Mastering plugins input / output levels?

[VooDooGenic]

hi all,

forgive me if this question has been answered before. i've watched a ton of tutorials and, i'm still a little bit fuzzy on this topic.

from the tutorials, i've learned to use the Utility tool to gain stage the diff instruments, and my Master Bus level is -6. so far, so good. i then export to a .wav file.

i then import the .wav file into a new Ableton session, and then typically add 2 plugins:

1 - saturator (Waves Infected Mushroom)
2 - limiter (Tokyo Dawn Limiter 6 GE)

starting with the saturator, the thing that's got me perplexed is - how do i determine the input and output levels? is it some combination that results in the output levels maintaining the -6 headroom going into the limiter?

thanks in advance.

Gianni

[Tarekith]

Instead ask yourself, why are you using a Saturator in the first place? What issue in your song do you hear that you think requires a Saturator?

[VooDooGenic]

thank you for your reply.

i'm a virtual noob to this, but w/o the saturator, the song sounds kind of "pale" - i guess that's that best way for me to describe it.

if there are other (non-technical) ways for me to achieve this, i would certainly welcome any advice.


Gianni.

[Tarekith]

Hard to say what you should do without hearing the song. Can you post the mix down so I can take a listen?

[VooDooGenic]

thanks again. i will post a couple of samples. still new to this, so it may take me a day or two.

[VooDooGenic]

a little off-topic, and i'd hate to kick a company when they are down, but i think i'm not a fan of Waves' business practices, so i'd eventually like to move away from the Waves Infected Mushroom plugin.

[VooDooGenic]

hi and sorry it took so long. the whole Mastering process is still a bit of a mystery to me.

i've tried to match the Integrated LUFS on both clips. i'll attach a link to a couple of clips here:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... sp=sharing

1. Song with Saturation.
2. Song without Saturation.

thank you.

[Tarekith]

Yes, I agree that the version without the saturator sounds a little more dull in comparison. That said, the version WITH the saturator sounds a little buzzy and harsh in places too. Not saying that using a saturator in mastering is wrong, but for something like this a gentle EQ boost of about 2dB around 1kHz with a broad Q setting could help gain back some of that presence without adding distortion.

Anyway, as always there's more than one way to fix and issue in music production. Best advice I can give is to not reach for Saturation all the time, but instead consider why you would use it versus something like EQ.

[chris harbin]

Am I daft in thinking that "saturation" is different than "tape emu" ?

If I'm not, then I'd strongly recommend trying something like "tape" by softube or the now native "studder" by UAD.

Both have excellent no-BS demos, so you could try that and see if it adds more of what you are looking for. The studder is my fav, personally.

[VooDooGenic]

thank you all for the replies.

i'd be more than willing to try diff ways to address the "vibrancy" of the music, and if i can subtract one more moving part, i'd be more than happy to do so.

but circling back to my orig "head-scratcher", all these plugins have Input and Output knobs.

so if the music is being fed to the plugin at -6, should i be leaving the input control at 0 and tuning the output levels to match the -6 of the original signal? at which point the Limiter does the rest?

[VooDooGenic]

Am I daft in thinking that "saturation" is different than "tape emu" ?

If I'm not, then I'd strongly recommend trying something like "tape" by softube or the now native "studder" by UAD.

Both have excellent no-BS demos, so you could try that and see if it adds more of what you are looking for. The studder is my fav, personally.

in my noob-level understanding, i think they are all similar in terms of function?

[VooDooGenic]

Yes, I agree that the version without the saturator sounds a little more dull in comparison. That said, the version WITH the saturator sounds a little buzzy and harsh in places too. Not saying that using a saturator in mastering is wrong, but for something like this a gentle EQ boost of about 2dB around 1kHz with a broad Q setting could help gain back some of that presence without adding distortion.

Anyway, as always there's more than one way to fix and issue in music production. Best advice I can give is to not reach for Saturation all the time, but instead consider why you would use it versus something like EQ.

i will certainly try these suggestions - thank you.