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Post by Deleted on Nov 1, 2021 16:20:53 GMT -6
Most of us are mastering our own stuff and just want to take some peaks off in the cleanest way possible and universalize the volume of the individual tracks without flatlining things. There’s an variety of technical reasons why brick walling hurts translation despite what the average modern mastering dude with thousands in credit card debt and a rack of gear lit up like Christmas lights that sounds awful doing more than 1 db of anything tells you. Agreed...unfortunately. "Do no harm" should be an oath that mastering engineers take. I used to use TP limiting all the time, until I turned it off one time and got smacked by REAL dynamics...or going to a -0.5 or -0.3 dB ceiling instead of -1 dB...man, I had no idea I was killing so much LIFE in tracks. To my limited understanding (still kinda new to mastering, only a couple years under the belt, and the pun was intended lol), limiting should be mostly invisible. I know sometimes it provides that last little bit of edge for some genres, but for the most part it shouldn't be heard. Do I have the right idea? True peak on most limiters is just a clipper, not even really a limiter. Pure dirt. — transients instead of /\. Then they get usually get reconstructed as god knows what by the phase shifts anyway in most playback systems (non dc coupled amps, converters, etc). They’re used because Most limiters don’t have sidechains that can both see the actual peaks and take them off by attack and releasing. Lookahead is just a delay and there’s tons of program dependencies to hide the pumping and insane distortion on most of them. Multiband limiters are the new phase scrambling hotness like multiband compressors.
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Post by Ward on Nov 5, 2021 6:11:48 GMT -6
Agreed...unfortunately. "Do no harm" should be an oath that mastering engineers take. I used to use TP limiting all the time, until I turned it off one time and got smacked by REAL dynamics...or going to a -0.5 or -0.3 dB ceiling instead of -1 dB...man, I had no idea I was killing so much LIFE in tracks. To my limited understanding (still kinda new to mastering, only a couple years under the belt, and the pun was intended lol), limiting should be mostly invisible. I know sometimes it provides that last little bit of edge for some genres, but for the most part it shouldn't be heard. Do I have the right idea? True peak on most limiters is just a clipper, not even really a limiter. Pure dirt. — transients instead of /\. Then they get usually get reconstructed as god knows what by the phase shifts anyway in most playback systems (non dc coupled amps, converters, etc). They’re used because Most limiters don’t have sidechains that can both see the actual peaks and take them off by attack and releasing. Lookahead is just a delay and there’s tons of program dependencies to hide the pumping and insane distortion on most of them. Multiband limiters are the new phase scrambling hotness like multiband compressors. The market opportunity to make a true peak limiter that can flatten the spikes without distortion is still out there . . . how much engineering would it take to get there?
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Post by Deleted on Nov 5, 2021 14:03:39 GMT -6
True peak on most limiters is just a clipper, not even really a limiter. Pure dirt. — transients instead of /\. Then they get usually get reconstructed as god knows what by the phase shifts anyway in most playback systems (non dc coupled amps, converters, etc). They’re used because Most limiters don’t have sidechains that can both see the actual peaks and take them off by attack and releasing. Lookahead is just a delay and there’s tons of program dependencies to hide the pumping and insane distortion on most of them. Multiband limiters are the new phase scrambling hotness like multiband compressors. The market opportunity to make a true peak limiter that can flatten the spikes without distortion is still out there . . . how much engineering would it take to get there? It’s not physically and mathematically possible to guarantee to take the peaks off cleanly. People need to stop slamming records and clipping the shit out of everything. That’s the only way. Limiters are just fast compressors. Compressors modulate the signal. Modulation distorts. Digital limiters usually have a lookahead because their attack filters literally don’t work correctly. The filter coefficients literally don’t work. Lookahead is just a delay and they will often modify the filter too. Then they try to hide the distortion caused by digging in deeply with a fast attack/program dependent release compressor by putting the crazy pumping on harmonic content and then the distortion on transients. They will have normalization and levelers included and it’s all proprietary and all distorted! Oh and the likes of Waves L1, L2, and Oxford Limiter can’t take any transients off without digging into the tonal content because they can’t see the transients since their rectified sidechains are just based off the pcm samples. So to reduce that peak, you have to push the threshold further down. They’re basically random shit boxes that can even increase the transients with a ton of program dependencies and leveling and other crap built it. Some of them actually increase the transients and then try to normalize peaks! Oh and to take the real sample peaks off, you’ll have to run part of sidechain into the MHz. Your glorified shitbox modulator or your clean modulator might not do it so you get one of those 128x oversampled clean clippers. And there’s still an audible transient there when played back or after further processing phenomenon when played back because the discontinuity you just caused is oscillating en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gibbs_phenomenonThe cleanest digital limiters I’ve used is TDR Limiter 6 GE and avoid the true peak. The cleanest distortion box limiter is the BX_truepeak, which is still cleaner than anything from Waves or FabFilter if you’re not digging into the midrange like a maniac because to be clean, it lacks the crazy dependencies because it’s not making a mess it has to clean up to not sound like total shit with even 1-2 db off! And BX limiter true peak has the best intersample peak limiter because tdr is just a clipper where the oscillations are normalized. I don’t know if I can engineer craziness to get past bx_truepeak but it’s very tonally flexible for a distorted limiter. I probably can but what’s the point?
