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Ozone 4 vs UAD Precision Mastering

Just wondering if anybody here has used both?

I've a bit of experience using Ozone 4 and think the results you can get from it are quite remarkable.

There's something niggling me that it's not that transparent though. It tends to add the same sheen to every track I put through it (could be a user error though....)

I've got a UAD card coming this week and i've heard the Precision Mastering Bundle is pretty shit hot. It took me a good couple of weeks to 'get' Ozone so a demo of any UAD stuff (if they do demos?) probably wont help that much.

I'm not looking for 'The Slam', I just want to be able to transparently get things up to level.

Perhaps just the UAD precision limiter would suffice?

By the way I've got a powercore as well but I don't think there's any decent alternatives there for less than one billion dollars

I do a fair bit of professional mastering, and either piece of kit doesn't deliver any professional sounding results.

To get stuff up to a level just use a limiter. If you're using Logic, use Adaptive Limiter, Maximizer is fine in Cubase 4 and 5 and if you're using something else try a free Event Horizon from Stillwell Audio (or Shwa, I don't quite remember, but those companies are the same).

If you want to use the term Mastering, well it means a hell lot more than just limiting : ) but if you've got a good sounding mix, just squeez it with a reasonable limiter to get RMS and you've got a decent demo.

You can check some of my mastering works and a bit of theory here : www.myspace.com/powersoundengineering

quote:

Originally posted by tehlord By the way I've got a powercore as well but I don't think there's any decent alternatives there for less than one billion dollars

Actually Poco is the platform that you want to use as DSP for mastering ... but the more serious stuff costs a lot as you mentioned.

quote:

Originally posted by chrissundive If you want to use the term Mastering, well it means a hell lot more than just limiting : ) but if you've got a good sounding mix, just squeez it with a reasonable limiter to get RMS and you've got a decent demo.

Indeed

Which is why I didn't use the term mastering except in the actual name of the UAD bundle

Great information you gave me and i'll get straight on that link.


Cheers

Oh sorry : ) I'm just used to "all in one mastering wonders" that software designers call mastering plugins ... well they are in a sense, too bad they are not suitable for any professional use. If they were any real deal they would cost probably around �1000 / �1500 for a pack ... but here we go, theres capitalism

You'll be better off with a free Event Horizon than a pseudo mastering pack. UAD stuff gets a lot closer to the pro level and I use a lot of their stuff in my work as well, just not the Precision series Their analogue emulations is the stuff that really delivers what matters.

quote:

Originally posted by chrissundive Actually Poco is the platform that you want to use as DSP for mastering ... but the more serious stuff costs a lot as you mentioned.

Bullshit. Stop spreading bullshit. The more serious stuff huh? So whats the more serious stuff? Outboard stuff? What could possibly be more serious than for instance HarBal + UAD + Waves? You won't find anything similar to HarBal on outboard equipment, and it's a godsend to mastering engineers, and, it doesn't fucking cost much, contradicting to what you say. It's THE mastering EQ you wan't to use, you can drop out using anything else. Unless you wanna smash your recordings ofcourse, then you would put on a good quality MB-comp, which you find with both Waves and UAD, AND OZONE, and Powercore. You can even get transparent, silky, controlled multi-comp behaviour with HarBal, without the compression downside!

So please stop spreading bullshit. "The more serious stuff" Lols.

You won't get more serious than HarBal for a mastering EQ, there is nothing like it, nothing similar to it in the whole wide world. It is unique in what it does, and I bet you even don't know what it does and have yet to try it tbh.. If you couple that with UAD, Waves or Powercore, good monitors and a treated room, good ears and good brain, you do have a professional mastering environment. Yes indeed you do.

quote:

Originally posted by lenieNt Force Bullshit. Stop spreading bullshit. The more serious stuff huh? So whats the more serious stuff? Outboard stuff? What could possibly be more serious than for instance HarBal + UAD + Waves? You won't find anything similar to HarBal on outboard equipment, and it's a godsend to mastering engineers, and, it doesn't fucking cost much, contradicting to what you say. It's THE mastering EQ you wan't to use, you can drop out using anything else. Unless you wanna smash your recordings ofcourse, then you would put on a good quality MB-comp, which you find with both Waves and UAD, AND OZONE, and Powercore. You can even get transparent, silky, controlled multi-comp behaviour with HarBal, without the compression downside! So please stop spreading bullshit. "The more serious stuff" Lols. You won't get more serious than HarBal for a mastering EQ, there is nothing like it, nothing similar to it in the whole wide world. It is unique in what it does, and I bet you even don't know what it does and have yet to try it tbh. If you couple that with UAD, Waves or Powercore, good monitors and a treated room, good brain and good ears, you do have a professional mastering environment. Yes indeed you do.

Lolz so what are you using from Waves then ? Do you OWN it ? Was it cheap ? I bet it was : ) are u using Waves on DSP or native ? please show me your works so I can believe that you've got any experience ... because what you're (and how) saying states otherwise.

