Mastering (osx), need help on mastering pretty please Options

[prosthetix]

Hiya, I've finished a few songs, (they're wavs from Reason) and now I want to master them, i am using 3.0.3 and Audacity, Im guessing there's no good way or tips you folks could give me on perfect mastering (so that it sounds good on the nicest of hifi speakers ot the lowest of earphones), all i have is a hifi system and dj headphones (for now) I can't afford to get studio monitors just as yet, but im on a tight schedule at the moment...

I was told I could try to keep the equaliser on the hifi all on flat, and tweak the sound so it sounds perfect (during composition and also normalising) with audacity I just use the regular settings for that (both the options ticked);

- Remove any DC offset (centre on 0 vertically)
- Normalise maximum amplitude to -3dB

are there any solid methods in Reason with the mastering suite? or any other programs or just general methods/tips??

cheers heaps!

[crossed_needles]

one "simple" Setup could be:

01.) kill DC-offset
02.) Normalise (up to ~ -0.5 dB)
"03.") Denoise if necessary (soft!)
"04.") Declick if necessary (soft!)
05.) Limiting with Dynamics (to receive about 3 to 4 dB level)
06.) several EQ-steps (soft!)
07.) Dynamics like Comp (soft!) - get pressure
"08.") if necessary: other psychoactive FX like Exciter, Enhance, etc. (soft!)
09.) Limiter - soft limiting! (don't kill the BD-peaks)
10.) Normalise (up to ~ -0.5 dB)
"11.") optional: Dither

and:
- if the source is bad, even "the master of the universe" couldn't help
- the ""-steps are optional
- soft means soft! (fine-tuning)
- between the steps you should compare A (the source)
and B (the processed file)


CN

This post has been edited by crossed_needles: Wed 21 Sep 2005, 08:51

[prosthetix]

excellent!! and thats all in audacity?

[crossed_needles]

you must look around for some of these points in reason or purchase a
waveform-editor with vst/au-compatibility ...then you can download many
free plugins for each step (like mda-bundle) or even purchase professional
plugin-software and do it. audacity is not professional and does not feature
any good solutions. you even got reason --- so it will be possible to get the
right tool for your mastering-realisation...
(the real professional does the setup with hardware which is _much_ more
expensive than the software-solution)

This post has been edited by crossed_needles: Thu 22 Sep 2005, 08:27

[prosthetix]

oh yeah, where can i get these vsti's ??