Get the free Mastering Compression Cheatsheet here: go.mastering.com/mastering-compression?el=10-tips-for-louder-masters-youtubeorganic&htrafficsource=youtubeorganic
Hey, Sonox Inflator is just one of the simplest waveshaper shapes/functions. You can easily create it yourself with any waveshaper and even null it. Interesting that not many people know this
@@FinnJainman that’s when you know your worth and don’t mix for garbage tracks. You’ve gotta pick and choose what and who to work with. I wouldn’t want my name on something like this and neither would most self respecting audio engineers 😅
The fact that compression can make transients loader is totally overlooked in most tutorials, it took me years to figure this out, wasted so much time. This video would be great for beginners, still great with 15 years up my sleeve.
Wow, this is the way I thought of mixing and mastering when I first started recording. This kind of advice is not very typical, at least not in many videos I've watched. When I started learning about audio engineering I got in the mindset that you pretty much always needed some compression on just about everything. It's simply not the case, and I'm glad you took me back to my roots to start looking at both mixing and mastering with fresh eyes again (or rather, ears).
8:15 I have always wondered about that, it was so simple and logical and yet no one ever points that out. How am I supposed to get a more consistent level when I let an initial transient pass through, and level down what follows 🤷♀🤷♀ thanks for clarifying. Well, thanks for all this video, I am already putting your advice into practice.
I’d started applying a lot of transient management within the mix just because I felt it made sense. Even though I run into CPU issues and feel like I’m breaking all sorts of mixing “rules”. Very comforting to know it’s a thing.
Appreciate the shout out on the final pointer; I will say credit to where the origins of that technique is from; are the passages on "manual limiting" in Bob Katz' Mastering Audio book;
I think reference plugins like Metric AB and others were the biggest game changer for home mastering. The ability to instantly flip back and forth between your mix any song instantly make using your ears everything.
this has got to be the most helpful mastering video I've ever watched thanks a ton mate my masters are loud and competitive now i really appreciate it!!!!
I always thought that learning mastering first would make you better in mixing. I've realised it when I started mixing and noticed how that improved my production. However you are the first person I've heard talking about this reverse engineer concept. Thank you, great video!
Good video, but a quick note: @ ~29:48, in the Ozone Maximizer module, those sliders on the right are not "left and right" but "transient and sustain, and while they can be unlinked it appears they affect the stereo signal -- no L/R specific effect.
From my experience, Sonnox Inflator is a soft-clipping saturator with a small volume boost. I achieved similar results with the soft saturation on the Logic PHAT FX but unfortunately, it doesn't do oversampling and introduces aliases in the upper frequencies. That was an ABSOLUTELY GREAT mastering tutorial by the way!!
really really well put together video, lots of great tips and superb explanations. I'd disagree on the 9 ish LUFS for club music though, needs to be much louder than that (sadly). Glad you mentioned the inflator, superb tool
I produce club music so this is very helpful indeed! I got a question tho, How would I set the master on my tracks to upload to different streaming services since some require a certain db limit? Like 9 lufs ain't too bad, but I know some have strict requirements for uploading to their servers! I don't know if I would have to make numerous copies of each song with different volumes for each upload to apply with each streaming service requirement tho....that's what confuses me frfr
@@JXYMXNDXZOFFICIALpeople have really made something very simple and unimportant this massive complicated issues. - Master it above -14LUFS or whichever is the loudest service. -loud tracks get turned down so unless your limiters or clippers improve the sound don't bother going excessive. -tracks being turned down through normalisation just turns tracks down, they aren't limited or changed. -tracks being turned up, through normalisation? You can guess what happens to your peaks, they get clipped or limited...its actually more problematic keeping things below the recommended LUFS if your peaks are hitting near the top still. -no...you can't just set each track to average -14 or album dynamics between songa will be way off, mellow tracks will blast out of speakers and loud ones will be weak...not to mention dynamica within song structure too -loads of tracks at "club volume" on streaming services that isn't suffering. No they don't make loads of masters, except perhaps the necessary thing in vinyl pressing
Nice video, even helps influence choosing samples early on. Loudness over time vs short transient knocks that will affect headroom and processing etc...
