mastering a non-stop album?

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mxomtk2k
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mastering a non-stop album?

Post by mxomtk2k »

Hello,
Firstly, sorry for the poor desciption in the subject heading lol but couldn't think of the words to descibe. :oops:

I was recently hired by a small local church to mix and record a three day event which included several hours of un-interupted, often imporvised 'jamming'. One out of the 6 sessions has been chosen to be mixed down to be put on CD. All of this went fine and the mix has come together ok but my issue is really that it is an hour and ten minutes of non-stop music, each song merging into the next. Some songs are over 15 min long. While the instrumentation stays constant through out, the dynamic range shifts often and dramatically.
Is it practical and/or prefered to break the tracks up for mastering and re-join or should I process as a single file?
I could post a link to an mp3 if you wish to hear it but it will be round 50 - 60 MB for the full mix.

Thanks for your time,

Nigel.
mix-o-matic 2000
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Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by HarBal »

Yes, I'd suggest it is worthwhile splitting the track up and re-merging later. It can be a little tricky though, as to do it well you should provide some overlap to allow for a cross-fade from one track to the next. Doing so should help disguise changes in EQ and or other processing between tracks.

Interestingly enough, the latest version of HB I'm working on will do that in place, but I've got a fair bit of stuff to implement before it can be released.

cheers,


Paavo.
mxomtk2k
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Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by mxomtk2k »

Paavo,

Thanks so much for that, I thought that may be the case. I have not really done any crossfading so it wll be an interesting experiment for me. I did bring up the entire track in Har-Bal to see what my overall eq curve was like, and over all it was ok, IntuQ ( you know what I mean lol) hardly made any changes which I hope is a good thing but I was wondering if I was to post a couple of parts,(Since the whole track is too large) say the most extreme parts dynamicly speaking, if you could see what improvments could be made. From what I can see I think the bottom end is a little weak but with out decent monitoring I can't really tell.
There seems to be some masking going on interfering with the clarity and transparency of the mix.

Thanks for your time,

Nigel.
mix-o-matic 2000
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Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by HarBal »

Feel Free to send some selected snippets to us for a look. I'd be happy to give an opinion.

So do you have this recording as a two track mix down or do you have it as multi-track? Masking in the mix for live recording often stems from leakage. That is, you have a time delayed version of player1 in player2's track and visa-versa. When you go to mix them together you get phase cancellation (combing type effect) going on taking the clarity out.

This is particularly problematic for live recordings in small rooms as the players are generally pretty close to one another so the level of the leakage is quite high. If you have a big enough venue to work with you can place the players far enough apart to minimise (at least to some extent) the effect of leakage. In ear monitoring is also helpful to avoid fold-back leakage. I don't know if any of this applies to your recording.

cheers,


Paavo.
mxomtk2k
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Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by mxomtk2k »

Paavo,

I have the mix as a multi track file in Cubase SX 3. I mixed the show live on a Mackie Onyx 1640 so I was limited to 16 channels for recording but I was able to link from firewire to my laptop pre insert and eq etc for dry mixdown. The venue was big enough to be able to seperate the musicians except for the two BV as they were handheld and spent alot of time dancing round the stage. I have edited out silence as much as I can an time aligned to the best of my ability.
The track list includes Drums(5 piece), bass, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, keys, main vox and 2 BV. I also lost 2 channels for headset mics for various speakers not recorded.
I will send you some clips I would love your opinion as always. What is the best email to use or would you prefer I use a download site?
Thanks for your time,
Nigel.
mix-o-matic 2000
HarBal
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Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by HarBal »

email to support at harbal. I'd suggest using www.yousendit.com to send the files, particularly if they are large. If you send too many directly you may max out my inbox quota.

regards,


Paavo.
mxomtk2k
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Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by mxomtk2k »

Paavo,

I am in the proccess now of uploading a sample of the church recording we spoke of in this post a week or so ago to yousendit for you. I have also incuded a copy of the Filter file I created for the track to see if you are able to tell me if I am using Har-Bal the way you intended (if you dont mind that is) This was created by analizing the whole track mind you. I think the changes I made mostly cured the masking I could hear, what are your thoughts?

