The Definition of Mastering

Mastering is simply defined as the final stage of production of either a single or album(project) that involves in making a song or a project much cleaner(clarity)and adding depth value,thereby letting it reach a tonal volume suitable for public listening.
 
riffycones said:
Mastering is simply defined as the final stage of production of either a single or album(project) that involves in making a song or a project much cleaner(clarity)and adding depth value,thereby letting it reach a tonal volume suitable for public listening.
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Really this is called "pre-mastering." And at this point, this treatment is really what people look for in a mastering engineer. But, the idea of knowing how the recording will translate to a medium is a very important and often overlooked trait that makes mastering unique from mixing. As does the balancing of multiple tracks. And authoring the recording.

I stress this because mastering is also a technical art. And that technical expertise is really the baseline of what a mastering engineer does. The creative stuff is what makes the mastering engineer desirable, but the technical shit is the foundation.
 
WeissSound said:
Really this is called "pre-mastering." And at this point, this treatment is really what people look for in a mastering engineer. But, the idea of knowing how the recording will translate to a medium is a very important and often overlooked trait that makes mastering unique from mixing. As does the balancing of multiple tracks. And authoring the recording.

I stress this because mastering is also a technical art. And that technical expertise is really the baseline of what a mastering engineer does. The creative stuff is what makes the mastering engineer desirable, but the technical shit is the foundation.
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Pre-Mastering? Did you just make that up? I guess you could call lots of thing pre-mastering for yourself, but there is no official definition of pre-mastering in the recording community.

If you want to know what mastering is, it is creating a master ready for duplication (cutting a vinyl record, authoring a redbook CD, or making an mp3 with tagging and title information). In the process of creating the master it has become customary to add processing to making the multiple tracks (songs) of an album sound more cohesive, make smooth transitions and spacing between tracks, make the songs translate better in all listening environments (sound good in the car and the club), and most importantly sound better (more punchy, more brilliant, more fat, etc.). The loudness war that we are the mist of has turned mastering into a demolition stage where all the depth and clarity is compressed to the point of distortion and mush for the sake of making a song seem to sound louder than others. Just like mixing, mastering is part technical and part art. The technical side does things right and the art side does some things wrong for the sake of feel, emotion, and groove.
 
theDAWstudio said:
Pre-Mastering? Did you just make that up? I guess you could call lots of thing pre-mastering for yourself, but there is no official definition of pre-mastering in the recording community.

If you want to know what mastering is, it is creating a master ready for duplication (cutting a vinyl record, authoring a redbook CD, or making an mp3 with tagging and title information). In the process of creating the master it has become customary to add processing to making the multiple tracks (songs) of an album sound more cohesive, make smooth transitions and spacing between tracks, make the songs translate better in all listening environments (sound good in the car and the club), and most importantly sound better (more punchy, more brilliant, more fat, etc.). The loudness war that we are the mist of has turned mastering into a demolition stage where all the depth and clarity is compressed to the point of distortion and mush for the sake of making a song seem to sound louder than others. Just like mixing, mastering is part technical and part art. The technical side does things right and the art side does some things wrong for the sake of feel, emotion, and groove.
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I can't take credit for the term "pre-mastering" - it's one that gets tossed about pretty frequently. But, thanks for the snarky little jab there about it, very professional of you.

As for the rest - yep, that is what in fact mastering is.
 
theDAWstudio said:
Pre-Mastering? Did you just make that up? I guess you could call lots of thing pre-mastering for yourself, but there is no official definition of pre-mastering in the recording community.

If you want to know what mastering is, it is creating a master ready for duplication (cutting a vinyl record, authoring a redbook CD, or making an mp3 with tagging and title information). In the process of creating the master it has become customary to add processing to making the multiple tracks (songs) of an album sound more cohesive, make smooth transitions and spacing between tracks, make the songs translate better in all listening environments (sound good in the car and the club), and most importantly sound better (more punchy, more brilliant, more fat, etc.). The loudness war that we are the mist of has turned mastering into a demolition stage where all the depth and clarity is compressed to the point of distortion and mush for the sake of making a song seem to sound louder than others. Just like mixing, mastering is part technical and part art. The technical side does things right and the art side does some things wrong for the sake of feel, emotion, and groove.
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Mmm... no actually premastering is a pretty commonly used term. Premastering is process of altering the stereo image, dynamics, and tone of a track/album whereas mastering is a more physical process which involves transferring the track onto the medium on which they are to be duplicated. To make it simple, all the processes Ozone covers would be considered premastering save for perhaps dithering. The part after Ozone where you use SRC, prepare a copier or press for mass duplication would fall under actual mastering. Premastering is where you make the track/album sound good on most systems and mastering is the translation of the data from your DAW into the form in which it can be copied and mass duplicated from. Obviously, people don't really think much of the latter because of how easy mp3's are to duplicate.
 
MikeG said:
What are some general rules to stick to when mastering??
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Rule #1 - if you have access to the mix, try to get things sounding the best they can there.

In terms of general tips as far as the treatment/sweetening side of mastering - first, have an idea of where you want things to go. How bright, how loud, how clean, how dirty, how wide. Mastering for loudness and mastering to sound good are two different things. If you're going for loudness, start by slamming into a limiter and work backwards - try to compensate for whatever weird imbalances, screwed up imaging, or transient distortion comes from going nutso into a brickwall. In terms of making things sound good - a little compression with a long attack and medium release and light ratio doing just a hair of gain reduction is a good starting spot. Just lifts things forward.

From there the only tip I can say is put something else up that you want it to sound like.
 
true, unfortunately! i hate hearing new music and thinking how good it might actually sound if it had any dynamics.
 
Mastering has evolved, it's different things to different people these days. If you don't think it's required your music may be perfect, you may be ignorant or simply not ready or cannot afford it. When a time comes when your music counts you send out to a dedicated mastering engineer. Someone who does this day, in day out. 35pct of audio I receive has clicks in it, did you catch all the clicks in your tracks? Great, one more reason why you don't need to get your music mastered right ?.

Mastering is for those who want to know that their important musical productions have been given the best chance possible in every situation. I don't know many people who do not want their music to sound as good as possible, especially considering very serious mastering can be obtained for substantially discounted rates compared with 10 years ago.

I think a lot of people might have been stung by the many low end bedroomers setting up a website and offering 'mastering'. If so, next time use common sense when selecting, gear, engineer credibility, room shots with advertized kit in it, recent clients, free preview.

When the time is right you will know you need your track mastered.
 
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WeissSound said:
In terms of making things sound good - a little compression with a long attack and medium release and light ratio doing just a hair of gain reduction is a good starting spot. Just lifts things forward.

From there the only tip I can say is put something else up that you want it to sound like.
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Yeah I heard about a trick Dave Pensado uses. Set a really low threshold and listen to the way the track pumps. Start adjusting the release settings so your track pumps in time. Then put the threshold back up to where you get at most 2 dB gain reduction.

And if I understand this correctly, your last point is right on. I always use a reference track when I'm mastering.
 
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