Thank you Rob, this edified my process and then, once you got to the sonnex inflater, it showed how much I still have to learn, lol. Appreciate all you guys do! 🙏🤛🎶
When demoing L2 you said fast attack is like clipping - but actually slowest attack is what gives the shortest gr envelope. Doesn't the attack knob essentially work as a wet/dry for how much signal goes to the initial levelling comp with the slowest setting being a bypass?
Hi, beautiful work, thanks for your dedication! Two nitpicks/suggestions on this one: your logo is wonderful AND it's in the way up to 72Hz and just in general I don't want it there while I'm working. Perhaps an option to disable it would be nice. Second, it would be great if we could mouse the output level up/down on the horizontal lines, rather than needing to turn the output knob. Thanks again!
When using saturation, typically it adds harmonics which has an impact on perceived loudness. In other words, in simple terms, adds more information to the affected frequency range.
Actually the attack parameter in proL2 controls the amount of time before the beginning of the release and the release parameter is an actual and classic release so i think that the actual attack of the limiter is always 0. Being a limiter, it would make sense.
I think this has been singlehandedly the best mastering tutorial I've seen to date. I will say this though. I think in modern mastering one of the most important and 'new' things are the mid/side limiting and multiband limiting. I would really love if you could/would go more in depth on those topics because this is often not really explained well. Then one small thing about Saturn: the default settings are with the entire plugin on -1dB. This is also the case in your video. So if you want to understand why the LUFS go down with a dB mostly it's because you're literally turning down the thing as a whole with 1dB. And the reason you're lifting the transients mostly is because you are not affecting the bass/kick as you're working mutiband (above 530hz), so you're saturating the top end more, hence affecting more the transients of for instance the percussion as you mention.
I love this tutorial and this channel. Any insight on what you would do differently mastering for vinyl? Are there any specific videos for vinyl mastering?
YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME. I went to school for audio engineering, but the market isn't acfepting of "fresh meat." Why is it so competitive? 😂. God be with me.
one of my fav loudness videos on youtube. this guy is such a good teacher. only issue, that beat with tune glides. different beat, a couple of different ones would be nice. but its ok i m here for the top tricks. and definitely in good hands. than kyou
heard spotify only does -14 Lufs when you have the option enabled, so there is apparently still reason to limit to ie. -6 as most mastering engineers often still do.
I agree. In my experience putting together playlists (of both my own stuff, and commercial works), if you have a loud (good) master, it sounds: - Louder than the competition, when Spotify normalization is off - Much the same as the competition, when Spotify normalization is on The logical conclusion I drew from this was, therefore, that a good, loud (within reason) master still had clear benefit and survived both scenarios well. A quieter master only survived one of these two scenarios well. Therefore, by process of elimination: loud master wins (IF that's what you're looking for). This is a slightly simplistic overview of the situation, of course, but you get the point. Other's experience might vary, of course!
26:09 - Frank Pole has recreated Inflator in Fl Studio with stock plugins and discovered its a waveshaper with a sinewave function. He links two videos achieving a null test with a waveshaper and the Inflator. Frank's video (I've created an INFLATOR clone in PATCHER)
Super helpful post -- just as good as the gain staging one. Thank You!!! I do wish the reference track were a bit more musical--with the electrochirp stuff it's hard to hear the effects in a meaningful way. I've always thought of clipping as the hard, square wave distortion resulting from volume going past the capacity of the system to reproduce accurately. And here you're using 'clipping' to refer to an activity which might be better described as trimming. Am I just old and out of touch? Regardless it's a practice I hadn't seen before and will be trying this with the Standard Clip.
Small queston, the RX phase check trick is a really life saver!! But wondering, if you master a song with analog gear, and once you print that, is it usefull to check the final wavefile again on phase issues? Sometime analog brings small face issues. Very curious about that!
You are not soft clipping with the StandardCLIP there, you need to slide the fader unde the mode the "soft-clip saturator" to the right to start soft clipping, if its at 0 you are hard clipping whatever your mode is. the more to the right you take it the softer the clipping.
Funny story. I used compressor like ReaComp and TDR for years, but I only understand ratio and gain reduction/addition. I finally understood what the attack/release speed does after using Airwindows compressors, which doesn't have any fancy GUI or indicator lol. It forces you to listen on the result instead of watching numbers appear.
