There is a lot more to it than what you are thinking. But the door is closing in. See Sequoia 11 as an example of great recording and mastering software, but then you still need a treated room and monitors that add up to another $20,000 or so plus ears and a bunch of goodies with knowledge. So, yes, there is software that has the core and then the rest follows as mentioned.

Mastering is also having another set of ears not related to your project. Coming at it from an independent POV. This is extremely important. I am of course talking about professional mastering, not low end home studio mastering using plug-ins and a set of low end monitors in a poorly treated room.

In one of our just recent topics about buying VOVOX cable for my hybrid studio (all in the name of getting a 2% better sound quality. The cable cost for that 2% injection was $11,000. That is just cable. So, you really are talking about a magical plug-in that runs the audio through some processing and spits it out the other side all shinny and loud yes? What you are thinking about isn't true mastering.

Last week I had a band with a nice production in for mastering. Due to some tight budget I agreed on a flat rate and took my time to make it real good. In the background the dudes were rather silent, as usual. After, say, 5 hours they slowly began to snore away and the 2, still awake, began a whispered discussion like "what is he doing the last 40 minutes? I don't hear what he is doing, at all??" Finally, I turned round and explaned to them what I was doing for hours to the sound and songs. Well, I guess I could have better spent the time for a coffee. My deliberations did not get that gloom of understanding in their eyes. But at least they now knew I was actually working..lol..
Late afternoon the CD was finished and sounded big, proud and shiny, like they wanted it. I could bet, some had tears in their eyes. They were absolutely happy, payed cash and left for some celebration or rather party..lol..

It took me watching at least 3 Mastering sessions at a good mastering house to roughly understand what they do there, as well. And soon I found out that it takes different tools, rooms, monitors and another approach to the matter. The extra costs for a good mastering gear are immense and even harder to cough up since, as audiokid said, it is only to get the last 2 %. Or rather the last 0.5 % when we talk about the difference between a ok-working and a good mastering setup. Bob Ludwig payed about 25 grand for his speaker cables..lol.. but I don't need that... But maybe I begin some experiments with super conductors...
Integrating mastering into a studio complex is possible but it does not come for free. If you want survive commercially you must deliver best quality that justifies the price it costs. Even if you get the gear and room, it still takes the ears and experience. The air is thin up there...

jmm22, post: 359764 wrote: What exactly prevents a company from making some kind of system that would integrate the step of mastering?

There is no rubber-stamp, cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all solution. Are you doing bluegrass or deathcore? Classical or country? There are as many different approaches to the recording, mixing, and mastering as there are songs.

You could buy the [="http://www.tcelectronic.com/MasterX3TDM.asp"]Finalizer Plug-ins[/]="http://www.tcelectr…"]Finalizer Plug-ins[/] or the hardware version [[url=http://="http://www.tcelectr…"]TC Electronics Finalizer[/]="http://www.tcelectr…"]TC Electronics Finalizer[/] for well over $2k and find that the tool can't exceed the abilities of the user. The Finalizers are probably magnificent tools to have in your arsenal, but I don't think they ever caught the world on fire because they can't account for the human element and personal taste. No matter how useful they might be as a tool, presets and 'wizards' aren't likely to ever equal the craftsmanship of a great mastering engineer making each adjustment by ear. And even if you stumbled across the perfect settings, unless your monitors and listening environment are essentially lab-spec - you won't know it when you hear it.

Hobbyists and home recording enthusiasts are just kidding themselves if they believe they are well and truly mastering their project. Your job is to get the best tracks and best mix you can. Mastering should be the icing on what is already a damn fine cake.

I think if you could give an ME a magic slider it would be able to balance between the raw artistic quality of the work and the adjustments needed to make the work broadcast-ready and commercially viable.

I've noticed a lot of the topics you are so inquisitive about, it seems like you're looking for a nice neat numerical answer. But that doesn't account for the reality that the "Recording Arts and Sciences", are just that... Art and Science. And that is before you factor in the art of songwriting and playing the music. Drum machines are boring, but Kenny Aronoff doing a simple 4/4 is not.

I could go the art supply store and buy brushes, paint, canvas and Da Vinci for Dummies. And if I live to be 1000, I might learn to mimic Leonardo's brush strokes, but could never mimic his creative process.

Well said, dvdhawk. The Science is the technical knowhow (objective) and the Art is executing the task (subjective). Bravo.

dvdhawk, post: 359797 wrote:

I've noticed a lot of the topics you are so inquisitive about, it seems like you're looking for a nice neat numerical answer. But that doesn't account for the reality that the "Recording Arts and Sciences", are just that... Art and Science. And that is before you factor in the art of songwriting and playing the music.

