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What Are Your Mastering Tricks

ChancedMusicChancedMusic
in App Tips and Tricks

Super new to mastering but let me tell you, Toneboosters made it super easy. I just mastered my lofi album using TB Equalizer’s compressor template with AI on and managing loudness with TB Barricade’s LKFS meter and limiter/compressor.

Could have added in ReelBus for a bit of tape warmth, but the P.O. 33 already added its own character to the tracks.

I had also tried the Bark Filter trick but it flattened things out a bit and ruined the dynamics.

What are your preferred mastering tricks?

Comments

  • audiblevideoaudiblevideo

    Rolling off the low lows that you can't hear (literally) but that add to what the software still processes in DB.

    Not a trick but what I've learned and seen others doing.

  • Small_paul1976Small_paul1976

    YourJunk, do you have to have to mess around a lot with tb equalizer and barricade?
    I am new to mastering also and have barkfilter. It does help the high and mids but feel it dampens down the lows but the ease of use of It appeals!

  • reasOnereasOne

    what tb app did you use... barricade?

  • JhnkJhnk

    I’m also beginning and I think it depends a lot on what you are mastering and who you are mastering for (if it’s your own music, the line between mixing and mastering gets dangerously blurry). Anyway here are some things that I try to keep in mind. Picked up from various sources and screwing up my own mixes. The best resource for me is the mastering show podcast. Some of these tips are from there, but your better off going to the source.

    1. Mixdown and import your song into a new clean session
    2. Turn on ‘dither’ (I’m not sure if it is wise to dither when you save the mix for importing into the mastering session. I suppose so but perhaps someone with experience can let us know).
    3. Don’t trust your ears. Especially with volume increases. Use reference tracks, loudness metres, etc.
    4. Don’t trust your eyes either. Listen out for unexpected consequences of changes that you make. Use the force.
    5. Give yourself 1db headroom on the limiter.
    6. When applying compression or reverb for more creative uses, go nuts and push it to the extreme. Then lower it until it sounds good. Then go for a coffee. Then listen again and lower it some more. (Perhaps more of a mixing issue. Or my own personal issues).
    7. think about why you are making a change and where it should be made in the signal chain. If you are EQing out an annoying frequency, do it before reverb etc. If want more bass drum but don’t want more pumping from the compresor, try the EQ after. (again, perhaps a mixing issue).

    I don’t claim to be an authority on it! Just some things I’ve picked up.

  • ChancedMusicChancedMusic

    @audiblevideo said:
    Rolling off the low lows that you can't hear (literally) but that add to what the software still processes in DB.

    Not a trick but what I've learned and seen others doing.

    Have definitely heard this too.

    @Small_paul1976 said:
    YourJunk, do you have to have to mess around a lot with tb equalizer and barricade?
    I am new to mastering also and have barkfilter. It does help the high and mids but feel it dampens down the lows but the ease of use of It appeals!

    Not much, no. The biggest manipulation is in Barricade, balancing the compressor and limited to maintain the dynamics while staying within the -16 to -14 LKFS range. I did also have to make some smallish changes to EQ but that’s mostly due to the fact that I recorded the tracks straight from my P.O. 33 as a single track so I couldn’t do much with the EQ beforehand.

  • ChancedMusicChancedMusic

    @reasOne said:
    what tb app did you use... barricade?

    Equalizer and Barricade.

  • ChancedMusicChancedMusic

    @Jhnk said:
    I’m also beginning and I think it depends a lot on what you are mastering and who you are mastering for (if it’s your own music, the line between mixing and mastering gets dangerously blurry). Anyway here are some things that I try to keep in mind. Picked up from various sources and screwing up my own mixes. The best resource for me is the mastering show podcast. Some of these tips are from there, but your better off going to the source.

    1. Mixdown and import your song into a new clean session
    2. Turn on ‘dither’ (I’m not sure if it is wise to dither when you save the mix for importing into the mastering session. I suppose so but perhaps someone with experience can let us know).
    3. Don’t trust your ears. Especially with volume increases. Use reference tracks, loudness metres, etc.
    4. Don’t trust your eyes either. Listen out for unexpected consequences of changes that you make. Use the force.
    5. Give yourself 1db headroom on the limiter.
    6. When applying compression or reverb for more creative uses, go nuts and push it to the extreme. Then lower it until it sounds good. Then go for a coffee. Then listen again and lower it some more. (Perhaps more of a mixing issue. Or my own personal issues).
    7. think about why you are making a change and where it should be made in the signal chain. If you are EQing out an annoying frequency, do it before reverb etc. If want more bass drum but don’t want more pumping from the compresor, try the EQ after. (again, perhaps a mixing issue).