Speaking about mastering this video has a great balance... between very great and useful tips that I'll for sure implement from now on, but explained on a horrendous song. Never heard a melody this irritating sound so clean lol, just my liking tho I'm sure other people would love this.
In first tip, we're using clipper to cut down the peaks and in the last tip we're using RX to manually cut down the peaks again. Could you elaborate how they work differently? Thank you.
Clipping in DSP is a mathematical function where each sample point above a given ceiling is pinned to a constant peak level; and then if you use soft clipping there are transfer curves that lean into that ceiling; typically cubic functions 1/3*n^3, quintic polynomials, algebraic, or otherwise; ultimately you're pinning every sequential sample that is above the ceiling to the exact same sample point; cutting the waveform off at the top; (Squaring the waveform) and the artefacts of this are harmonic distortions otherwise not present Clip gain across a series of samples; doesn't have a ceiling as the adjacent samples within the selection are all being attenuated at equal amounts; maintaining their original waveform shape; there may be some modulation/harmonics on the cross-overs of samples adjacent to your selection; but in the sceme of 48000 samples happening every second; this is impossible to hear;
@@post-man23 all clipping will produce harmonics; how audible these harmonics are; depend on how much it's being clipped; Manual limiting (clip gaining peaks) won't produce these harmonics
Hi, some good stuff in here but I have to point out that your 'Saturation increased the LUfS' test was inaccurate due to the second (Saturn ON) part of the test featuring a big hit at the end of the section you took a reading from. This hit didn't seem to be in the other one. Arguably it would have increased the LUFS, which enforces your point, but seeing as you did also make the point that LUFS is an average measurement (be it short or long term), this might confuse some people.
I have been mmixing about 8 months, but i still dont understand "mastering" should i aim my mixes to like-16 luf? i aim for 10-12 on my beats, but 13-10 for mixes with vocals i just dont get it
@@bugglebegger143 and it’s not so much about the levels it’s more about emulating. If you’re watching a performance on the stage and how the sound is actually traveling I took some classes with a Grammy winning engineer. I had several classes with him and another guy who charts consistently. But yeah I totally agree. Like, what is the goal? and I’ve watched. Quite a few people go on favor and use five different people and it’s just seems very subjective mastering to get a solid answer. So you actually experience a noticeable difference if your track is too loud on Spotify? Interesting. I aim the fgx2 at abojt -12 usually I don’t think I have been turned down.
You shouldn't be trying to understand mastering if you're still learning mixing. By the way - that's not an insult - you can learn the entirety of your DAW, but it still takes years to train your ears and hear tiny differences, resonances, fundamentals and overtones of sounds - what compression does .. etc. etc. Mastering is purely for when you've done the best mix you possibly can, you've left enough headroom to compress the entire mix and then limit it to bring the level up to commercial levels, to EQ the mix as a whole (note - mastering is going to affect the entire mix as a whole, mastering can't affect individual tracks within the mix) Mastering takes years as well on top of mastering to understand. Every mix is different, needs different mastering techniques and is generally done by somebody that hasn't done the mix, because they have the ability to step back and hear the whole mix objectively. If you've mixed the track, its likely you'll hear everything separately still and still want to go in and fiddle with the mix. This is a nightmare vicious circle.. changing the whole mix, something sticks out or disappears, you go back to the mix, then back to mastering,, etc. etc.
@@bugglebegger143 The different values for volume are for different amounts of time. RMS is average over time, LUFS is more the whole track, peak is the highest point in a transient.. for Mastering you're looking to get the entire track level to a good LUFS level. But these days Mastering engineers that understand the platform they are aiming for will try and achieve a certain LUFS level because Spotify for example adds its only limiting and auto-normalisation, so it will turn the track up or down and then in a playlist your track might stand out as too quiet or too distorted. To get it right, you need to understand the mix phase more - you'll need to remove peaks, bring up the RMS with saturation, clipping and limiting. But the magic in mastering comes from hearing where the distortion begins so you're bringing the level up with those tools, without destroying the punch and transients of the song. I'm a mastering engineer and I'm still learning and ear training - even after 5 years mastering and 20 years of mixing.