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Post by Martin John Butler on Nov 5, 2021 14:11:14 GMT -6
It's a bit over my head, but that was a very cool post Dan.
No wonder I never use limiters !
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Post by svart on Nov 5, 2021 14:24:45 GMT -6
A square wave is mathematically equal to an infinite number of harmonics. Flattening a signal's rise time will ALWAYS equal harmonic output. That's just the nature of limiting. No amount of lookahead on any type of signal can fix that.
One way to fix that is to band limit the passband and then calculate all possible harmonics and negate them. You'd need a supercomputer or dedicated hardware. I use an RF DDS (direct digital synthesizer) that has multiple pseudo-channels that generate cosine harmonics of equal amplitude and opposite phase to snuff out all harmonics of a sinewave output. It uses hardware lookup tables to do so. It's also ONE agile frequency. I can't imagine what an infinite number of harmonics would take.
The other way to fix is to ramp the gain reduction by binning out frequencies and reducing the amplitude of each bin at a speed at which modulation is least. Because you're essentially modulating a frequency by the speed(also frequency) of a gain reduction element, you have created a crude mixer. You need the secondary mix products to be outside the band of interest. However, this all requires a boatload of frequency bins to avoid modulation and each bin might need different time constants, possibly also needing hardcore processing.
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Post by mrholmes on Nov 5, 2021 16:19:59 GMT -6
Liked the post too dan . Just yesterday I tested a compressor with LH and to my ears this thing sounds amazing clean and grabbed the transient and clamped it down. I had an old bundle by TB and this thing was just 15 bucks for me... The SC EQ idea is very handy, I can set the compressor up as Desser only clamping down the SS sounds and leaving the rest untouched.... www.toneboosters.com/tb_compressor_v4.html
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Post by Guitar on Nov 5, 2021 16:46:51 GMT -6
Liked the post too dan . Just yesterday I tested a compressor with LH and to my ears this thing sounds amazing clean and grabbed the transient and clamped it down. I had an old bundle by TB and this thing was just 15 bucks for me... The SC EQ idea is very handy, I can set the compressor up as Desser only clamping down the SS sounds and leaving the rest untouched.... www.toneboosters.com/tb_compressor_v4.htmlI only have the EQ from Toneboosters, but it's fantastic... makes me want to look deeper... these don't get mentioned a lot, the compressor looks nice!
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Post by mrholmes on Nov 5, 2021 18:22:20 GMT -6
Liked the post too dan . Just yesterday I tested a compressor with LH and to my ears this thing sounds amazing clean and grabbed the transient and clamped it down. I had an old bundle by TB and this thing was just 15 bucks for me... The SC EQ idea is very handy, I can set the compressor up as Desser only clamping down the SS sounds and leaving the rest untouched.... www.toneboosters.com/tb_compressor_v4.htmlI only have the EQ from Toneboosters, but it's fantastic... makes me want to look deeper... these don't get mentioned a lot, the compressor looks nice! He is the opposite of Ray. He stays most often on the modern clean approach. His old compressor, version 3 was already dope. His de esser was one of the best ever, it took the Ss as well as the too strong Ttt sounds. The EQ has extremely low artifacts....