I could go the art supply store and buy brushes, paint, canvas and Da Vinci for Dummies. And if I live to be 1000, I might learn to mimic Leonardo's brush strokes, but could never mimic his creative process.

I think I have been misunderstood. I am not remotely trying to minimize the importance of mastering in any way, or diminishing the importance of an innate creative process of the artist. However, In a certain scientific or technical sense, it seems redundant to have two distinct processes, first creating a mix, and then mastering that mix. My question was/is, what prevents a software company from creating a program that allows all final levels to be established during one single stage. It is a valid question, and has no relation to how I work, or think. If you try to explain to a layman that it requires two distinct processes to create a recording he/she is apt to wonder why. Apparently, there are good reasons why the process must be in two stages, such as the need for fresh ears, new room, better gear etc., and I wanted to better understand if there were technical reasons beyond these, which I already knew and appreciated.

I may be inquisitive, but hardly for any of the reasons you have erroneously attributed to me.

Leonardo mixed his own paints, so he had two important steps do in executing a painting. But then if Leonardo were alive today, he might buy his paints from Old Holland. It's also worth remembering that Leonardo was a fine painter, but he was just a mediocre helicopter engineer. :smile:

dvdhawk, post: 359797 wrote:
Hobbyists and home recording enthusiasts are just kidding themselves if they believe they are well and truly mastering their project. Your job is to get the best tracks and best mix you can. Mastering should be the icing on what is already a damn fine cake

Of necessity, my ADL 600 submission will be mastered "in house" with all of the requisite struggling this entails, and thus the struggle was the genesis of my question. :tongue: The scientist in me asks why I need to do again what I just did, and in the same place.

The shortest answer is that you perform mastering on a final 2-bus mixdown/bounce/render. You can't provide any mastering whatsoever on a multitrack project as it isn't summed down to a final mix.

Once you have your final stereo mix then you begin the process of tweaking it to "mastering" standards whatever those might be in the limited setting you have. I suggest saving a backup copy of your mixdown prior to this stage.

In an actual professional mastering facility, if they had the original session and tracks they might tweak the main mix further and re-sum the mix down to a new stereo mix to work with to get a better beginning point. Otherwise they are limited to manipulating a stereo mix/breaking it apart/reassembling etc.

Thanks. Something in that answer clicked. I also lost sight of the fact that mastering almost always involves multiple songs, where they must be also balanced one to another, as well as to themselves. I have been thinking purely in a singular manner.

As part of the Logic Studio, there is a mastering application (Waveburner) which uses nothing more than the same plugins that Logic Pro 9 uses (the main DAW application). Waveburner has unique plugin presets and it puts them into sets for different music styles, but otherwise the same plugins.

Correct. A compressor is a compressor is a compressor. An eq is and eq is an eq. It's all about the settings and the quality of that device/plugin.

I think I understood just fine, you've posted 6 questions this month specifically involving the mastering stage. My reply today was generally at this body of questions that indicate you need some clarification on what mastering is. Your question poses the notion that mixing and mastering in two stages, "contains one stage more than one might naively believe is necessary", and that there's a shortage of mastering hardware and software available to the DIY recordist. Neither is true.

You continue by saying,"...such a system might well be of lesser quality than taking a mix to a fully equipped mastering house, but then such a product would appeal to hobbyists and home recording enthousiasts.".

The systems exist. If shoddy (lesser quality) results are OK there are hundreds (if not thousands) of products available. In the professional realm (where shoddy results are not acceptable) there are scores of mastering plug-ins and enough hardware to sink a battleship - but there are no shortcuts in mastering audio. The point of mastering is to add polish and consistency, so your tracks sound good on shuffle and played on the radio in between mega-budget offerings.

Certainly your questions are valid questions, and my answer today was in no way a dig at you, just my observation that there are precious few people equipped to properly master to major-label / major network standards. There is a good reason they use the same people over and over again. (Such as Mr. Ludwig in the States)

Someone like Big K can mix 200+ tracks down to stereo with the mastered finished product in mind - but real mastering is still a separate process.

I love science. In science you have to start with the fundamentals. Asking questions is an important part of the learning process, but hands-on experimenting (button-pushing / knob twiddling) beats it by a mile. You're learning that there is more to the flow of how things mix together than meets the eye. That's why I would encourage you to get great at mixing before you "get swamped with the literally infinite permutations of such settings."

Write good songs, track them well, and make great mixes, then let your record company deal with choosing someone to master it.

Since I am new to recording, I need clarification on everything, sometimes more than once. But it would be a mistake to attribute my lack of knowledge of recording as a lack of determination, and I appreciate all replies.

This is a very good topic.