Thanks for the insights. But aren't those dutch and dutch 8c's placed now that the cardoid part doesn't function properly? The yamaha's seem in the way to me.
I only figured the value of clipping for masters recently, had to go back to all my old projects and scrap the 5-6 tools I was using for 1-2 and everything is so much louder now 🤦♂️😂
i understand that this video could be geared more towards people who are receiving full mixes and cannot tweak, but for your example at 2:40 where it shows the clipping just happening mostly on the kick, in what scenario would you use a clipper on the individual channel vs the master? or if you have a drum bus, should it be clipped there before going into a master? i can try these out myself to test by ear but im the sort of person who needs to understand they why for everything so i fully can understand what im doing, but this gets confusing for me when trying to figure out how my mix should sound first, since most references are mastered. thanks!
This is VERY insightful and empowering content! Thanks so much for presenting such! I've come away from this with a better grasp on how to plan transient management further upstream before the mastering phase of audio production. Therefore, I have 2 questions: 1. As it regards the order of the 10 Tips you've presented, is there an implied order of plugin placement in the mastering chain based upon your presentation of these tips? Or is there another, better suggested approach to the chain plugin placement? 2. As it regards using multiple limiters in serial to tame transients, is there a best-practice to follow related to the optimum number of plugins to employ? Also, do I employ multi-band limiting before or after "whole-band" limiter processing? I've used this serial approach before but never employed such with multiband processing.
Get the free Mastering Compression Cheatsheet here: go.mastering.com/mastering-compression?el=10-tips-for-louder-masters-youtubeorganic&htrafficsource=youtubeorganic
Hey, Sonox Inflator is just one of the simplest waveshaper shapes/functions. You can easily create it yourself with any waveshaper and even null it.
Interesting that not many people know this
No
It’s not working for me - the locations is not found (error 503)
@@foxate dude, these guys are CONS.
That fast compression visualisation just helped me understand something i have been struggling to understand for a while now. Thank you!
Hey you seem to be very knowledgeable for this subject. Why did you choose this track?
Same. Highkey
The song playing in the beginning is just hilarious to me for some reason
The background song? Or the before/after demo?
From this to this😂😂😂 and it sounds shitty af 🤣🤣🤷🏻♂️
That's what it sounds like in a microwave. 😂
Hahahah like a robotic seizure
Its a very wobbly melody with loads of pitch bending.
Why do audio engineering tutorials pick the most annoying tracks imaginable to demo 🤣
I swear man
The reality of being a mastering engineer I suppose; you are going to come across some terrible songs that need mastering
Im vibing bro✌️
Ahh Human music
@@FinnJainman that’s when you know your worth and don’t mix for garbage tracks. You’ve gotta pick and choose what and who to work with. I wouldn’t want my name on something like this and neither would most self respecting audio engineers 😅
The fact that compression can make transients loader is totally overlooked in most tutorials, it took me years to figure this out, wasted so much time. This video would be great for beginners, still great with 15 years up my sleeve.
This is me 😅Suddenly it makes sense after 10+ years lol in freaking 1 video
Just one thing. Thank you. After watching this I've increased the loudness of a track from -11 luvs to -7 luvs without any dist.
Knowing how mastering works at the start of the journey will save you a couple of good years..
Wow, this is the way I thought of mixing and mastering when I first started recording. This kind of advice is not very typical, at least not in many videos I've watched. When I started learning about audio engineering I got in the mindset that you pretty much always needed some compression on just about everything. It's simply not the case, and I'm glad you took me back to my roots to start looking at both mixing and mastering with fresh eyes again (or rather, ears).
Add parallel compression to this and you have a great tool kit for mixes that retain a sense of their original dynamics
Amazing video. No clickbait title and full of real useful information based on experience.
8:15 I have always wondered about that, it was so simple and logical and yet no one ever points that out. How am I supposed to get a more consistent level when I let an initial transient pass through, and level down what follows 🤷♀🤷♀ thanks for clarifying. Well, thanks for all this video, I am already putting your advice into practice.
Serial limiting was the big “AH-HA!” moment for me. It’s been a long road over the years but it’s all coming together now. Thank you!
I’d started applying a lot of transient management within the mix just because I felt it made sense. Even though I run into CPU issues and feel like I’m breaking all sorts of mixing “rules”. Very comforting to know it’s a thing.
