I thought it might be a good idea to share some general "rules of thumb" in order to get most out of your track during mixing phase and make sure you deliver a "mastering friendly" source, if you choose to have your track mastered for you.

Please mind this is not a challenge to debate, but some general advise which you may or may not agree with, but will yield you best results when leveraging mastering services.

First and foremost download the Dynamic Range Meter


- Do NOT i repeat DO NOT mixdown into a limiter, you can mix with a limiter on to get a feel on how to mix reacts, but do not mixdown with them.

- Make sure that your mix is around -12db RMS with peaks around -2db maximum, with NOTHING on the main buss

- Don't put any EQ on your main buss

- Don't put any compression on your main buss

- Do low cut everything (general note, cut until you hear the sound change IN THE MIX, don't cut solo as you might not cut enough since changes are much more obvious)

- Do mix(down) in 44.1, not 48 or 88.2 or even 96. It has no advantage nyguist wise and the necessary conversion will degrade your mix if your targetrate is going to be 44.1

- Do mixdown to 32bits, with NOTHING on the main buss this will preserve maximum headroom for mastering processing.

- Do advise what your target medium will be (MP3, CD, vinyl, radio)

- Do check M/S (mid/side) compatibility by pressing the mono button in the Dynamic range meter, if you miss stuff while in mono, that stuff is too much out of phase (often the spread button in NEXUS) and your mix will sound strange on a lot of PA systems (since their often mono)

If you check all above points and you are happy with your mix, i can guarantee that the engineer will get the most out of your track.
If you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.

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Analogue Mastering
Esoteric sound for the discerning ear

Last edited by Raphie on Jul-02-2009 at 19:37

emmmmmmm
yeaaah

think ill pass thx

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Did you read the manual that came with the plug in?

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quote:

Originally posted by dj_alfi change your avatar for fucks sake.

quote:

Originally posted by Beatflux Did you read the manual that came with the plug in?

I am not sure I understand? are you referring to the Dynamic Range Plugin? in what respect?

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Analogue Mastering
Esoteric sound for the discerning ear

quote:

Originally posted by Raphie I am not sure I understand? are you referring to the Dynamic Range Plugin? in what respect?

The online meter doesn't actually give you RMS, it gives you the top 20% of the RMS it finds. The offline meter calculates the distance between the peaks and the top 20% of RMS values. So what they recommend is a dynamic range of 14 in the offline meter. They recommend this for rock and pop because it's not as tiring and it translates better to MP3. However, like I said it's rock and pop. If you listen to modern dance songs the DR offline meter will probably read between 5-7, and nowhere near the recommendeded 14.

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quote:

Originally posted by dj_alfi change your avatar for fucks sake.

Yes, fully agree, but that's your TARGET for a mastered track (and then still as you mentioned it depends on the builds and passages as well)

Above you're aiming at a preparation for the target. An engineer can't do too much anymore dynamics wise when delivered a mix with a value of 5/6/7 hence you're more flexible when on average mixing around -12db RMS

___________________
Analogue Mastering
Esoteric sound for the discerning ear

quote:

Originally posted by evo8 emmmmmmm yeaaah think ill pass thx

No problem, but I DO like the June Mix on your soundcloud

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Analogue Mastering
Esoteric sound for the discerning ear