I won't even argue about Ozone being on pair with, lets say MD3 or L3-16, because everyone that has a decent monitoring setup will hear the difference in a split second. So either you haven't used them, you don't know how, or you don't have ears, room or monitors to hear it. Anyway, thats about that for spreading bullshit

As for Harbal :
1) its not a part of the topic
2) its a neat idea with a cool technology behind
3) unfortunately the implementation leaves a lot to be desired
4) sound quality of harbal is miles behind the mastering standards
5) it may be enough for a bedroom production, but please don't call it mastering for the sake of professionals working in that field.

Sorry I got you so nervous : )

Generally for mastering I like a nice buss compressor, a nice EQ, and a good limiter.

For EQ, I find that sonalksis does the job, L3 multimaximiser from waves is a good limiter, and I'm yet to find a compressor which I'm totally satisfied with.

I wouldn't go for an all in one solution, I'm not that impressed with ozone or T-Racks tbh... Haven't tried any others.

Also, keep in mind that I'm not producing proper masters in a good studio. Just working off my headphones to make demos really, so if you want totally professional results, you might want a slightly different setup.

quote:

Originally posted by kitphillips Generally for mastering I like a nice buss compressor, a nice EQ, and a good limiter. For EQ, I find that sonalksis does the job, L3 multimaximiser from waves is a good limiter, and I'm yet to find a compressor which I'm totally satisfied with. I wouldn't go for an all in one solution, I'm not that impressed with ozone or T-Racks tbh... Haven't tried any others. Also, keep in mind that I'm not producing proper masters in a good studio. Just working off my headphones to make demos really, so if you want totally professional results, you might want a slightly different setup.

Well I'm also not looking for a 'mastering' setup as I don't know how to master stuff and there's little agreement on what the word means anymore anyway

I want glue and volume, and maybe a bit of EQ air.

That's it.

quote:

Lolz so what are you using from Waves then ? Do you OWN it ? Was it cheap ? I bet it was : ) are u using Waves on DSP or native ? please show me your works so I can believe that you've got any experience ... because what you're (and how) saying states otherwise. I won't even argue about Ozone being on pair with, lets say MD3 or L3-16, because everyone that has a decent monitoring setup will hear the difference in a split second. So either you haven't used them, you don't know how, or you don't have ears, room or monitors to hear it. Anyway, thats about that for spreading bullshit As for Harbal : 1) its not a part of the topic 2) its a neat idea with a cool technology behind 3) unfortunately the implementation leaves a lot to be desired 4) sound quality of harbal is miles behind the mastering standards 5) it may be enough for a bedroom production, but please don't call it mastering for the sake of professionals working in that field. Sorry I got you so nervous : )

=D

Well.. Many professionals use HarBal, with good reason.. Sound quality of HarBal is miles behind the mastering standard? 32 bit float + linear phase and minimum phase is miles behind? You can't have much knowledge of Harbal.. Told you you didn't, and it's the best mastering EQ around :P All I can say is, you should definitely have a more in depth look at it, as it can help your mastering tremendously. And ofcourse HarBal is part of the discussion.. We were talking about the best mastering equipment around, and HarBal is undoubtedly the best non-coloring mastering EQ, because of all the extraordinary features you won't find in any other EQ. Also check out HarBal's community:

http://www.har-bal.com/ipw-web/bulletin/bb/index.php

If you think Harbal is all about pushing IntuitQ three times and done, you better think again :P Preconceptions seldom servers one well..

Ok so you meant Waves when you were talking about "more serious/expensive stuff"? I thought you meant outboard gear.. Sorry about that. Preconceptions seldom servers one well.. I know.

And I'm going to admit.. Yes I have the Mercury Bundle and I don't own it. And no it's really not cheap. But ofcourse, like every other thing I use alot and have yet to pay for, it's getting paid, and the "must-buy-list" is shrinking.

Q

Thx for changing the tone mate : )

Well from my experience with Harbal, which I own, is that it can make the material sound harsh. The interface is not clear for me and I can't make it sound better then lets say UAD Cambridge EQ.

The 32bitness isn't really a factor here. The linear phase is, but then again digital linear phase EQs are wide spread at the moment. My fav being the TC Dynamic EQ. Harbal works with advance FFT analysis and reconstruction (resyntesis if you like) of the audio material. The idea is great, but as I said the implementation doesn't cut it for me ... and I'm still waiting for the promised mac version :/

In the real world, you rarely have to EQ as much as Harbal gives you the advantage to. With a reasonably good mix, all you need is a couple of cuts here and there, one shelving filter, maybe a low cut and a hi cut (depends on the quality of the mix engineer). Thats it, you can do it with one instance of most EQs out there.

I just remembered that I was once using Gliss EQ from voxengo and it also had a linear phase option plus a spectrum analyzer, which makes it a contender. It was ages ago so I can't say anything more. I also heard good stuff about the elephant limiter they've made but didn't try it myself.

quote:

Originally posted by tehlord Well I'm also not looking for a 'mastering' setup as I don't know how to master stuff and there's little agreement on what the word means anymore anyway I want glue and volume, and maybe a bit of EQ air. That's it.

For good clean loudness its hard to beat Voxengo Elephant, i find i can push it harder than the P Lim before it gets noticeable

quote:

Originally posted by evo8 For good clean loudness its hard to beat Voxengo Elephant, i find i can push it harder than the P Lim before it gets noticeable

You know I demo'd that and I thought it added far too much colour to the mix.