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Limiters
Nov 5, 2021 19:18:06 GMT -6
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Post by jeremygillespie on Nov 5, 2021 19:18:06 GMT -6
True peak on most limiters is just a clipper, not even really a limiter. Pure dirt. — transients instead of /\. Then they get usually get reconstructed as god knows what by the phase shifts anyway in most playback systems (non dc coupled amps, converters, etc). They’re used because Most limiters don’t have sidechains that can both see the actual peaks and take them off by attack and releasing. Lookahead is just a delay and there’s tons of program dependencies to hide the pumping and insane distortion on most of them. Multiband limiters are the new phase scrambling hotness like multiband compressors. The market opportunity to make a true peak limiter that can flatten the spikes without distortion is still out there . . . how much engineering would it take to get there? Pendulum PL-2 is pretty damn close.
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Post by jhsmastering on Nov 6, 2021 5:34:54 GMT -6
It's a bit over my head, but that was a very cool post Dan. No wonder I never use limiters ! What do you use instead, some combo of compressors? Do you also just not worry about ISP's?
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Post by Martin John Butler on Nov 6, 2021 7:03:16 GMT -6
I use UAD's ATR-102 first on the 2 bus, sometimes I use a pinch of Black Box which gives a little analogue-ish distortion that might be called warmth. The ATR-102 is the most important. I set input and output in a way that improves tone and volume. I use only the Smooth Vocal or the 30ips Mastering presets and tweak to taste. Then I use one compressor, often the Logic DBX clone. That one compressor stays under 4db, usually only 2 db gain. On occasion if the mix is a bit flat, i'll use the most minimal turn of the knobs of the Clariphonic Mk II to liven it up a bit.
When I have the luxury, I let the mastering engineer bring it up to broadcast levels. When it's low budget, I use the ARIA online mastering service. It's actually quite good, the others I've tried were seriously disappointing.
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Post by jhsmastering on Nov 9, 2021 13:43:19 GMT -6
I use UAD's ATR-102 first on the 2 bus, sometimes I use a pinch of Black Box which gives a little analogue-ish distortion that might be called warmth. The ATR-102 is the most important. I set input and output in a way that improves tone and volume. I use only the Smooth Vocal or the 30ips Mastering presets and tweak to taste. Then I use one compressor, often the Logic DBX clone. That one compressor stays under 4db, usually only 2 db gain. On occasion if the mix is a bit flat, i'll use the most minimal turn of the knobs of the Clariphonic Mk II to liven it up a bit. When I have the luxury, I let the mastering engineer bring it up to broadcast levels. When it's low budget, I use the ARIA online mastering service. It's actually quite good, the others I've tried were seriously disappointing. I see, very cool! Another idea to try, thank you! Is that the Clariphonic plugin, or actual hardware?
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Post by Martin John Butler on Nov 9, 2021 14:54:32 GMT -6
It's the Mk II plug-in. It's so much more powerful than the Mk I, you have to dial it in very carefully or you'll overdo it. It can save a track from being dull on occasion.
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Post by jhsmastering on Nov 9, 2021 15:31:14 GMT -6
It's the Mk II plug-in. It's so much more powerful than the Mk I, you have to dial it in very carefully or you'll overdo it. It can save a track from being dull on occasion. Cool deal, I'll give it a whirl! There's a few hardware pieces floating around on Reverb, so I may pick one up after getting a couple other things on my list.
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Post by viciousbliss on Nov 10, 2021 0:20:13 GMT -6
Recently I’ve been focusing a lot on mastering and it always seemed like these limiters make stuff worse. The Sonnox was the most recent one I used and it was so tough to make it sound good. I’d have to just leave it at the lowest settings. So, I read Dan’s post and swapped it for Vlad GE and turned the safety limiter off on the Weiss and stuff was so much better.