Appreciate the shout out on the final pointer; I will say credit to where the origins of that technique is from; are the passages on "manual limiting" in Bob Katz' Mastering Audio book;
I think reference plugins like Metric AB and others were the biggest game changer for home mastering. The ability to instantly flip back and forth between your mix any song instantly make using your ears everything.
one of the best videos i have seen on this subject, thanks a million really helped :)
This is one of the best audio related videos on TH-cam so far. Thanks!
The info in this video are amazing, especially the way to use compression and the super gem; phase check in RX.
this has got to be the most helpful mastering video I've ever watched thanks a ton mate my masters are loud and competitive now i really appreciate it!!!!
I always thought that learning mastering first would make you better in mixing. I've realised it when I started mixing and noticed how that improved my production. However you are the first person I've heard talking about this reverse engineer concept. Thank you, great video!
That bit about compression and dynamic range was worth the watch alone, so obvious once explained, but I'd never considered it.
Uohh, really loved today's song. Actually the first time you work with music in the same genre as mine, Love it!
Amazing video, finally understood things i couldnt wrap my head around! THANK YOU
Glad it helped!
this is a complete course, thanks mate
Good video, but a quick note: @ ~29:48, in the Ozone Maximizer module, those sliders on the right are not "left and right" but "transient and sustain, and while they can be unlinked it appears they affect the stereo signal -- no L/R specific effect.
Best mastering video on youtube. Period.
This is the BEST mastering video I have seen in awhile. No gimmicks... and very useful info!
the attack times with compression blew mind, seems so obvious but i never saw it that way!
Thats a true masterclass. Great content, congratulations!
From my experience, Sonnox Inflator is a soft-clipping saturator with a small volume boost. I achieved similar results with the soft saturation on the Logic PHAT FX but unfortunately, it doesn't do oversampling and introduces aliases in the upper frequencies. That was an ABSOLUTELY GREAT mastering tutorial by the way!!
really really well put together video, lots of great tips and superb explanations. I'd disagree on the 9 ish LUFS for club music though, needs to be much louder than that (sadly). Glad you mentioned the inflator, superb tool
8-9 should be competitive enough - good data here to back this up: www.masteringthemix.com/blogs/learn/mastering-trends-for-2023
Glad you liked the video, thank you for the kind words!
I produce club music so this is very helpful indeed!
I got a question tho, How would I set the master on my tracks to upload to different streaming services since some require a certain db limit? Like 9 lufs ain't too bad, but I know some have strict requirements for uploading to their servers! I don't know if I would have to make numerous copies of each song with different volumes for each upload to apply with each streaming service requirement tho....that's what confuses me frfr
@@masteringcom na man, loud music is now 3 LUFS, even below for Hardcore. Yeah, yeah :)
@@JXYMXNDXZOFFICIALpeople have really made something very simple and unimportant this massive complicated issues.
- Master it above -14LUFS or whichever is the loudest service.
-loud tracks get turned down so unless your limiters or clippers improve the sound don't bother going excessive.
-tracks being turned down through normalisation just turns tracks down, they aren't limited or changed.
-tracks being turned up, through normalisation? You can guess what happens to your peaks, they get clipped or limited...its actually more problematic keeping things below the recommended LUFS if your peaks are hitting near the top still.
-no...you can't just set each track to average -14 or album dynamics between songa will be way off, mellow tracks will blast out of speakers and loud ones will be weak...not to mention dynamica within song structure too
-loads of tracks at "club volume" on streaming services that isn't suffering. No they don't make loads of masters, except perhaps the necessary thing in vinyl pressing
Nice video, even helps influence choosing samples early on. Loudness over time vs short transient knocks that will affect headroom and processing etc...
Thank you Rob, this edified my process and then, once you got to the sonnex inflater, it showed how much I still have to learn, lol. Appreciate all you guys do! 🙏🤛🎶
Clear and useful discussion, especially about clipping; thanks.
When demoing L2 you said fast attack is like clipping - but actually slowest attack is what gives the shortest gr envelope. Doesn't the attack knob essentially work as a wet/dry for how much signal goes to the initial levelling comp with the slowest setting being a bypass?
