Ableton & Mastering phase

[Toneless]

Hey, it's me again and my curiosity

I have few simple questions about mastering. Ok, you make some cool song in Ableton and you decide, this is the song i want on my cd and ofcourse before that it must go through the mastering process. The question here is what exactly you send to the mastering studio?

1. do you send the whole Ableton project?
2. do you export current project as .wav and send it to the mastering studio?
3. do you send each clip seperated and when you get all files mastered, you put them again together?
4. should midi files be recorded as audio or do you send just midi?
5. when do you use audio effects (reverb on vocals for example, etc.), before mastering or after?

Thank you,

Tone

[interpolate]

I tend to (try to) master stuff myself, but I've heard that people typically just send audio files as high quality as they can with about 2-3 db of headroom available. You don't want to leave too much as it can increase the noise floor.

[zalo]

mastering is the final step

never do anything to a mastered track unless you plan on completely reworking it and mastering it again

record the song the exact way you want it be and export it as a wav file

save each song as a separate file and burn to a cd(s) (some studios will want high quality audio cds instead) and send instructions about song order, track start times, track overlaps and things like that along with the cd(s)

all the great mastering studios run everything analog so sending them anything besides audio would be like trying to open up your ableton project in note pad

once you get the mastered copy back from them, you cant do anything, dont mess with levels, dont do your own crossfades nothing, its a final version what you got back from them

you can rip the files and upload them some where to sell and you can send the album out to get pressed on vinyl or cd or hell cassettes if you want

the point is NO MORE EDITING if you do then you better be ready to send it right back to get REMASTERED (there is a word that everyone knows but few understand, haha)

hope this helps

oh yeah, i do all of our mastering digitally using Izotope Ozone 3, but even though i am self mastering, i separate the writing/recording from the mastering in the same way

if you try and fiddle with mastering effects while you are messing with mixing and other things your track will not sound as crisp and clean as it could

check us out (link in sig)

[H20nly]

Hey I don't have anything to add but plenty to learn. I'm just posting to keep up with the thread. I don't know what "subscribe to topic" does but it doesn't seem to help me. email?

Carry on...

[Toneless]

Thank you interpolate and especially to you zalo, your post was very helpful.

Tnx

Tone

[Tarekith]

Usually you want (and I want) to send the mastering engineer a stereo mixdown of your song, typically at 24/44.1 or higher. Most mastering engineers want a little bit of headroom, so aim for around -6dBFS when doing your mixdown if you can. Also, if you leave at leasta measure of silence before and after the track, gives the mastering guy/gal more room to trim and fade as needed.

Finally, most important, name your wav file something meaningful. I always prefer "Artist Name - Track Name.wav" myself, that way there's on confusion as to who's file is who's. Don't send the mastering guy something labelled "FinalMix#2.wav", or "Rendered.wav". You can't imagine how many people send me stuff that way

[AudioRuso]

What's up zalo, tarekith!



Here's my 50 cents. Ableton is a great suite for both production and mastering.... the catch is you can do both at the same time. For instance in my case I am running the track through an external effect which is my external compression and mastering chain of hardware boxes....

I will never send my track to a mastering studio. Most of the time they will master the track to what they think it should sound like. Which might not be at all what you wanted your track to be.

Learn it yourself, it's not that hard once you put a lot of time and practice into it. Of course having good studio monitors and a nice subwoofer is a must.


Ableton's effects are plenty good for mastering.... and do as much as can as you go. Spread things out across the sound field and eq unneeded muffling frequencies.

You will have a much better result from mastering if you not only do the whole mix, but also each individual track... you have a lot more control over it.

Good luck.

[zalo]

well when doing it at home i think a big problem in only using ableton native tools is the lack of dithering options

and the dithering that ableton does do isnt the best

ruso, mastering every track? as in the kick separate from the bass separate from the lead....

aside from eqing and maybe compression on each of the tracks i wouldnt do anything else that would be under the realm of "mastering effects"

things like reverb, loudness, harmonic exciters and multiband dynamics all need the complete soundscape to really work correctly

i feel like its a much better idea to mix your song down to a single file then master, when mixing down dont dither the file thats a final step


i forgot to mention that earlier NEVER DITHER BEFORE MASTERING, send the tracks as files not audio cds


the guides here are pretty good, they are written for ozone but the lessons they teach can be applied to any thing

http://www.izotope.com/products/audio/ozone/guides.html

[Tarekith]

For what it's worth, I think the POW-r dithering offered in Live is more than good enough. It's maybe not as nice as MBIT+ or UV22Hr, but I can't imagine many here really noticing the difference. It took me a long, long time and lots of hi-gain sessions to really be able to spot the differences in dither, and even then there's likely no way I'd be able to spot different ones blind in your average tune.

[AudioRuso]

well when doing it at home i think a big problem in only using ableton native tools is the lack of dithering options

and the dithering that ableton does do isnt the best

ruso, mastering every track? as in the kick separate from the bass separate from the lead....

aside from eqing and maybe compression on each of the tracks i wouldnt do anything else that would be under the realm of "mastering effects"

things like reverb, loudness, harmonic exciters and multiband dynamics all need the complete soundscape to really work correctly

i feel like its a much better idea to mix your song down to a single file then master, when mixing down dont dither the file thats a final step


i forgot to mention that earlier NEVER DITHER BEFORE MASTERING, send the tracks as files not audio cds


the guides here are pretty good, they are written for ozone but the lessons they teach can be applied to any thing

http://www.izotope.com/products/audio/ozone/guides.html

No drums are a single track. but yes.


Besides there are different ways to master.... I simply don't dither. Just because a guide tells me I should doesn't mean I would. The point of mastering is to make a great track sound perfect. And if your track sounds perfect from the beginning, there isn't much mastering you have to do. I don't think a human ear can hear the difference between a 48 and a 96 track... or a 16 and a 24 bit track.... provided the track was put together well.

[timothyallan]

Besides there are different ways to master.... I simply don't dither. Just because a guide tells me I should doesn't mean I would. The point of mastering is to make a great track sound perfect. And if your track sounds perfect from the beginning, there isn't much mastering you have to do. I don't think a human ear can hear the difference between a 48 and a 96 track... or a 16 and a 24 bit track.... provided the track was put together well.

You've got some learning and listening to do my friend

[Tarekith]

Ruso has a good ear, I've heard (and am a fan) of many of his productions. I don't neccesarily agree with some of his points, but we're all entitled to different points. I'd agree that very few people are likely to hear between 48 and 96, or 16 and 24 straight up. Doesn't mean they are not important for other reasons though.

[timothyallan]

That's cool, but to discount all humans ears is a bit of a sweeping statement.

WWBKD!

[AudioRuso]

And isn't hearing music the reason for making music..... and since almost noone can hear the difference.... doesn't it make it irrelevant ?

Sorry just thought I'd nit pick, I do realize that my views are a but flawed, but what I mean is that they work great for me and would work just fine for others.... there isn't a "set way" to master and I'm just sharing mine.

[zalo]

Besides there are different ways to master.... I simply don't dither. Just because a guide tells me I should doesn't mean I would. The point of mastering is to make a great track sound perfect. And if your track sounds perfect from the beginning, there isn't much mastering you have to do. I don't think a human ear can hear the difference between a 48 and a 96 track... or a 16 and a 24 bit track.... provided the track was put together well.

but how do you burn a 24/96 file to cd without dithering? just resampling without dithering? if you listen to just the "sizzle" in the hi hats you can hear it distort, and no offense to my girlfriend but she can even hear the difference without me pointing it out