mastering plugins

Discuss music production with Ableton Live.
d-track
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mastering plugins

Post by d-track » Sat Jun 01, 2013 1:36 am

I've tried a bunch of mastering plugs in the recent years but now i am looking for the ultimate one. In the near future we are planning to establish a label and releasing both vinyl and digital.
i am thinking of these 3 alternatives:

Ozone - it looks like an all-in one package but what i recall it was too artificial or digital when it comes to limiting. However i have played with the previous version

T-racks - the gui, simplicity and sound character is what i liked and probably the best for vinyl but doesn't have multiband imager which can be handy for vinyl especially under the 300hz range.

Fabfilter Pro series - similar to ozone but less features (no imaging)

what do you guys think hows these 3 compare and i'm also open to other alternatives
*-*

glacier808
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by glacier808 » Sat Jun 01, 2013 3:58 am

I think Ozone is good. A lot of people who do video tutorials constantly reference and use Ozone in their demonstrations. I personally use the maximizer function on Ozone, as well as some of the Exciter and Stereo functions. Good overall.

I thought about getting Fabfilter Pro, but then saw the EQ update in Ableton Live 9. IMO, it seems like the new EQ is not far from the FabFilter one, plus the price is about the same to upgrade for 9 if you already had Live 8 or a previous version.

Good luck man,

Mike

Machinesworking
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by Machinesworking » Sat Jun 01, 2013 4:42 am

My current favorites are:

PSP Master Compressor

Fabfilter Pro L

and currently using PSP Neon for a linear phase EQ.
I'll probably buy DMG Audios Equilibrium soon, but the demo is about out and it's slightly buggy for me, very possibly not the developers fault, but it's still in 1.0 release so....

I also use on occasion Voxengo's Elephant, Nomad Factory Puls Tech EQ's and LM Amplifier.

freshdrumma
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by freshdrumma » Sat Jun 01, 2013 10:06 am

ozone is good, great limiter and dither. fab filter stuff are good too. i'm not a big fan of tracks, quite hard to get good results with it for me. (i run a mastering studio)

i use :

Brainworks eq
uad manley massive passive and pultec eq
vertigo sound compressor
sonnox limiter.

those cover the most of the jobs in the digital domain for me. but as said ozone is quite good too, usable eq, great limiter.

XSIMan
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by XSIMan » Sat Jun 01, 2013 12:10 pm

They are some of the best plugins.

Pro -L is supposed to be the best limiter / loudness maximiser for covering all music types.

Other plugins to consider for mastering and adding mojo are:-

DMG Audio Compassion limiter / Bus compressor/ exciter/ compressor
DMG Audio Equilibrium allows you to make a custom digital or analogue EQ for track or mastering ads colour if you want it.

Slate Digital
VCC console emaulation
VTM Studer tape machine emulation
VBC vintage mix bus compressors
FG-X A limiter loudness maximiser designed to preserve dynamics.

Soundtoys Radiator adds a vintage amp warmth to your track.

mauronedj
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by mauronedj » Sat Jun 01, 2013 1:26 pm

For limiting:
Toneboosters and Vladg :D
For EQ: Live eq or Variety of Sound for characters.
Compressor:
PSP master comp or the new Glue compressor

d-track
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by d-track » Sat Jun 01, 2013 6:14 pm

freshdrumma wrote:ozone is good, great limiter and dither. fab filter stuff are good too. i'm not a big fan of tracks, quite hard to get good results with it for me. (i run a mastering studio)
Could you be more specific? How do you mean hard to get good results? is it the limiter (which one?)

However it looks like Ozone is good overall based on opinions here but i personally liked T-racks the most and probably give DMG Audio Compassion a try.
*-*

d-track
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by d-track » Sat Jun 01, 2013 6:16 pm

XSIMan wrote:They are some of the best plugins.

Pro -L is supposed to be the best limiter / loudness maximiser for covering all music types.
In contrast to Ozone? What is the difference?
*-*

XSIMan
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by XSIMan » Sun Jun 02, 2013 12:25 am

Compared to Ozone no idea but many say Pro-L is the best because it can go louder without distorting and retain the transients but their is always a limit on how loud you can go before it distorts too much. I guess you have to demo both and listen. on every debate on every forum the conclusion has been that Pro-L is the best but I'm ok using FG-X and Compassion after demoing Pro-L.

Machinesworking
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by Machinesworking » Sun Jun 02, 2013 12:34 am

All these mentioned are good choices, I tend to think of the Pro L as really without any color at all, which I guess is a way to say it acts without any compression type feel to it at all? I have Pro C as well, and forgot to mention it, it's the least coloring compressor I own, so in some ways I end up using other compressors in terms of mastering, because mostly I want the glue effect on mastering with compression, and straight volume with limiting.

d-track
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by d-track » Sun Jun 02, 2013 1:25 am

I see. But i like coloration that's why i found Ozone too artificial. There was no coloration whatsoever even if i pushed the volume. I like how T-racks plugins bring mild saturation/clip/whatever to the mix. What i dislike is the too wide crossovers. In Ozone i can set them to almost zero.
*-*

Tarekith
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by Tarekith » Sun Jun 02, 2013 1:42 am

I use Pro-L and Compassion for probably 95% of the stuff I work on these days, they're both really flexible. Ozone is not a bad option either, but time and again I see that the fact it comes with many modules means people feel they need to use them. When really only one or two will be all you need.

For me Pro-L is a winner because the 4 different modes it operates in cover such a wide range of styles. It can be super clean, or (almost) warm and pumpy. Ignore the mode names and just try them all to see which sounds best. Also, it is very hard to get the Pro-L to distort, even when pushed to the point that it makes the song sound terrible. This is both good and bad IMO, again people think they CAN push it harder than they really should. And I don't say that in terms of "ideally" dynamic music.

Compassion is just rediculous in how flexible it is. Complex though as a result. But again it can cover a huge range of sounds and is very configurable. That's one reason I like both of these so much. They sound great, they are extremely flexible, and they give the user a lot of ways to customize how they look to suite your needs.
Tarekith
Ableton Forum Administrator
https://tarekith.com

freshdrumma
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by freshdrumma » Mon Jun 03, 2013 6:45 am

t-racks doesn't sound clean (transparent) enough for mastering to my ear. it's not an all rounder, tends to have a specific sound, while ozone it's clean, flexible and adaptable to any kind of music, plus the limiter and the dithering options are far more powerful than t-racks.
the eq on ozone it's much more transparent than the tracks one, more precise too.

evon
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by evon » Mon Jun 03, 2013 3:35 pm

I guess this thread wouldn't be complete until we heard from Tarekith. I must try out Pro-L and Compassion. I have tried other Fabfilter Plugs also Sonalksis, Waves, Ozone etc. I find it hard to work without Waves L2 Limiter and Maximizer.
fe real!

d-track
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Re: mastering plugins

Post by d-track » Mon Jun 03, 2013 8:27 pm

freshdrumma wrote:t-racks doesn't sound clean (transparent) enough for mastering to my ear. it's not an all rounder, tends to have a specific sound, while ozone it's clean, flexible and adaptable to any kind of music, plus the limiter and the dithering options are far more powerful than t-racks.
the eq on ozone it's much more transparent than the tracks one, more precise too.
That's why i tend to use T-racks. For that sound. However that's right you cannot push the volume too far without side effects compared to Ozone. But usually i am not intend to. For specific things i may consider getting both later.
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