Just WOW. What a Video! I've learned so much and will put all of your tricks to good use. Thank you super duper much. Lovely guy
Hi, beautiful work, thanks for your dedication! Two nitpicks/suggestions on this one: your logo is wonderful AND it's in the way up to 72Hz and just in general I don't want it there while I'm working. Perhaps an option to disable it would be nice. Second, it would be great if we could mouse the output level up/down on the horizontal lines, rather than needing to turn the output knob. Thanks again!
When using saturation, typically it adds harmonics which has an impact on perceived loudness. In other words, in simple terms, adds more information to the affected frequency range.
And better have some good oversampling happening. Unless the specific track you’re working on sounds great with bizarre aliasing.
isnt saturation the same thing as distortion?
Actually the attack parameter in proL2 controls the amount of time before the beginning of the release and the release parameter is an actual and classic release so i think that the actual attack of the limiter is always 0. Being a limiter, it would make sense.
Correct, if the limited audio sustains longer than the attack setting, then the release setting is brought into the process.
thanks to your visualization at 8:40 I finally understand what threshold means! learned a lot here thanks
I think this has been singlehandedly the best mastering tutorial I've seen to date. I will say this though. I think in modern mastering one of the most important and 'new' things are the mid/side limiting and multiband limiting. I would really love if you could/would go more in depth on those topics because this is often not really explained well.
Then one small thing about Saturn: the default settings are with the entire plugin on -1dB. This is also the case in your video. So if you want to understand why the LUFS go down with a dB mostly it's because you're literally turning down the thing as a whole with 1dB. And the reason you're lifting the transients mostly is because you are not affecting the bass/kick as you're working mutiband (above 530hz), so you're saturating the top end more, hence affecting more the transients of for instance the percussion as you mention.
I love this tutorial and this channel. Any insight on what you would do differently mastering for vinyl? Are there any specific videos for vinyl mastering?
YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME. I went to school for audio engineering, but the market isn't acfepting of "fresh meat." Why is it so competitive? 😂. God be with me.
one of my fav loudness videos on youtube. this guy is such a good teacher. only issue, that beat with tune glides. different beat, a couple of different ones would be nice. but its ok i m here for the top tricks. and definitely in good hands. than kyou
very good explanations and tips.. thanks!
Wait does Standard Clip add auto gain? I thought it only adds gain if you move the gain slider up...
Oxford Inflator is great now and then but it does alter the stereo image somewhat and not necessarily always in a good way.
heard spotify only does -14 Lufs when you have the option enabled, so there is apparently still reason to limit to ie. -6 as most mastering engineers often still do.
I agree. In my experience putting together playlists (of both my own stuff, and commercial works), if you have a loud (good) master, it sounds:
- Louder than the competition, when Spotify normalization is off
- Much the same as the competition, when Spotify normalization is on
The logical conclusion I drew from this was, therefore, that a good, loud (within reason) master still had clear benefit and survived both scenarios well. A quieter master only survived one of these two scenarios well. Therefore, by process of elimination: loud master wins (IF that's what you're looking for). This is a slightly simplistic overview of the situation, of course, but you get the point. Other's experience might vary, of course!
26:09 - Frank Pole has recreated Inflator in Fl Studio with stock plugins and discovered its a waveshaper with a sinewave function. He links two videos achieving a null test with a waveshaper and the Inflator. Frank's video (I've created an INFLATOR clone in PATCHER)
Nice - will check this out!
Thanks My Teacher Rob for a lot of information~ A lot helpful and always respect 🙏
Thanks! Really useful and helpful tips.. one thing tho is the demo song is very grating
Is there a way to do the phase rotation in real time with a plugin instead of using RX?
Golden video
Super helpful post -- just as good as the gain staging one. Thank You!!! I do wish the reference track were a bit more musical--with the electrochirp stuff it's hard to hear the effects in a meaningful way.
I've always thought of clipping as the hard, square wave distortion resulting from volume going past the capacity of the system to reproduce accurately. And here you're using 'clipping' to refer to an activity which might be better described as trimming. Am I just old and out of touch? Regardless it's a practice I hadn't seen before and will be trying this with the Standard Clip.