It took me years to fully understand the difference between the true meaning and process of mastering music. I have been reading these forums for 12 years and I think I'm finally catching on lol. My problem is I'm coming at this from a musicians POV and also live music. Although I have been recording for 35 years, I wasn't doing it like a pro. I never knew the secrets of the pro's until I starting reading what they were doing here. There really has not been this kind of information available until the internet. We are now getting G.A.S. ed by it all. Somewhere there is a balance. And this is why I say I am finally getting it.

Mastering is a lot more than just running something through a box. But you are on the right track.

Nobody doubts your drive or determination. You have passion and persistence - both traits are common of successful people in any field.

Dave used to hang here alot. He talks about his gear a bit; If he could use a simply in/out I think he would.

Make no mistake gentlemen, I have full appreciation for the high skill and necessity of the mastering engineer. No doubt, some of my questions are born out of frustration with the steep learning curve. Ironically, I think I have made acceptable headway in my "learn to pseudo-master for a contest in less time than it takes paint to dry" program, and now I am down to a single chord change which has brought my production to a virtual stand still. Endings are my achilles heel, a product of never having played in a band or having to have the discipline (until now) to do much more than vamp in solitude. I actually finished my master this evening, but had to go back to the mix to try to resolve the problem.

That's a nice looking rack of gear Dave. Do you have any QRD's in your room?

Good for you. You've hit a sensitive section in the recording area where there are so many people posing as mastering engineers so we do take the time to talk about it in detail. I'm very excited to hear your song. GOOD LUCK!

As mentioned earlier Samplitude comes about as close as you can get in a DAW to a recording AND mastering software all in one application.

Part of what made music GREAT back in the Golden Era was collaboration. Now with the current DIY mentality it is something that most people don't even think about and try to do everything themselves in their bedrooms or basements without another living soul hearing or commenting on their endeavors. When they finally post their magnum opus on line or make CDs and sell them and people start to pick it apart they get upset. I have learned, the hard way, that just because I like something does not necessarily mean that everyone else will as well. It is too bad that a lot of the DIYer have not learned that lesson yet.

My point is that as part of the musical "experience" one should involve other people in the music before it is released. A good professional mastering engineer is one person who can make informed judgments and really help you make the best of what you have done up until the time you have contacted them. To try and do everything yourself with an all in one DAW in your basement or bedroom is probably not a good idea.

Best of luck!

Well what you are missing is that you aren't doing 'the same thing again' when mastering.

When mastering you are performing a lot of yes, very scientific procedures - bear in mind that in the truly pro realm you are not just taking a 16-bit 44.1 wav file as your input source - you may be receiving a digital master, a DAT, true tape, or god knows what, and you need to firstly convert this (to perform a digital mastering process) at an incredibly high level, and then process it at the same level in terms of both quality and accurate feedback. You may then be correcting incorrect bits, re-clocking, or performing other correctional functions that I do not wot of, simply to create a seemingly identical digital file that actually works in terms of providing correct bit information to high-end hi-fis. None of that is DAW material.

When explaining to clients why I cannot master for them I explain that there are two ways to spend your money. Either on 16 tracks, or on 2. The latter is a mastering house with the two tracks and all processing being the focus, whereas in the multitrack studio the focus is spreading the quality over 16 tracks. This slightly disingenuous example ignores the fact that in the multitrack studio there will be a focus in financial spend on the tracking rooms themselves whereas in the mastering studio the focus would be on the monitoring stage. Technically there is a situation where both of these can be set up by a single person but in hard reality its financially impossible to do both to a world-class level.

Without being facetious, the question involving performing all of this in the DAW domain shows that you don't truly understand what can be done to 2 tracks or 16 outwith the digital domain that makes the two disciplines completely seperate and divisible. You could have a mastering studio and a recording studio in the same building, but not in the same room. The two people operating them would need to be different as well - as a bad generalization I would say that a mastering engineer cannot hope to have the same knowledge in-depth of microphone usage and placement that a recording engineer can, and vice versa - the recording engineer cannot hope to excel at his job and also know everything the mastering engineer does. At a world-class level you would not keep the two in the same head, its not practical.

Its as much a question of what is possible within a business catering to real paying clients as it is of what is possible within a DAW. And the numbers don't add up in either situation.

And I would argue that for the home recordist ALL DAWs contain the functionality to 'master' to an acceptable level for them. Just strap some finalizing plugins over the two-bus and mix into them?!

