Right I have seen SA have still not put anything out on mastering and mixing down so I thought I would write a bit to hopefully try and help people. Ok first of mastering and mixing for a dance or electronic producer go hand in hand more so than any other genre.
The reason for this is because you want to send your tracks to Dj’s and they need to have to same loudness and apparent loudness as the other pro tracks that djs play. The reason mixing and mastering go hand in hand is because it’s all in the mixdown.
If your mix is wank no matter how much you do to the master, no matter how expensive the equipment you are using is or whatever it will not make your **** mix sound great. I feel this is where alot of people get confused. Ok so all producers have their own master chain usually for EDM guys they master their tracks with a goal of them being ‘loud enough for the clubs’ .
This is what you need to aim for especially if your sending tracks to labels don’t send out just your mixdowns. Remember if something sounds loud and banging it’s the quickest way to make a mediocre track sound pro and alot better. Ok so let’s have a look at what mastering options there are for the budding producers and in part 2 Ill explain my methods.
Let me be clear mastering is something that fascinates me and if you want to get better quickly pick yourself up a copy of bob Katz mastering audio it’s great! Ok one plugin I reccomend to everyone is the PSP Vintage Warmer. This next to sylenth1 is prolly the most used vst on the planet and pretty much everyone from amateurs to pros use it. Get it get it get it!!
I can’t stress this enough! Now some people like the all in one packages like isotope ozone. I personally hate ozone I think it colours the sound BUT luckily there’s something called t-racks I love this package it’s got great vintage plugins, great meters and a fantastic no frills limiter.
With t racks and a vintage warmer I think your pretty much set you can deffo get to commercial levels with just these plugs, if your mix is good ofcourse that is! This stuff is all relatively cheap but ofcourse there are high end products like Waves, Universal Audio and Sonnox Oxford.
Tbh the waves stuff I just don’t feel is worth it’s price unless mabey the R series and the cla series. As for UAD if you have the cash go for it they are great little plugins and alot of pros use them ALOT. I personally like the sonnox EQ and dynamics and use both frequently it’s one of the best EQs out there and has won numerous votes for the best software EQ.
If you want a high end multiband compressor there is only ONE that you want and I can’t remember who makes it buts it’s called alchemy or the alchemist, this one is quite expensive but my god what a beast this is, takes a while to learn but a huge big bomb monster with endless posibilities!
In part 2 Ill explain my process of mastering, let me apologised if this is just a wall of text but I wrote it on my iPhone. The main lesson of part 1 is that you don’t need to spend thousands but please for the love of god get yourselves a vintage warmer!!
(had to edit that post too add some paragraphs it was just soo difficult to read! :phil:)
Cool post however it is made hard to read due to lack of spacing and paragraphs, lol.
+1 on vintage wamer and t - racks, although i don’t use t racks anymore i have used it in the past and it’s pretty good for mastering.
IMO i like izotope ozone, i’ve been using that a lot in my more recent tracks, I know some big producers use it too. It’s all subjective really and down to personal preferences.
There is a tut on mastering mate, I found it useful [url=http://www.sonicacademy.com/Producer/Course/?contentId=2418]http://www.sonicacademy.com/Producer/Course/?contentId=2418[/url]
I think a mix down one should be coming soon, Phil was going to use one of my tune to do a tut mate
+1 for Paragraphs. Bit hard to concentrate on the Info.
Great post though Mate… Maybe you could space things out a bit more in future?
My intention is not to offend ya - Hope you dont mind 
I have a vintage warmer but dont have a bloody clue what I’m doing with it! A wee topic on this would help
[quote]gofunk (16/08/2010)[hr]I have a vintage warmer but dont have a bloody clue what I’m doing with it! A wee topic on this would help[/quote]
LOL me too 
[quote]gofunk (16/08/2010)[hr]I have a vintage warmer but dont have a bloody clue what I’m doing with it! A wee topic on this would help[/quote]
Someone posted a thread from another forum here yesterday I think about the VW.
All I usually do is go to one of the presets & adjust the wet/dry control. normally I bring it down to around 50% or less. It sounds too big & fuzzy to me if its 100% wet.