Small queston, the RX phase check trick is a really life saver!! But wondering, if you master a song with analog gear, and once you print that, is it usefull to check the final wavefile again on phase issues? Sometime analog brings small face issues. Very curious about that!
These videos are gold.
Thank you for your insight and tips.
No worries!
You are not soft clipping with the StandardCLIP there, you need to slide the fader unde the mode the "soft-clip saturator" to the right to start soft clipping, if its at 0 you are hard clipping whatever your mode is. the more to the right you take it the softer the clipping.
still adds some color without moving that fader, just by being on the soft clipping option
What's awesome is when I started in like 1994 that manual transient reduction was always what we did first in the process :)
Shout-out to youtube to knowing when i need what video... perfect timing
Funny story. I used compressor like ReaComp and TDR for years, but I only understand ratio and gain reduction/addition. I finally understood what the attack/release speed does after using Airwindows compressors, which doesn't have any fancy GUI or indicator lol. It forces you to listen on the result instead of watching numbers appear.
Speaking about mastering this video has a great balance... between very great and useful tips that I'll for sure implement from now on, but explained on a horrendous song. Never heard a melody this irritating sound so clean lol, just my liking tho I'm sure other people would love this.
Great video, thanks a lot. 🙏 But do you really need a calculator for these? 😅
Great video! It was so useful. On a side note, is the song you're working on out anywhere?
In first tip, we're using clipper to cut down the peaks and in the last tip we're using RX to manually cut down the peaks again. Could you elaborate how they work differently? Thank you.
Clipping in DSP is a mathematical function where each sample point above a given ceiling is pinned to a constant peak level; and then if you use soft clipping there are transfer curves that lean into that ceiling; typically cubic functions 1/3*n^3, quintic polynomials, algebraic, or otherwise; ultimately you're pinning every sequential sample that is above the ceiling to the exact same sample point; cutting the waveform off at the top; (Squaring the waveform) and the artefacts of this are harmonic distortions otherwise not present
Clip gain across a series of samples; doesn't have a ceiling as the adjacent samples within the selection are all being attenuated at equal amounts; maintaining their original waveform shape; there may be some modulation/harmonics on the cross-overs of samples adjacent to your selection; but in the sceme of 48000 samples happening every second; this is impossible to hear;
@@panorama_mastering Thanks for the explanation. So in short, DSP clipping generates audible harmonics and manual clipping doesn’t do that?
@@post-man23 all clipping will produce harmonics; how audible these harmonics are; depend on how much it's being clipped;
Manual limiting (clip gaining peaks) won't produce these harmonics
Which Podcast Mic are you using? Video was very awesome!
This was very insightful, thank you
Great video! BTW How did you create the visualization in the compression piece?
Great video!! And bonus point for staying true to mixing/mastering tutorials and having the weirdest songs lol
Thank you,your videos are always help me
Video that is worth watching
💪
Thank you, that was just excellent!
Hi, some good stuff in here but I have to point out that your 'Saturation increased the LUfS' test was inaccurate due to the second (Saturn ON) part of the test featuring a big hit at the end of the section you took a reading from. This hit didn't seem to be in the other one.
Arguably it would have increased the LUFS, which enforces your point, but seeing as you did also make the point that LUFS is an average measurement (be it short or long term), this might confuse some people.
I like the musical example. More interesting than most
That lead drove me crazy.
I have been mmixing about 8 months, but i still dont understand "mastering" should i aim my mixes to like-16 luf? i aim for 10-12 on my beats, but 13-10 for mixes with vocals i just dont get it
Yeah, and the music is just as loud on Spotify, even with the loudness normalization option turned on
@@bugglebegger143 and it’s not so much about the levels it’s more about emulating. If you’re watching a performance on the stage and how the sound is actually traveling I took some classes with a Grammy winning engineer. I had several classes with him and another guy who charts consistently. But yeah I totally agree. Like, what is the goal? and I’ve watched. Quite a few people go on favor and use five different people and it’s just seems very subjective mastering to get a solid answer. So you actually experience a noticeable difference if your track is too loud on Spotify? Interesting. I aim the fgx2 at abojt -12 usually I don’t think I have been turned down.