On a side note about Sonnox, I think most of their stuff is massively underrated. To get the buzz out of this bass track, all I had to do was use a preset in Debuzzer. NR800 can do this as they show in their video, but you have to know a lot about noise reduction. I got the buzz out with it, but it really changed the audio. The Sonnox sounded like almost transparent removal. Same with Declicker and talking an xlr cable pop out of a vocal tack from when I was holding the sm7 and the cord came loose a bit. RX9 wasn’t giving me the results of the Sonnox either.
Claro does a much better job at keeping eq boosts from interfering with the other parts of the frequency range. Oxford Reverb is really easy to get quick results with. With Rock and Metal I can just pick a preset and get all the benefits of my usual favorites and none of the defects. If I need to modify something, usually I just need to change the position or edit one small thing and the mix ends up being very balanced in terms of fix.
I did buy Molot GE a few weeks ago. Definitely lives up to the hype in insane mode. The game with these plugins really seems to be about using the ones that don’t put obstacles in your path.
With true peak, I never understood what the hype was. Everyone kept saying how great it was and I never really felt that way. It was better than some of the other modes, but none made me think they were improving anything. I’ve always wondered what was used for mastering before the L1 and all these “maximizer” things came along. When I use L1 on tracks, I use minimal settings because it starts to sound really bad otherwise.
Pensado talked that one up a lot decades ago. How it had “all the advantages of the LA-2A and none of the drawbacks”. And he went on to say how it was gonna become this classic and all.
I tried to listen to some new Metal and Hard Rock releases the last few months and the loudness war approach just burns me out on them really fast. I know there’s old albums with DR6 ratings and such, but they are much easier to listen to. Probably because they barely used any plugins due to lack of availability.
Compare something like Nevermore’s Dead Heart with the 2014 Sanctuary album. Dead Heart is really loud but it’s 10x more listenable.
With the DS1-MK3, I again use pretty minimal settings. Treat it more as a bus compressor than something where I’m trying to really shave off peaks or something.
You guys might like to read the discussions on the Steve Hoffman forums where they examine waveforms and talk about clipped peaks and all this. Those guys really go into a lot of depth about how record labels often destroy remasters in 50 different ways.
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Post by Guitar on Nov 10, 2021 14:15:41 GMT -6
@vicousbliss I share your taste for good masters, and have noticed, sadly, many unlistenable records being put out the last ten years or so. Like you say, not just loud, but "bad" loud. There's a right way and a sad way to go loud. Loudness itself is not necessarily the problem, it's a good insight!
Also want to join in the Sonnox love, that brand took me by surprise recently. I used to think they were "old" or something, yesterday's plugins, now they are some of my most used. The EQ's, TransMod, Inflator, are what I have so far. I guess I should demo the repair ones and the reverb!
Do you use the Sonnox EQ's in mastering? I've been mixing with them but haven't done any mastering lately.
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Post by ab101 on Nov 10, 2021 14:26:14 GMT -6
Recently I’ve been focusing a lot on mastering and it always seemed like these limiters make stuff worse. The Sonnox was the most recent one I used and it was so tough to make it sound good. I’d have to just leave it at the lowest settings. So, I read Dan’s post and swapped it for Vlad GE and turned the safety limiter off on the Weiss and stuff was so much better. . . . Thank you for your post. Is there anything more you can share about the Vlad VE, such as any particular settings or modules used?