Lowering the drive is sometimes another option if I have things over 50%
Ok onto part two! Ok my master chain goes like this: Waves SSL bus compressor, Sonnox EQ, ableton or t-racks fairchild, waves s-1 imager, PSP vintage warmer and finally the t racks brickwall limiter or psp xenon. That’s it! Now i find this quite a high end chain as some of these plugins cost me a few bob. Tbh the only essentials are the vintage warmer and t racks which shouldn’t set you back too much. Also the ableton compressor is great and has the same compression types as an API25000 Now the process alot of mastering I feel is trying out different settings and seeing if it sounds good! Usually I use the SSL for some light compression and just the warm sound it adds to pretty much anything! It may also be worth putting in a utility at the start of your chain so you can see how it all sounds in mono and turning your input down if anything is clipping before it hits the limiter. Ok next onto the EQ. Usually I will cut at around 20hz and move up to 35hz at the most. Check your sound is it ruining it or cleaning it up? I usually also put in a cut at around 250-300hz this will also clean up your sound but move around that range and use your ears here! If it kills your sound don’t cut! Next it’s onto the highs. A small bump at around 5-7k is nice for a bit of brightness and Ill put in a bit of a high shelf from around 12k. It’s important that if I notice that the overall sound changes dramatically I’ve over done it! Overdoing things in mastering is very easy and can kill your track. Ok, next the ableton comp. I use this to get a nice tight attack but not too much here you don’t want to over compress, remember each time a sound goes through another compressor the ratio is not added it’s multiplied! For example a kick that goes through two compressors both at 10:1 isn’t 20:1 but 100:1 so think about it. Check out the different compressor types in the ableton comp and the different compressION types. Get a nice chunky sound, if you have it this is where you can put your multiband comp and fine tune the attack of each band instead the whole mix. The fairchild compressor I use if I want a warmer analogue sound. Next the waves s1, very simple stuff here check the correlation and widen or narrow down the stereo field, use utility and check your mono playback too. I personally tend to narrow down most mixes a little. Ok now the beast, the vintage warmer. This really is the apparant volume maker. Remember to click the psp logo on the front and you access the back panel where you can tweak the bands a bit more individually. The more clockwise the knee is the louder you get, watch out for distortion. For the eq I set the low to 80-100hz and the high to 10-12khz. I then add or take off whatever is needed. Remember you can add or take away some of the individual bands on the back! Always turn fat mode on and switch between single and multi to see what you like. The best way to set your drive is to listen to the loudest part of your mix and set it there, you want a bit of bite no clipping/distortion/farty bass sound. Next it’s simple on the limiter turn the input up untill you get about -3 in gain reduction. Your rms on your t racks meter should be hitting -6 to -5 if you hit -4 your prolly over doing it but listen on headphones for distortion if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. The meter you want to focus on is apparent loudness and it’s the easiest to move once you start mastering the vintage warmer. You want to be hitting atleast -14 on even your most quite parts and moving up to about -10 MAX! Remember bass is power but a well refined high mid and high end is loudness the best way to achieve apparant loudness before even inserting one mastering plug in is a well balanced mix. The clearer your mix the louder your master. This is my process but everyone has their own way also try out different plug INS and make a chain that you like working with the best. You will most likely never get the ultra crispness that pro mastering houses get as you don’t have the gear, studio, experience! But this method gets it loud enough to play in a club and send out as demos. Another important thing is to use a reference track when your mixing down and mastering, most only do this on the master but think logically, the closer you can get to a pro track with a mixdown the less you will have to do and the better it will sound when you master! I can’t stress this enough so one last time it’s all in the mixdown! The mixdown is a car being buil from start to finish the mastering is the bit of wax and polish put on at the very end just before it goes on sale. Sorry for the wall of text but blame the iPhone and computer maintenance happy producing!
Thanks for sharing this Kim!! you are a Legend 
Kim? My name is Jan lol
[quote]jjdejong0 (16/08/2010)[hr]Ok onto part two! Ok my master chain goes like this: Waves SSL bus compressor, Sonnox EQ, ableton or t-racks fairchild, waves s-1 imager, PSP vintage warmer and finally the t racks brickwall limiter or psp xenon. That’s it! Now i find this quite a high end chain as some of these plugins cost me a few bob.
Tbh the only essentials are the vintage warmer and t racks which shouldn’t set you back too much. Also the ableton compressor is great and has the same compression types as an API25000 Now the process alot of mastering I feel is trying out different settings and seeing if it sounds good!
Usually I use the SSL for some light compression and just the warm sound it adds to pretty much anything! It may also be worth putting in a utility at the start of your chain so you can see how it all sounds in mono and turning your input down if anything is clipping before it hits the limiter.
Ok next onto the EQ. Usually I will cut at around 20hz and move up to 35hz at the most. Check your sound is it ruining it or cleaning it up? I usually also put in a cut at around 250-300hz this will also clean up your sound but move around that range and use your ears here!
If it kills your sound don’t cut! Next it’s onto the highs. A small bump at around 5-7k is nice for a bit of brightness and Ill put in a bit of a high shelf from around 12k. It’s important that if I notice that the overall sound changes dramatically I’ve over done it! Overdoing things in mastering is very easy and can kill your track.
