sonar, pro quality master?

[rayoung]

Hi , i have sonar xl and i'm having a bit of trouble getting a pro sounding mix, is it my mastering capabilities? what do i do after i bounce to two tracks? and how do i do it? also is it important to record at 24 bit 48 hz?

 

[KasioRoks]

Originally posted by rayoung
what do i do after i bounce to two tracks?

I've never used sonar, but rather than bounce down to 2 tracks don't you have 'bounce to disk' kind of option where you bounce your finished mix down to a WAV or AIFF file (or maybe more choices) on your hard disk? Then you'd use a CD burner app to make that into a CD. That's what you do with pro-tools and cubase anyway.

Originally posted by rayoung
is it my mastering capabilities?

Probably ..... and your mixing capabilities, but keep practising you'll get better - not that I'm saying I'm good at it, just that it takes practice.

Originally posted by rayoung
also is it important to record at 24 bit 48 hz?

The greater bit depth you have the more dynamic range you've got, but you have to have a decent dithering algorithm to get it down to 16 bit. As for the 48Hz thing... it's just so technical that it's beyond me.

KasioRoks

 

[rayoung]

really what i'm wanting to know is lets' say i have 20 tracks, i bounce them to stereo left and right then how and should i apply compression, eq and a loudness maximizer and in what order before i save it to my hard drive and thne burn cd. and is it good to normalize every track before i bounce them?

 

[KasioRoks]

Don't normalize every track - doing so will completely screw your mix up!

The other stuff you're talking about is the art of mixing. What you need to do is get everything sounding as good as possible and then bounce it to disk. People make a career out of doing this so I'm not going to be able to tell you how to do it in an answer here (not that I'm even remotely qualified to do so!) For some general articles on mixing, compression, eq and other things, check out www.studiocovers.com

One thing I would say is that your maximiser should be applied right at the end of your mix - that as an effect on your master outs and not until you've done everthing else you're going to do (don't do you mix with it on... that's my opinion anyway).

KasioRoks

 

[Funktastico]

Mastering = what you do on the whole mix after you bounce it to one stereo track.

This is all I do in the mastering stage, my way, not necessarily the best way.
(I do this in Wavelab 3.04 with VST dynamics and EQ plugins) but you could manage this all in Sonar too.

1. EQ out inaudible areas below 20-25hz and above 22khz (with a smoother curve in the high area to avoid distortion which will happen if the curve is too steep).

2. Compress away 2-10db - I'm producing mostly techno/electronic music so high RMS (leads to lower dynamics) is needed unlike in classical for example.

3. With a maximizing limiter, set peaks to -0.2dB, or limit enough to reduce the most visible peaks with zero attack and sub-20ms release and then normalize. (some CD players clip if you go all the way to zero, or something like that, some pro guy told me some time ago. Not sure if that's true but I prefer to go safe lol)

Now a little pre-mastering tip (before mixing down): you could add a separate EQ to all or some channels, and bring up the most important (lead) tracks. Emphasize a track by giving a peak to it's EQ curve in some area of the spectrum, in the highs for example, and if needed (go by your ear) reduce the same area in some background tracks. Bring contrast.

Hope this helps even a little.

Toni L.
www.mp3.com/NativeAlien