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Limiters
Nov 10, 2021 17:40:02 GMT -6
via mobile
Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2021 17:40:02 GMT -6
Recently I’ve been focusing a lot on mastering and it always seemed like these limiters make stuff worse. The Sonnox was the most recent one I used and it was so tough to make it sound good. I’d have to just leave it at the lowest settings. So, I read Dan’s post and swapped it for Vlad GE and turned the safety limiter off on the Weiss and stuff was so much better. On a side note about Sonnox, I think most of their stuff is massively underrated. To get the buzz out of this bass track, all I had to do was use a preset in Debuzzer. NR800 can do this as they show in their video, but you have to know a lot about noise reduction. I got the buzz out with it, but it really changed the audio. The Sonnox sounded like almost transparent removal. Same with Declicker and talking an xlr cable pop out of a vocal tack from when I was holding the sm7 and the cord came loose a bit. RX9 wasn’t giving me the results of the Sonnox either. Claro does a much better job at keeping eq boosts from interfering with the other parts of the frequency range. Oxford Reverb is really easy to get quick results with. With Rock and Metal I can just pick a preset and get all the benefits of my usual favorites and none of the defects. If I need to modify something, usually I just need to change the position or edit one small thing and the mix ends up being very balanced in terms of fix. I did buy Molot GE a few weeks ago. Definitely lives up to the hype in insane mode. The game with these plugins really seems to be about using the ones that don’t put obstacles in your path. With true peak, I never understood what the hype was. Everyone kept saying how great it was and I never really felt that way. It was better than some of the other modes, but none made me think they were improving anything. I’ve always wondered what was used for mastering before the L1 and all these “maximizer” things came along. When I use L1 on tracks, I use minimal settings because it starts to sound really bad otherwise. Pensado talked that one up a lot decades ago. How it had “all the advantages of the LA-2A and none of the drawbacks”. And he went on to say how it was gonna become this classic and all. I tried to listen to some new Metal and Hard Rock releases the last few months and the loudness war approach just burns me out on them really fast. I know there’s old albums with DR6 ratings and such, but they are much easier to listen to. Probably because they barely used any plugins due to lack of availability. Compare something like Nevermore’s Dead Heart with the 2014 Sanctuary album. Dead Heart is really loud but it’s 10x more listenable. With the DS1-MK3, I again use pretty minimal settings. Treat it more as a bus compressor than something where I’m trying to really shave off peaks or something. You guys might like to read the discussions on the Steve Hoffman forums where they examine waveforms and talk about clipped peaks and all this. Those guys really go into a lot of depth about how record labels often destroy remasters in 50 different ways. The new Carcass records sound worse than ALL the old ones. Including the super chaotic wall of noise first two. The best sounding loud metal record I’ve ever heard was Immolation’s Close to a World Below. I believe nobtwiddler did that one. Most other slammed metal records sound awful or the drum tone is totally sacrificed. The new Maiden records also tend to sound okay. They have low end unlike the 80s stuff where Bruce is compressed anyway.
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Post by viciousbliss on Nov 10, 2021 23:22:36 GMT -6
I was using the regular Oxford Eq in mastering before the Sonnox Dynamic Eq. Now I mainly use a chain of Satin with the 102 preset-Sonnox Dynamic Eq-Maat Orange on the track. Then Unisum-Vlad GE-Goodhertz Dither with the cd master preset. With the Limiter 6, I only have the HF Limiter and Peak Limiter on. Don't really adjust them beyond the default more than a notch or two. I just don't have a need to do a lot after using Unisum. I was using the DS-1 after or instead of Unisum, but I don't feel that it made anything better. The Oxford Eq is something I use on individual tracks and busses a lot. It doesn't really make anything worse. The filters seem to largely leave the sound intact and if I boost vocals with 3k, 10k, 12k, or whatever, it just gives them a good quality of air or immediacy as opposed to a big change.
The reverb seems more static compared to stuff like Capitol Chambers, Transatlantic Plate, SP2016, UAD 480, and my other usuals. It almost sounds gated. Supposedly that's what it's known for and it does the job well. But I'm noticing that I can be a lot more flexible with my reverbs without these limiters on my masters.
The Sonnox doubler also comes pretty close to the fake doubles I'd make with Revoice Pro years ago. I haven't made any in a while with Revoice Pro 4.
Didn't get on with Transmod much when I tried it, but I use Envolution from time to time.
Without the limiters I'm able to get a better sound with MAAT orange than Claro. Claro can really hold its own though.
I never use Inflator. Maybe because I'm already covering my mixes with Phoenix, RA, and Peacock.
Superesser is one I didn't like as much as LSR VLB902 last I tried it. The 902 is the only de-esser I use.
Onto the subject of records...I am not a fan of the Shirley-produced Maiden. They sound underproduced, especially Bruce. On the newest one, it's reminds me of what a session sounds like before I mix it.
