Frank Harley: Mastering Engineer With Before and After Sample Works
One of the most important things to assess audio mastering work quality is to listen to the samples before and after.
It is the mastering engineer job to:
a.) Maximize the volume of the mastered audio track without getting obvious distortion.
b.) Further improving the tonal quality of the mix and not destroying the mix EQ balance.
c.) Transform the raw mix into broadcast quality recordings ready for any distribution.
The mastering engineer will be using a lot of new tools some of them are not commonly used by a mixing engineer.
Precisely, to accomplish the 1st task above (in maximizing the volume), the mastering engineer will be using a combination of limiters and multi-band compressors.
A multi-band compressor is a very powerful tool to shaped out the volume of the mix with respect to a certain frequency range. It is because supposing you are mastering a track with very loud bass transients. If you are using an ordinary compressor, once you compressed the whole track it can also affect other frequency range of important instruments (example the vocals, bass guitar, electric guitar).
Using a multi-band compressors can iron-out problematic volumes at certain frequency range. So to correct the bass problem, the mastering engineer can simply adjust the multi-band compressor to apply compression only to the bass or low frequencies without affecting the vocals and other frequency range.
A sample work submitted by Frank Harley a mastering engineer demonstrates the application of multi-band compressors, EQ and limiters during the mastering process.
This is the audio sample before mastering:
And this is the audio sample after mastering:
The following settings are applied by Frank Harley:
Eq of 2 track
+1.5 db at 100hz low shelf
-4 db at 500Hz Q at .36(wide) for vocals and acoustics
-3.5 for vocals at 4Khz
+3.3 at 6kHz for snare and LPF at 10k
Multiband compressor
Crossover points, low 160hz and hi at 6khz
Low threshold at -8, ratio at 4:1 atk at 30, release at 355
Mid band -8, 4:1, 30 and 355
Hi band -24, 1:25, 30 and 355
Limiter -4, attack 0 and release 50 and +4 db to output using soft clip
About Frank Harley as interviewed by audiorecording.me: “I’ve been into recording since 1998. On a advance level of recording the past 5 yrs. I’ve taken online courses in advance audio engineering and mastering. Now we know you can’t teach someone to master music but there are some fundamentals that you have to know such as how to use compression, filters , limiters enhancers and much more. For more about me contact me at hustle1@tmo.blackberry.net or frnkhrly@yahoo. Com”
Music production/Song credits:
Writer: Jeanine Maningo/Emerson Maningo
Performed by: Jeanine Maningo
Music publisher: Emerson Maningo
Recording/Mixing:Emerson Maningo
Mastering: Frank Harley
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