The Acceptable Standard
Mastering is the process of transferring the final mix recordings of your music, spoken word, etc, into a "master" that is acceptable for replication or playback. Some of the steps of the mastering process are straightforward eg. sequence the songs into the right order, convert from tape or DAT to a Compact Disc, fade or edit songs, adjust levels so that one is not louder than another unnecessarily. However, making your recording sound like a master is a whole different ball game.
Sweetening the Audio
This is one of the main aspects of mastering and is a process which remains very mysterious to many musicians and engineers. It is not magic, but the resulting master can indeed be a revelation from the previously supplied mixes. Simply put, mastering is the final adjustment of tone and space so that your album is consistent with great sounding records. If you know what it’s like to labour long and hard over final mixes only to find that there isn't the same tone, depth and punch of your favourite records, then you are already on your way to understanding the necessity for mastering. |
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The following excerpts written by Jay Frigoletto have appeared in the rec.audio newsgroup and on the internet over the past several years.
Mastering is more than a fresh set of impartial ears, although this is certainly one advantage.
It's the experience of the ears in mastering, which is different from mixing.
The best mix engineers still get all of their work mastered.
It's a different discipline, however related. It's the training of the ears, knowing what to look for, knowing how far to go, knowing how it will translate, knowing the monitors, the experience with so many records that have come through, with what works and what doesn't.
It's the training, the knowledge that has been passed on by somebody more experienced, learning the aesthetic and technical details that aren't obvious or seem counter-intuitive to the lay person.
It's the gear.
Its the well designed and implemented monitoring environment, the high definition full range monitors, the knowledge of when and how to dither, what type, what gain, noise shaping or not, which curve.
It's having the highest quality processing gear and the cleanest signal path.
It's having digital gear that processes at a high enough resolution for the resolution of your project, and gear that doesn't truncate, and offers you dithering options when you need them, and has tried and tested quality algorithms and proper DSP practice.
It's quality A/D and D/A and properly maintained and calibrated tape machines. It's understanding PQ codes, ISRC codes, noise reduction, and different master formats that will come in and be delivered. It's having the proper gear to make masters that glass can be cut directly from.
It's knowing what glass mastering is in the first place, and why that's not done at the "mastering" houses we are talking about, it's knowing the difference between mastering and pre-mastering.
It's knowing when to use analog or digital, how to get to and from digital with the least degradation.
It's not getting carried away, it's restraint, but it's not necessarily timid.
It's attention to detail, cleaning heads and tails, adjusting fades when necessary, making the album even from track to track, not thinking normalization will do this for you, understanding emphasis, not losing bits of data that are important or passing bits of data that are incorrect, knowing what to do about DC, phase relationships, balance, clicks, pops, dropouts, and how to prepare a proper log for the replication plant.
It's all of this and more.
It is NOT simply putting an EQ and a limiter on the mix bus so your CD is loud and bright. If you don't understand the difference, you are sadly missing out on one of the most valuable assets in the completion of your project that you have put your heart and hard work into.
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