    I don’t claim to be an authority on it! Just some things I’ve picked up.

    Definitely some good tips. I also found this image on Reddit with some useful tips.

  • TarekithTarekith

    One of the most common issues I hear when mastering people's tracks is that they tend to push things out too far to the sides of the mix, leaving a big hole in the center of the imaging. Especially people who work solely in headphones, this seems to be pretty common. My favorite trick for fixing this is using a Mid-Side plug in that lets you adjust the volume of the mid and side channels seperately. Normally I reach for Voxengo's free MSED on the laptop, but I'm sure there's some iOS equivalents. Anyway, I'll boost the mid channel anywhere from 0.3 to 1dB, and then lower the side channel by the same amount. This does a lot to bring back a bit more solidity to the center of the mix.

    More tips:

    • Less is more. 95% of the time in mastering all I'm using is an EQ and limiter. I almost never need to reach for multiband tools unless there's a very specific problem I'm working on and going back to fix the mixdown is not an option.

    • Try listening to the song you're working on from the room next to your main listening space. Often that will point out any issues you might have with an instrument being too loud or harsh.

    • If you're going to take a listening break, go outside for a bit. I find that not only does the quiet help, but giving your ears a break from the sound of acoustic space you're in brings back a lot of objectivity. Often times we are listening more to the room than the music in less than ideal monitoring environments.

    • Remember that often when we high pass or filter out the sub frequencies, we're also boosting a little bit near the cutoff point, it's just the nature of how EQs work. So you might think you're making things better by getting rid of everything below 30Hz, but you might also be making things worse by simultaneously boosting things at 40Hz in the process. Some times this is a useful trick too! By using less steep filter or EQ curves, you can reduce this boosting so don't think you need a super steep cutoff to fix the issue.

  • ChancedMusicChancedMusic

    @Tarekith said:
    One of the most common issues I hear when mastering people's tracks is that they tend to push things out too far to the sides of the mix, leaving a big hole in the center of the imaging. Especially people who work solely in headphones, this seems to be pretty common. My favorite trick for fixing this is using a Mid-Side plug in that lets you adjust the volume of the mid and side channels seperately. Normally I reach for Voxengo's free MSED on the laptop, but I'm sure there's some iOS equivalents. Anyway, I'll boost the mid channel anywhere from 0.3 to 1dB, and then lower the side channel by the same amount. This does a lot to bring back a bit more solidity to the center of the mix.

    More tips:

    • Less is more. 95% of the time in mastering all I'm using is an EQ and limiter. I almost never need to reach for multiband tools unless there's a very specific problem I'm working on and going back to fix the mixdown is not an option.

    • Try listening to the song you're working on from the room next to your main listening space. Often that will point out any issues you might have with an instrument being too loud or harsh.

    • If you're going to take a listening break, go outside for a bit. I find that not only does the quiet help, but giving your ears a break from the sound of acoustic space you're in brings back a lot of objectivity. Often times we are listening more to the room than the music in less than ideal monitoring environments.

    • Remember that often when we high pass or filter out the sub frequencies, we're also boosting a little bit near the cutoff point, it's just the nature of how EQs work. So you might think you're making things better by getting rid of everything below 30Hz, but you might also be making things worse by simultaneously boosting things at 40Hz in the process. Some times this is a useful trick too! By using less steep filter or EQ curves, you can reduce this boosting so don't think you need a super steep cutoff to fix the issue.

    I actually ran into that side/mid issue on my last song. I found that moving my bass and pads to mono while leaving the drums and leads in stereo really helped fill the space.

    Totally agree on the simplicity factor. First time I mastered my lofi songs, I way overdid it and flattened the whole thing. This time, an EQ and limiter was really all I needed. I did have a little compression on a few of the songs to keep my peaks within a reasonable range.

    Also dig the idea of listening from another room. I’ve also found that listening in the shower helps in a similar way.

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