Great forum idea! Let me begin by saying that after reading through the other posts, I’m thrilled that there are those of you out there who are willing to share your knowledge and kick this forum off. My many thanks in advanced.

Now then, here are a couple of questions for the gurus out there:

a friend of mine recorded a project for a band and they took it to get professionally mastered at Freq Mastering. Everything on the mastered copy sounded more present, it was subtle like you couldn't hear EQing or compression it was just that every instrument found their place. Is this presence achieved by just running things through really nice analog outboard gear?

Wow, I made a little suggestion in the Bar and Grill about a mastering forum and wham! There it is. Thanks audiokid! So let's see who else is into it. FYI I've done a couple small mastering projects but I'm nowhere near a guru. Certainly no moderator type. Um. so I'll start with what I'm using. A 400mHz PIII, Win 98, Cool Edit Pro, Sound Forge and some Waves plugins.

How's about a mastering forum? That's one thing I havent seen much. So many of us are doing basic mastering that a resource would be very appreciated. Maybe Brad would be into it? Hmmmm, just a thought.

what do you guys do about mastering? what tools do you use? Is every mastering house accepting PT files?

I use the C4 and L1. It works excellent for me. I use WavesC4 only at the master track of the entire session, then bounce the session in 24 bit to two tracks, then open a new session up in 24 bit and import the two tracks.