betore/after mastering

[przechuy]

Hey guys.

I think this topic is directed mainly to mr Medway who as we know knows his stuff with mastering.

I was wondering often how much proper mastering can improove my mix,you know,this is this stage when you wonder if your track really sound good or not,and you are bit shy to put all the stuff forward

And i listened examples on medwaystudios.com ,especially noticeable huuuge changes were in the 2nd example...I was astonished how "crappy" it sounded before and how amazing after.Weak bass ,not so "goovy" feeling before,and after magic sparkle form medway boom,it sounded great...

Is there any possiblity to here more before/after examples?

To be honest,basically,to learn at which point of production skills i am .To compare it with other producers,what stuff they send to engineers.
And maybe anyone else knows examples of before/after mastering on the internet and can provide links?

I would love to hear how sound tracks of good producers right before mastering,to which level they are able to bring it without help of engineer.It would show where i am with my skills.


I think everyone would love to make such comparation with himself



Oh,and btw i know that mastering is just a final polishing etc,nothing that makes great track from crappy track etc.But what i heard in examples provided by medway on this site ,medwaystudios.com it totally surpassed my expectations.It added A LOT to example tracks

[admin]

Hi good question as since I am about to release the new website (about 95% ready now) I was wondering about using some new before and after examples.

The two I have show the difference between a good mix that just needs polishing and a mix that needed stems. The second mix is a stem master so I did a lot more work on that one. The first one is just a stereo master.

I will try to see if I can get some more examples but it's up to the artists to give me permission. I almost don't like to show the real extreme changes as I don't want to put the artists original rough sounding mix up as maybe they wouldn't like that. So this is why I stuck to these two.

I would actually like to put some more subtle ones up as I think this is where the real skill of mastering comes. With a bad mix it's pretty easy to get it sounding a lot better right away. It's when I get an already good sounding mix that just needs polish where most of the time is spent. But also these examples might not 'wow' anyone as much as the more extreme cases.

I put on the site not to expect a 'magical fix' but someone told me recently that's exactly what they got in their master ;-)

But I would say that eventually your aim should be for the mastering to only be a polish. Sometimes when I get EPs from labels with more established artists there is very little or none I have to do. The worst though is tracks that come in already 'mastered' but really clipped and harsh..

[przechuy]

yes,those extreme cases are fascinating.Because at this point zou start to wonder how good it sounded when lets say producer "x" who is a recognized well known producer sent it to his engineer.

By stem mastering you ask for every single track used in mix rendered separately and You start mastering on those single tracks and then "glue" it in DAW once again as a final song,am i right?


And as i wrote in first post,thats really fascinating,because it can show at which point You/I/any aspiring producer is.
And sometimes it kills me when i hear mega giga track in radio or dancefloor and i compare it to myself at the moment.Offcourse i talk about quality of track in techincal meaning,not creativity/melody/ideas.And i started to wonder how much mastering can do.And even this stereo mastering done great job.Not mentioning second example,because it turned average track into good sounding dance floor rocker.

[admin]

It depends on the artists. For instance Dubfire is using Matt Nordstrom, if you check his myspace you will hear the same quality and similar sounds as the Dubfire tracks. Some guys are using Martin Buttrich or Andre Winter. For instance the Dios track is credited to both Andre and Matt for mixing.

If a track is sounding really pro then at some stage a well skilled engineer had their hands on it and in many cases this isn't the DJ. I think that's fine though, specialization is good. One person can only be so good generally. A team of a well traveled DJ and skilled engineer sitting in studio all day can be powerful.

Stem mastering is just taking the parts of the track separated, usually no more than 8 output tracks. Kick and bass especially. I usually get one of the drums and synths on their own as well. From that I can do quite a bit of cleaning up.

[przechuy]

Yup,i agree that other pair of ears is amazingly helpfull.
Because i know how much stuff for me does even taking off headphones and listening it one more time after lets say couple of hours when my ears "reset" .I start to more and more appreciate mastering engineers ,thats pretty amazing how much it can bring from track...I also saw on youtube Bob Katz short vid where he fixes bassline with few smart clicks and effect is instant.

[admin]

Yes speed is also a factor.