Once again it may have been a user error so i'll take another look at it.

Re: Q

quote:

Originally posted by chrissundive Thx for changing the tone mate : ) Well from my experience with Harbal, which I own, is that it can make the material sound harsh. The interface is not clear for me and I can't make it sound better then lets say UAD Cambridge EQ. The 32bitness isn't really a factor here. The linear phase is, but then again digital linear phase EQs are wide spread at the moment. My fav being the TC Dynamic EQ. Harbal works with advance FFT analysis and reconstruction (resyntesis if you like) of the audio material. The idea is great, but as I said the implementation doesn't cut it for me ... and I'm still waiting for the promised mac version :/ In the real world, you rarely have to EQ as much as Harbal gives you the advantage to. With a reasonably good mix, all you need is a couple of cuts here and there, one shelving filter, maybe a low cut and a hi cut (depends on the quality of the mix engineer). Thats it, you can do it with one instance of most EQs out there. I just remembered that I was once using Gliss EQ from voxengo and it also had a linear phase option plus a spectrum analyzer, which makes it a contender. It was ages ago so I can't say anything more. I also heard good stuff about the elephant limiter they've made but didn't try it myself.

I know, the authors haven't put in much time on the interface.. And they reason it with that they are audio engineers concentrating on audio purely, and they want the GUI to remain this way to reflect that. They simply don't want to make a fancy looking GUI.

Yes this is something I have experienced myself.. If the mix is good enough you don't need to do all the drastic changes Har-bal allows you to, it can only make it worse.. So ye I agree with you on that.. You don't always need all the control.. But for a little less excellent mixdowns it's pure gold, with the harmonic EQ control and all, just fantastic. About limiters, personally I prefer the Ozone4 limiter, and find it superior to any other thing I've ever tried.. Especially the Intelligent I and the new II behavior are excellent. And also the interface for the limiter is just great. You get a DC filter there as well, and dithering options. But for dithering though I'm rather using one of the POW-r algorithms, and very often the POW-r3 which pushes the noise-floor of dither below -150dB(!!) at 3kHz. I really like how silky and transparent this critical spectrum is handled, it's really 32bit like. Even Bob Katz can't hear the difference :P

Well I tend to send off rubbish mixes with free advice on what to correct. The same as "we can fix it in the mix", "we can fix it in the mastering" is also a false statement. Correcting a really bad mix with a lot of problem areas won't satisfy the client anyway, because they are expecting magic from you anyway : ) So for me its a fair trade if I sent someone off for a corrective remix.

The interface that you describe is the interface I found in TC 6000 processors and algos for the Poco. Its minimal and you can see ... or hear, that its about the sound, not the looks. With Harbal its the functionality of the interface that spoils it for me. And the developer didn't put any work into it for the last year or more, correct me if I'm wrong.

Anyway : ) the final answer to the mastering question is : do a good mix

quote:

Originally posted by chrissundive Well I tend to send off rubbish mixes with free advice on what to correct. The same as "we can fix it in the mix", "we can fix it in the mastering" is also a false statement. Correcting a really bad mix with a lot of problem areas won't satisfy the client anyway, because they are expecting magic from you anyway : ) So for me its a fair trade if I sent someone off for a corrective remix. The interface that you describe is the interface I found in TC 6000 processors and algos for the Poco. Its minimal and you can see ... or hear, that its about the sound, not the looks. With Harbal its the functionality of the interface that spoils it for me. And the developer didn't put any work into it for the last year or more, correct me if I'm wrong. Anyway : ) the final answer to the mastering question is : do a good mix

Mhm, totally agree with you. If the mix isn't up to par really the best thing to do would be to send it back.. Or request to do a multi-track master / new mixdown yourself..

Gotcha.. I get what you mean about Har-Bal.. It can be a bit cluttered, especially the timeline could need some serious improvements, but thats also what they're working on with the new version, even automation of the response curve alongside the changing material. But you get used to it as it is now, at least I did. And theres so many ingenious techniques to how you can use har-bal its just not funny :P .. One of the most interesting ones being Empathetic Equalisation!

I don't do mastering for clients myself, I just have a lot of knowledge about it. I only master my own work and for some friends.

quote:

Originally posted by chrissundive I do a fair bit of professional mastering, and either piece of kit doesn't deliver any professional sounding results. To get stuff up to a level just use a limiter. If you're using Logic, use Adaptive Limiter, Maximizer is fine in Cubase 4 and 5 and if you're using something else try a free Event Horizon from Stillwell Audio (or Shwa, I don't quite remember, but those companies are the same). If you want to use the term Mastering, well it means a hell lot more than just limiting : ) but if you've got a good sounding mix, just squeez it with a reasonable limiter to get RMS and you've got a decent demo. You can check some of my mastering works and a bit of theory here : www.myspace.com/powersoundengineering

are you using the actual tc 6000 or the ported powercore algorythms from the 5000

I'm renting the actual 6000 upon request. I've got the 5000 algos in my personal studio. �9k is a bit much at the moment.

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