Amanda PayneJacksonville Recording Connection

Chapter 19 Mastering Posted on 2014-05-07 by Amanda Payne

In this final chapter, the book started out by defining the era called the “loudness wars”. This was a time when most music was basically one dynamic, LOUD. We have learned however, that music with minimal to no dynamic changes tends to make our ears very tired. In Pro Tools, we have metering to help us measure average and overall volume levels.

There are two versions of metering, peak metering and RMS metering. Peak metering measures the volume of the waveforms instantaneously as the audio plays. When levels exceed a certain point, the clip indicator goes on to let you know that it has peaked. The RMS metering, or root means square, measures the average volume of the overall performance using a mathematical formula.

When mastering, it is good to understand that the environment in which a song(s) is recorded, can greatly affect special characteristics of the mix. This along with song style can make or break to flow of an album.

Pro Tools has come along way in what we are able to do. We can accomplish quite a bit of mastering signal processing by using Pro Tools however this is usually considered “pre-mastering” for it’s lack of ISRC/SKU codes.

When I listen to songs pre-mastered using the maxim plugin and meter, there is a nice sound that results as long as we do not abuse the metering rules. BUT, when we use the Slate FX-G plugin, the brick wall effect keeps the peak meter from going past 0dB. This causes us to be able to boost the gain and really juice up the mix without distorting.

In my opinion, I feel mastering is easier than mixing from the Pro Tools portion of it all. That is mostly because there is more that we can do with the program in mixing. I am so glad to be continuing on to the masters program to really dig deeper into the knowledge, technique and art of audio engineering and music producing. 

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