Bear in mind that I have conceded (a) that I am new, and perhaps prone to forget things from time to time (b) that the true purpose of the mastering stage became clearer (once again) after Jackattack's post, and those of others, and (c) that I have the utmost admiration for the mastering engineer and his craft. And yes, I know my DAW can master to some very modest level. That is what I have been working for two days now. No need to hammer home any points. Between reading the many replies here, and through wrestling with my pseudo-mastering, I get it, period. In fact, I get it so well now, I will never ask the question again. But as usual, I appreciate the help from anyone who is kind enough to reply.

I hope my posting didn't sound exasperated. Its late and I am catching up on replies and always write with a view to not only answering the OP, but those reading the posts in the future as well.

With this said, if you will permit me, I'd like to point out that you aren't asking a question that inspires discussion and spirited tete-a-teting, you are asking repeatedly, "what is the point of you guys". Everybody here who is a genuine professional (read, making their money solely out of running a recording business, with all the risk that entails in the 'prosumer' economy) is understandably touchy about their position in life being questioned.

At least, it could appear that way.

We are all supportive of your desire to learn. But we are also trying to give you real food for thought that will allow you to get past this. There was a very interesting and well-put set of threads put forward by a poster who had similar questions to you. So much so that I went and looked them up. He went through the initial questioning, the following stages of putting forward alternatives, the learning and putting forward real questions, and then disappeared from the forums after 3 years when he realized the amount of work it would take him to become an ME. I don't want the same thing to happen to you.

But to answer your question bluntly and in a nutshell, you cannot master a project in the true sense of the word, in a basic DAW. Nor do you need to. Finalize it using a hard limiter and a broadband compressor and rightly or wrongly you will get what you desire.

To go back to the painting analogy what you are doing is analogous to coming onto a painting forum and saying 'why this need for all these different colours of paints? surely when viewed from a distance, everything is brown?' and expecting respected artists not to take umbrage.

Perhaps its more like 'why do we have to paint and then varnish - surely there could be a paint made that varnishes as well'. I like to think that good audio has a lot more depth and dimension than paint on substrate, and will champion that cause, as will others.

Even in the short period from when I started this thread, I have come to understand enough of the primitive foundations of mastering to realize how naive my question was. Again, it was born largely of the momentary displeasure of being technically thwarted by the DAW. Of course there are a host of insurmountable reasons why there are two distinct stages to recording.

To be blunt, I have no interest in becoming a ME, except to be able to do a very primitive master so I have some rough idea of what I want the final product to sound like after having it mastered by professionals. The mix changes dramatically when you master it. This I just figured out. It seems certain new relationships between sonic elements are manifested through compression. I would certainly like to better understand how it works. I mean I roughly understand how compression works, but for my project, I simply pushed buttons and moved sliders until I found settings that were adequate.

Make no mistake, with the exception of the contest, I would have any and all of my mixes done at the best mastering studio I could afford. However, as a matter of principle, I am compelled to submit something to the contest that is entirely self produced. Admittedly, I am past most of the fundamental problems that I faced when I started the thread.

You are absolutely right. I would propose that the changes inherent in a full-spectrum, 2-channel mix thats been pushed "to the max" by the mix engineer, when mastered, are so seperate as to be incomprehensible to the mix engineer. Partly through a lack of knowledge and partly through a lack of perspective. In much the same way as repeatedly bouncing to tape tracks, something is lost and you need a new pair of eyes to guide you through. Hence, mastering.

This is sort of a derailment of jmm's initial inquiry, but I believe it may touch on what he is actually dealing with...

I do my best to maintain headroom, from tracking to mixing.
I don't want to focus on numbers, but I try and leave 3-6db headroom for the mastering engineer (peak levels).
Often clients want a louder mix, or they want something to "preview" how their mixes might sound mastered.

For the reasons you have all mentioned, I am loathe to do much to the stereo bus, or to squash levels.
I tell my clients that they have a volume knob for a reason, and I want them to hear the unadulterated mixes on systems and formats they are familiar with - as this will yield the best mix, and allow the ME to do their job.

So I suppose this is a two-pronged add-on / clarification to the OP's concerns:

Does anyone have suggestions for ST bus comps/limiters that do a good job of raising RMS levels w/o coloration? (Plug-ins preferred, given the OP's budget)

And does anyone have suggestions for a process of "pre-mastering" for the purposes of preview?
Something simple, but demonstrative enough to give the average musician an idea of the importance of mastering (a battle I fight daily)?

I realize the 2nd question is rather non-specific, but I am hoping to have the answers to my questions also provide insight to OP's questions.

For me, I use the Sonnox plugs for 2-bus now. I used to use waves L1 or L2 and just grab the preset for full-res, final master. I fully admit to my peers and to clients I consider this low-grade finalizing, not mastering.

I grab a broadband comp and a hard limiter and jam it to -0.3, thats what they want, after all.