interning for a ME... i disagree with him... shed some light.

[theycallmebrown]

I started interning in a studio where the head RE would sometimes also master. i have heard its a no no to master something you recorded but he prefers it and this is why. he says he is aware of what his mastering can do to a mix and so he mixes with the intent to *fix* things in mastering. his theory is that he should have everything almost clipping its so loud while mixing (meaning limiters and compressors galore) and then turn down the master fader up to or more than -20b so that he can boost it back up in mastering.

i disagree strongly with that, but i'm not an ME. in my opinion you should mix as if mastering doesn't exist. make the song sound as amazing as it possibly can without worrying about loudness too much, and then AFTER you have done everything you can do in mixing to make it fantastic without concern for loudness, you send it to get mastered. or even if your mastering yourself, your starting point should be as close to finished as possible.... but definitely 2 separate projects, not a continuation of mixing...

my issue with this is, he doesnt focous on making cymbals shine, or making the kick really punch you in the face, and so while mixing, the song generally feels pretty bad, but somehow he does end up making it sound good in mastering.

for all you ME's here, is this something i should be taking note of in a positive way or a "ill be sure not to do that" kind of way..?

[DrGonz]

Well I am just a pawn in the royal chessboard of square wave mastering, but I do think that what this guy is doing is the norm these days. I understand from others that do similar techniques (in the Box) of mastering and is the norm these dayz. If it sounds good then that is what really matters. It really is about getting a set of functions(plugin chains) that makes the distortions sound tolerable. But is that good for your ears? I don't like things that are mastered to be loud and typically if it is louder than -10rms on avg then it usually is too much for me. I listen on headphones and it just sounds horrible after a while. Trying to get the "cymbals to shine" and the "bass drum to punch" is not what modern (in the box) mastering is about. It is about creating a new sound of psychoacoustic loudness that somehow makes something sound ok. But does it ever sound great anymore? Is it dark side of the moon? or any Vintage mastering techniques? Or Is it just an assault on my ears? It seems to me this ME is really giving a lifelong lesson early on here in their course...

[bouldersound]

Whatever he's calling it it's still part of his mix process. I would call that finalizing the mix. If it works it's a good thing. True mastering is about creative sonic processing than the less glamorous details of PQ, error lists, ISRC etc. for CD, or RIAA curve, stylus velocity etc. for vinyl.

[theycallmebrown]

the problem with it is that i dont think it sounds good at all while he is mixing, in fact his bounces sound terrible, then when he imports them into his other system for mastering he has to tweak the hell out of it to get it to sound right again...
maybe hes cutting frequencies in mixing so he can replace them in mastering with his vintage Manley eq's... but still, the guitar tone was great coming from the amp, and greater through the crowley ribbon and vintage Neve mic pres, paired with an Apogee ad16x into a Pro Tools HD card.. soo, why would you ruin what sounds good, so that you can make it sound ok again in mastering? he uses the same outboard eq's and compressers in mixing as he does in mastering... he just keeps saying "trust me, it will sound better"
and it does, but i dont understand why you would do that....

[BassFuzz]

I'm not sure either, I would call what you are describing still a mix process, but if it works for him to get the sound he wants... Usually great mixes make great masters and mediocre mixes make mediocre masters (polishing the ol turd). Sounds like he "mastering" in the same room he's mixing in? If so sounds pretty far from traditional mastering concepts/practices (separate room, speaks, hopefully both better then the mixing room, and fresh set of ears to (hopefully) bring perspective to the mix!).

[Big K]

M2c...
There is no valid reason why you should not master your own mixes or recordings if you now what you do and you are not tempting to to master right after the mix has been done by you.
Your ears and your brain will tell you wild stories and it usually ends up in a big mess and waisted time...

The workflow of your fellow engineer is somewhat odd, but what can you say if it works well....Does it??...
I would always try to get the best mix possible before mastering, but without overdoing the mix buss compression and limiting, etc.
To tease out the right amount of sparkle and adequate loudness ( I am also no fan of squashing!! ) in a mix, as well as adjusting the overall sound to make a nice homogenous CD is what I do when mastering. I had no problems, yet, to master my own mixes, but, as I said, allow some time to free mind and ears...
If you can't agree with the way they work at this place don't try to copy it..find your own workflow.. Not even books can tell you exactly how it works best for you...

Look at starred chefs..they wandered from one gourmet temple to another to learn from different masters de cuisine... So do we...figuratively...just don't munch too loud...lol...

[theycallmebrown]

Thank you for the replys. What would you say of his peculiar "gain stage"principle while mixing? Is there a benifit to pushing track faders above unity, and pulling the master faded down? In protools HD.

[Big K]

Well, during mixing it happens that the overall level of the sum becomes too high.
Instead of re-adjusting all faders you surely can just lower the master fader.
It's been done with analog consoles and with DAWs at 24-bit there should be even less degradation of sound.
Pushing the channel levels harder on purpose ( other then to achieve a certain effect with compressors, asf.) would make more sense in the analog world, allthough, I would not want a mixer with such poor behaviour.
Mind you, if you work in 24 or 32 bit (float) you have to squeeze it real hard to overload the sum due to the huge dynamic range. Just the D/A converters will scream and yell...lol..
But that you hear immediately.. awful...

[Codemonkey]

I always thought that the "master fader" was a post-summing volume control. So the post-channel-fader sends and busses all get piled into the bus, and then scaled by the master fader. Lowering it will not increase your headroom inside the summing circuit/algorithm but simply increase headroom coming out of it.
Unless I'm way off whack on how summing works.

[IIRs]

I always thought that the "master fader" was a post-summing volume control. So the post-channel-fader sends and busses all get piled into the bus, and then scaled by the master fader. Lowering it will not increase your headroom inside the summing circuit/algorithm but simply increase headroom coming out of it.
Unless I'm way off whack on how summing works.

Correct. However, a modern native DAW will still be using floating point maths for the mix buss and master fader, so there is a vast amount of potential headroom above 0dBFS and 'overs' will not actually be clipped.