@@bugglebegger143 I also put wav up
You shouldn't be trying to understand mastering if you're still learning mixing. By the way - that's not an insult - you can learn the entirety of your DAW, but it still takes years to train your ears and hear tiny differences, resonances, fundamentals and overtones of sounds - what compression does .. etc. etc.
Mastering is purely for when you've done the best mix you possibly can, you've left enough headroom to compress the entire mix and then limit it to bring the level up to commercial levels, to EQ the mix as a whole (note - mastering is going to affect the entire mix as a whole, mastering can't affect individual tracks within the mix)
Mastering takes years as well on top of mastering to understand. Every mix is different, needs different mastering techniques and is generally done by somebody that hasn't done the mix, because they have the ability to step back and hear the whole mix objectively. If you've mixed the track, its likely you'll hear everything separately still and still want to go in and fiddle with the mix. This is a nightmare vicious circle.. changing the whole mix, something sticks out or disappears, you go back to the mix, then back to mastering,, etc. etc.
@@bugglebegger143 The different values for volume are for different amounts of time. RMS is average over time, LUFS is more the whole track, peak is the highest point in a transient.. for Mastering you're looking to get the entire track level to a good LUFS level. But these days Mastering engineers that understand the platform they are aiming for will try and achieve a certain LUFS level because Spotify for example adds its only limiting and auto-normalisation, so it will turn the track up or down and then in a playlist your track might stand out as too quiet or too distorted.
To get it right, you need to understand the mix phase more - you'll need to remove peaks, bring up the RMS with saturation, clipping and limiting. But the magic in mastering comes from hearing where the distortion begins so you're bringing the level up with those tools, without destroying the punch and transients of the song.
I'm a mastering engineer and I'm still learning and ear training - even after 5 years mastering and 20 years of mixing.
This is a goldmine! Thanks bud!
Thanks for the insights.
But aren't those dutch and dutch 8c's placed now that the cardoid part doesn't function properly?
The yamaha's seem in the way to me.
This is a super helpful video. Thanks man!
really well explained video. Thank You
Great and complete explanation mate, great!!!
Can anyone tell me why it's practical to try and reach -3 LUFS?
This was really interesting. 👍
Wow.. Where can i get the visual compressor generator?
At what point in the mastering process do you recommend checking and correcting phase rotation?
Bro sick loop you used. What is the use of doing this tutorial.
This really helped me out, tysm!
This is Incredible!
excellent video. Very informative. Thanks!
Thank you for the class!
I only figured the value of clipping for masters recently, had to go back to all my old projects and scrap the 5-6 tools I was using for 1-2 and everything is so much louder now 🤦♂️😂
Thanks for sharing the knowledge... 🤟
i understand that this video could be geared more towards people who are receiving full mixes and cannot tweak, but for your example at 2:40 where it shows the clipping just happening mostly on the kick, in what scenario would you use a clipper on the individual channel vs the master? or if you have a drum bus, should it be clipped there before going into a master? i can try these out myself to test by ear but im the sort of person who needs to understand they why for everything so i fully can understand what im doing, but this gets confusing for me when trying to figure out how my mix should sound first, since most references are mastered. thanks!
Both! I clip individual channels too. Then clip the whole track in mastering.
@@masteringcom thank you for the reply!
Thanks for clear explanation!
this is SO HELPFUL thank you
What is this compression visualizer?? 👀🧐
Such a helpful video. Thanks
This is VERY insightful and empowering content! Thanks so much for presenting such! I've come away from this with a better grasp on how to plan transient management further upstream before the mastering phase of audio production. Therefore, I have 2 questions:
1. As it regards the order of the 10 Tips you've presented, is there an implied order of plugin placement in the mastering chain based upon your presentation of these tips? Or is there another, better suggested approach to the chain plugin placement?
2. As it regards using multiple limiters in serial to tame transients, is there a best-practice to follow related to the optimum number of plugins to employ? Also, do I employ multi-band limiting before or after "whole-band" limiter processing? I've used this serial approach before but never employed such with multiband processing.
Perfects explainations, thank's !
Hai , I AM GOING TO IMPORT ALL TRACKS IN ONE LOGIC PRO PROJECT FOR ALBUM MASTERING , WHAT BPM SHOULD I USE ????
Soft clipping as shown can be it be achieved 1.5 dB compression with soft knee?