back to main page
|
Too long, read anyway: What is Mastering? It's the final step in the process of examining the single/ep/album before release and evaluating if anything can or should be done to improve it for as wide an audience and diverse of playback systems as possible. It can be target-platform dependent. Depending on the material and the release formats, sometimes different approaches may be needed to best fulfill those outlets. It is the job of a responsible mastering engineer to understand the details this all entails, to keep up with changing technologies, and to be attuned and attentive to the artist's needs and desires as well. Mastering can encompass something as simple as a bit of judicious gain and/or EQ (or to know when *nothing* is needed for a particular mix!) to creative solutions to make, for example, a number of songs work as a whole listening experience, while also maintaining the individual character of each mix. Years and years of experience is honestly the only way to get to that point of ability. (It is NOT about adding a smiley-face EQ and a brickwall limiter and calling it a day. Unless it IS! But...) It's a chance to get feedback about the mix(es) and possibly correct something that should be corrected at the mix stage as opposed to "fixing" it in mastering. Being required to send only mixes you're absolutely "happy with" is totally ridiculous. There are too many factors to know exactly how your mix will translate through a mastering chain... so: Yes, I do take mix revisions with no extra charge - within reason, of course. It's the final stage of your project - the budget shouldn't come with surprises! (Many mastering places don't, or severely restrict the number of them at least, and I do not understand why. Isn't the goal the best release possible? Some even only accept mixes with the caveat that they "assume the client is happy with their mixes." Well now, how is the client actually supposed to know that, really?) If need be, you'll find I'm quite generous in this regard. If you hear something after I put my ears on it that you'd like to change, go for it! I do it all the time. Happy to. Let's not cut any corners. It's also the time when the spacing between songs, cleaning up of the starts and ends, and so on (the "sequencing") can really come together. Something that is sometimes overlooked when putting together a set of songs into something bigger. It's knowing the finer details about bit depth, sample rate, dither, dynamic range and many other factors including a whole host of other things that look like jargon/mumbojumbo when typed in a post like this. (...LUFS? What the heck are LUFS? (Email me - I'll answer any qustions like this as promptly as possible!) There are many myths and misunderstandings surrounding audio and delivery formats. Anyone with a computer (or even a bunch of analog gear - that's another topic altogether) can call themselves a "mastering engineer". Even *great* recording engineers can hang out their shingle on this, with sometimes mixed results. But would you trust someone with a hydraulic jack, a socket wrench set, and a youtube video watchlist to fix something detailed and complicated with your car? Or someone who dabbles in it but hasn't made it one of their main focuses for, well, maybe almost three decades? Years and years of deep listening and an ever-growing knowledge base of audio, psychoacoustics, and playback systems and formats can and do make a lot of difference. Never mind the whole "AI/automated/online mastering" scam. You get what you pay for. Believe me, I test them. This is why I not only master at an affordable rate, but at a *flat* rate. It's the final step in your process, your release of your art. You should be absolutely *thrilled* to let it out into the world. Consider me to be a part of your team bringing your project and vision to fruition! |
|
|