Heartwork is interesting when you compare the original master vs the full dynamic range one. Neither really seems ideal. Covenant, Blessed, and maybe a couple others from that line just sound cleaner, not much of a range difference.
I'll have to listen to that Immolation.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 11, 2021 14:20:40 GMT -6
I was using the regular Oxford Eq in mastering before the Sonnox Dynamic Eq. Now I mainly use a chain of Satin with the 102 preset-Sonnox Dynamic Eq-Maat Orange on the track. Then Unisum-Vlad GE-Goodhertz Dither with the cd master preset. With the Limiter 6, I only have the HF Limiter and Peak Limiter on. Don't really adjust them beyond the default more than a notch or two. I just don't have a need to do a lot after using Unisum. I was using the DS-1 after or instead of Unisum, but I don't feel that it made anything better. The Oxford Eq is something I use on individual tracks and busses a lot. It doesn't really make anything worse. The filters seem to largely leave the sound intact and if I boost vocals with 3k, 10k, 12k, or whatever, it just gives them a good quality of air or immediacy as opposed to a big change. The reverb seems more static compared to stuff like Capitol Chambers, Transatlantic Plate, SP2016, UAD 480, and my other usuals. It almost sounds gated. Supposedly that's what it's known for and it does the job well. But I'm noticing that I can be a lot more flexible with my reverbs without these limiters on my masters. The Sonnox doubler also comes pretty close to the fake doubles I'd make with Revoice Pro years ago. I haven't made any in a while with Revoice Pro 4. Didn't get on with Transmod much when I tried it, but I use Envolution from time to time. Without the limiters I'm able to get a better sound with MAAT orange than Claro. Claro can really hold its own though. I never use Inflator. Maybe because I'm already covering my mixes with Phoenix, RA, and Peacock. Superesser is one I didn't like as much as LSR VLB902 last I tried it. The 902 is the only de-esser I use. Onto the subject of records...I am not a fan of the Shirley-produced Maiden. They sound underproduced, especially Bruce. On the newest one, it's reminds me of what a session sounds like before I mix it. Heartwork is interesting when you compare the original master vs the full dynamic range one. Neither really seems ideal. Covenant, Blessed, and maybe a couple others from that line just sound cleaner, not much of a range difference. I'll have to listen to that Immolation. I love Shirley Maiden’s production. It sounds real. The Birch LPs tend to kill the CDs too. Heartwork production is great. Some lame songs but the FDR CD rules. Blessed are the Sick has basic mix issues that can’t be undone. Like it varies a lot from track to track. Covenant was mixed by Fleming Rasmussen so it’s more consistent but you can really feel the loss of Richard Brunelle (RIP) as a player. They were a lesser band without him. Then the Steve Tucker albums feel like an experimental jazz album on top of journeyman death metal. They’re not legendary like the first two.
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Post by viciousbliss on Nov 12, 2021 11:54:03 GMT -6
I was using the regular Oxford Eq in mastering before the Sonnox Dynamic Eq. Now I mainly use a chain of Satin with the 102 preset-Sonnox Dynamic Eq-Maat Orange on the track. Then Unisum-Vlad GE-Goodhertz Dither with the cd master preset. With the Limiter 6, I only have the HF Limiter and Peak Limiter on. Don't really adjust them beyond the default more than a notch or two. I just don't have a need to do a lot after using Unisum. I was using the DS-1 after or instead of Unisum, but I don't feel that it made anything better. The Oxford Eq is something I use on individual tracks and busses a lot. It doesn't really make anything worse. The filters seem to largely leave the sound intact and if I boost vocals with 3k, 10k, 12k, or whatever, it just gives them a good quality of air or immediacy as opposed to a big change. The reverb seems more static compared to stuff like Capitol