a similar but less apparent way). The effects of each may be “invisible” but cumulatively can give rise, if you’re not careful, to a phenomena known as “listener fatigue”.
Brilliant thread.