Ok, next the ableton comp. I use this to get a nice tight attack but not too much here you don’t want to over compress, remember each time a sound goes through another compressor the ratio is not added it’s multiplied! For example a kick that goes through two compressors both at 10:1 isn’t 20:1 but 100:1 so think about it.
Check out the different compressor types in the ableton comp and the different compressION types.
Get a nice chunky sound, if you have it this is where you can put your multiband comp and fine tune the attack of each band instead the whole mix. The fairchild compressor I use if I want a warmer analogue sound. Next the waves s1, very simple stuff here check the correlation and widen or narrow down the stereo field, use utility and check your mono playback too.
I personally tend to narrow down most mixes a little. Ok now the beast, the vintage warmer. This really is the apparant volume maker. Remember to click the psp logo on the front and you access the back panel where you can tweak the bands a bit more individually.
The more clockwise the knee is the louder you get, watch out for distortion. For the eq I set the low to 80-100hz and the high to 10-12khz. I then add or take off whatever is needed.
Remember you can add or take away some of the individual bands on the back! Always turn fat mode on and switch between single and multi to see what you like.
The best way to set your drive is to listen to the loudest part of your mix and set it there, you want a bit of bite no clipping/distortion/farty bass sound. Next it’s simple on the limiter turn the input up untill you get about -3 in gain reduction. Your rms on your t racks meter should be hitting -6 to -5 if you hit -4 your prolly over doing it but listen on headphones for distortion if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
The meter you want to focus on is apparent loudness and it’s the easiest to move once you start mastering the vintage warmer.
You want to be hitting atleast -14 on even your most quite parts and moving up to about -10 MAX!
Remember bass is power but a well refined high mid and high end is loudness the best way to achieve apparant loudness before even inserting one mastering plug in is a well balanced mix. The clearer your mix the louder your master.
This is my process but everyone has their own way also try out different plug INS and make a chain that you like working with the best.
You will most likely never get the ultra crispness that pro mastering houses get as you don’t have the gear, studio, experience! But this method gets it loud enough to play in a club and send out as demos.
Another important thing is to use a reference track when your mixing down and mastering, most only do this on the master but think logically, the closer you can get to a pro track with a mixdown the less you will have to do and the better it will sound when you master!
I can’t stress this enough so one last time it’s all in the mixdown! The mixdown is a car being buil from start to finish the mastering is the bit of wax and polish put on at the very end just before it goes on sale.
Sorry for the wall of text but blame the iPhone and computer maintenance
happy producing![/quote]
Sorry just had to space this out so it’s a little easier for me to read, was f*cking with my eyes / head as one lump wall of text lol.
He’s Joking Jan - He’s talking about the similarity of your surname to Kim il Jong the North Korean Communist Dictator
[url]Cincinnati CityBeat
Hey Rob - Whats keepin ya with Pt.1? 
:hehe:
[quote]ICN (17/08/2010)[hr]Hey Rob - Whats keepin ya with Pt.1? :hehe:[/quote]
I just about managed that one before my eyes spazzed lol.
LOL - Kinda like this? :crazy:
Great Avatar btw Rob!
Thanks
i would kind of skip that mastering/plugin advice.you psp vintage warmer users out there not knowing what youre doing with it dont worry,none of the guys in the vids youve seen know how to use it either(im guessing fm vids are where this place caught the psp vm bug).thats why they always just insert it on a track and leave it in its default state.basically all its doing is slightly raising the volume(same as just turning up the input on a channel) and quite a few of them are idiots so they think its doing something magical(plugin placebo effect) .you want real,warm,analog tape saturation?(for about the same price btw) you need something like nebula3 pro with the cdsoundmaster r2r programs,the only thing closer would be to spend 4 or 5 gs on a real r2r.
I want to apologise for the wall of text but I did it on my iPhone as my PC is in the shop. Thanx to you guys for spacing it out for me hopefully it will make it easier to read to the above poster I completely disagree! Swedish house mafias fabled master chain had a vintage warmer in it and eveytime u hear an interview or see a video of some top producers they all use the vintage warmer. Like I said the aim of this tutorial was to help people get their tracks to a volume that is good enough to play out in a club and send to labels etc. If your gonna start forking out thousands on high end analogue gear you might as well start up your own mastering house. I’m guessing not many people can afford this so I say the vintage warmer is a great tool and it’s cheap! Also when you start to master the vintage warmer there is ALOT you can do with it it’s not just for adding a bit of analogue warmth.
sometimes i think those vids have more negative effects than positive on people new to production.
I shouldn’t worry too much about matching your loudness to that of a pro mastered track, DJs have knob on their mixer called a ‘gain’, it’s simples.
I mean, get it limited to a good level sure, but don’t over do things so you lose dynamics. Just turn your gain up on the mixer, it’s really not too difficult.