Chambers, Transatlantic Plate, SP2016, UAD 480, and my other usuals. It almost sounds gated. Supposedly that's what it's known for and it does the job well. But I'm noticing that I can be a lot more flexible with my reverbs without these limiters on my masters. The Sonnox doubler also comes pretty close to the fake doubles I'd make with Revoice Pro years ago. I haven't made any in a while with Revoice Pro 4. Didn't get on with Transmod much when I tried it, but I use Envolution from time to time. Without the limiters I'm able to get a better sound with MAAT orange than Claro. Claro can really hold its own though. I never use Inflator. Maybe because I'm already covering my mixes with Phoenix, RA, and Peacock. Superesser is one I didn't like as much as LSR VLB902 last I tried it. The 902 is the only de-esser I use. Onto the subject of records...I am not a fan of the Shirley-produced Maiden. They sound underproduced, especially Bruce. On the newest one, it's reminds me of what a session sounds like before I mix it. Heartwork is interesting when you compare the original master vs the full dynamic range one. Neither really seems ideal. Covenant, Blessed, and maybe a couple others from that line just sound cleaner, not much of a range difference. I'll have to listen to that Immolation. I love Shirley Maiden’s production. It sounds real. The Birch LPs tend to kill the CDs too. Heartwork production is great. Some lame songs but the FDR CD rules. Blessed are the Sick has basic mix issues that can’t be undone. Like it varies a lot from track to track. Covenant was mixed by Fleming Rasmussen so it’s more consistent but you can really feel the loss of Richard Brunelle (RIP) as a player. They were a lesser band without him. Then the Steve Tucker albums feel like an experimental jazz album on top of journeyman death metal. They’re not legendary like the first two. When I listen to Maiden, realism is one of the last things I want. I'm looking to be transported to the place on the album cover, not thinking about the studio. Somewhere in Time might be the best they ever did for atmosphere. Fear of the Dark too. Agreed on the LPs being much better. Finally, they've got Domination FDR on the way next year. Took em long enough. That's always been my favorite Morbid Angel by far. Formulas was the last thing they did that I liked at all. Everyone thinks Altars is this awesome album but I've never understood the appeal. I tried my Acustica Azure 2 and Erin eqs last night for mastering. Think I might like those results better than Maat Orange and Claro. I will have to try the TDR stuff tonight. One of these days I may just get a Bricasti and some hardware eq and some Cranesong hardware piece. Next year I may finally have the funds to do that.
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Post by Guitar on Nov 12, 2021 12:07:11 GMT -6
dan provideth good knowledge... I guess I'm going to stop using True Peak functions now. I pulled the one in Elevate all the way down, just to hear it, and sure enough it was like a Boss DS-1 distortion pedal. If I need to keep my peak levels down... I'll just use Izotope Insight meter, and use a gain trim to get there, instead of these clippers. Not sure why I would do that... uploads to streaming services? Who can keep track of this stuff when you're trying to make MUSIC.
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Post by seawell on Nov 12, 2021 12:22:49 GMT -6
The only time I use true peak is when printing Apple Digital Masters. The funny thing is though...you can download a major label "Apple Digital Master," run it through the test to see if it passes, and quite often it doesn't. I'm not sure we're all having to play by the same rules there but I digress...
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Post by Ward on Nov 12, 2021 13:13:20 GMT -6
When I listen to Maiden, realism is one of the last things I want. I'm looking to be transported to the place on the album cover, not thinking about the studio. Somewhere in Time might be the best they ever did for atmosphere. Greatest Maiden record EVER, IMHO. Love everything about it!
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Post by viciousbliss on Nov 13, 2021 0:58:26 GMT -6
When I listen to Maiden, realism is one of the last things I want. I'm looking to be transported to the place on the album cover, not thinking about the studio. Somewhere in Time might be the best they ever did for atmosphere. Greatest Maiden record EVER, IMHO. Love everything about it! I really can't find anything I don't like about it. SIT is very consistent beginning to end. It's tough for me to choose a fav Maiden record. BNW was the last one I liked as a whole to any real degree. It was very disappointing to me and a few people I knew in 2000. Thin Line is a top tier song though. Bruce needs his voice produced enough to hide how he strains at times. Plug-ins and hardware can do a lot. Some guys asked me to sing Hallowed about six years ago and I was like "no way", but I did way better than I thought. Trying to hold "loooooow" is a challenge though. When I recorded it at home with the live multi-tracks, I had to create a fake vibrato with Softube Fix Phaser, but it sounds real. Everyone in Metal has been obsessed with these barebones productions since the mid-2000s. On the latest Maiden album it sounds like Bruce didn't even use much compression. FX and compressors can really go a long way to hide his weaknesses if they wanted to. Digitech Vocalist Live 4 has a much easier fake vibrato, but it's too noisy to record with in a studio. I used it for my original songs in Chris Medina's former home studio and I was able to use Sonnox Denoiser across the track to fix some of that. Mastering those tracks is kinda a challenge because we recorded in one room and did three songs in less than three hours. Everything was basically one-take. I'd just add overdubs while those guys redid instrument stuff. There wasn't much headroom left to work with. If I knew then what I knew now, I probably would have just spent the money for Steve Albini or one of the other engineers at his studio. Medina was Pro Tools and whatever people used in 2008. I never saw what plugins, but given the small amount of time we had, he couldn't have done real comprehensive mixing. Today I deactivated Satin off my mastering tracks. It'd make some stuff better but introduce other problems. Slick Eq mastering sounded good with minimal changes. Claro always sound good with minimal time, but I feel like it's also always the B+ player. Azure was still what I went with just about every time. There I usually cut a low frequency and 300 hz or whatever it is and boosted 10k or whatever the highest frequency on the 3rd option is with a shelf. Sometimes I'd use the HPF at 20 or 30. I stopped messing with mid-side in mastering for the most part too. My mixes were already pretty balanced, so I'm finding I get better results just using less plug-ins and simpler moves. So, I'm just using Azure2 or one of the other EQs on the track. Then Unisum-TDR Limiter 6 GE-Good Dither on the master fader. I'm just going for a simple chain that doesn't really mess anything up. From here maybe I can experiment with some broader ideas. Using Sonnox Eq followed by Sonnox Dynamic EQ on my tracks as first and second inserts unless I had something like Autotune on there helps a lot. The two Sonnox plugins are mainly there just to control the lowest and highest frequencies. Using BX Consoles for that never worked this well. I'm a very heavy Cranesong user, and just removing RA from my mixes takes a lot out of them. Phoenix in Dark Essence mode is all over my vocal tracks, but I don't set the effect much above 10-15. Ironically, I have never liked HEAT. I've started using Molot GE in insane mode on vocal tracks as well as most busses too. Lindell 80 from PA with channels 23-24 and 16x oversampling features on most of my busses too. L1 is the only limiter I really use and mainly on really loud instrument tracks, and never enough to where it makes anything sound bad. The SSL Duende Bus Comp V2 with oversampling is worlds better than the last one. I never freeze tracks or really run out of cpu all that much with a slightly overclocked Ryzen 1700. If I upgrade CPUs, I bet I could use a lot more Molot GE. One plugin that is extremely underrated is CLAEffects. Great, great throw delays and distorted voices. Oxford Reverb still holds its own with any of the heavy hitters for what I use reverb for. I tried filtering the highest and lowest frequencies just a tad before the FX too. Pro Q2 before and UAD Precision Channel Strip after, but just the lows this time, like 40 hz. Just cutting about 1-1.5 db from each side of the spectrum. Fuse Bucket Delay or McDSP EC-300 are my go tos for delay. Eventide H3000 Factory is extremely useful to me and fits into a mix much better and easier than their 910 or 949. The presets like Stadium or Barry's stereo spreader are so good that I never really tried to learn how to do all the complex stuff. Sonnox Widener can also be really useful on an Aux. I don't play around with transient-focused plugins much. Occasionally I use Envolution to great effect though. Overloud is essential too, especially Dopamine. I use a fair bit of Tapedesk, but I don't change it from the default settings much at all. EQ84 can be useful as well. I'll follow instances of Phoenix with Dopamine. With these plugins chained like that, I don't have to rely on compression so much. I've started setting most of the HPF on compressors over 100hz. Usually over 200 on busses so that they aren't triggered very often. Unisum is so much more transparent than the DS-1. Maybe I have to start using the DS-1 in parallel or something. The TDR Limiter 6 GE also sounds better than the Weiss if you ask me. Most of what I try to do with mastering is retain the qualities I like in my mixes while converting down to 16-bit.
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