Thanks for your time,

Nigel.
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HarBal
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Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by HarBal »

Ok, when you email me the link to the file on yousendit I'll check it out and get back to you. Might provide for some interesting test material for the version 3.0 I'm working on.

cheers,


Paavo.
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Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by HarBal »

Ok Nigel, I hope you've got my modified filter.

First up, in future if you wish to bundle the files up into one archive can you use the zip or gz formats please. I'm not big on rar and had to hunt around for a program to decode it.

On the filter you constructed for the track, I'd say you're are basically doing what you should except for one minor detail and I guess that relates to some extent to the issue of trusting your ears that you brought up earlier. At a guess, is it fair to say this live recording was mixed live while monitoring through the PA system in the venue. From inspection of the spectrum and how you altered it I would guess so.

The issue is this. You have constructed a filter on the assumption that the PA response, coupled with the acoustics of the venue was ideal, hence you've preserved the general shape of the spectrum. That would be certainly true if the monitoring was that good. My guess is that the PA was somewhat deficient in the upper mid-range and as a consequence the mix is very strong in that area. Not because it sounded bad at the venue but you (or whoever was mixing) was compensating for the deficiencies of the PA.

I guess the art in using something like Har-Bal is knowing when something is questionable or not and that is where it is important to be able to trust your ears and make some educated guesses about whats wrong. On first listening to that track my ears were complaining about the overly prominent upper mids so I've tamed them quite considerably, though I judged the degree required by listening. Apart from that mid-range taming and a little added brilliance to the top end it is the same as your stab at it.

So in summary, yes you're on the right track but you also need to take into account the monitoring circumstances when the mix was performed. If it was less than ideal then you can expect to see big broad scale spectrum anomalies that you will need to compensate for and that is where experience, trust in your monitoring and trust in your own judgment comes to the fore.

Cheers,


Paavo.

PS - By the way, I'm still not completely happy with the way that filter sounds. His voice I still find a bit too strident and piercing, but it will make for good experimental material with my new HB developments.
mxomtk2k
Posts: 15
Joined: Sun Jul 26, 2009 7:06 pm
Location: Wanganui, New Zealand.

Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by mxomtk2k »

Paavo,
Sorry I didn't get back to you for a bit. Just wanted to update you since you have been such great help. Since our chat I have remixed the track and it is sounding better by a long way, I think. (earle has a copy) It will never be great due to the way it was recorded but it will serve its purpose. I was amazed to see how much different the filter you created in 3.0 was compared to 2.3 aswell, thanks for the time you took to do that. If you want any other test material let me know I have a few different things im working on at the moment.

Thanks as always,
Nigel.

Ps. Just had my new Dynaudio BM5a's turn up :) It will be interesting to see what that brings to the table.
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Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by HarBal »

Hi Nigel,

Thanks for the offer of test material. I'll probably take you up on that but not right now as I'm in a coding phase more than a testing phase.

When you've had a good chance to evaluate your new monitors perhaps you could share your opinions with us. I for one am curious to know what your views on them are.

Actually, If I'm to share the spirit of things I should post a review of the new digital piano I have (Kawai ES-6). All in all I'm very impressed. It isn't perfect but it's pretty close and when you consider the price it is a pretty amazing piece of equipment. I have two gripes with it, one a rather trivial engineering issue that they could pretty easily fix, the other a bit more involved but something I've grown accustomed too in any case. I'll leave that for my review post.

Cheers,


Paavo.
mxomtk2k
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Joined: Sun Jul 26, 2009 7:06 pm
Location: Wanganui, New Zealand.

Re: mastering a non-stop album?

Post by mxomtk2k »

Paavo,

I will indeed let you know what I think once I have a chance to really get used to the sound of them. On first listen I did notice an unbeliveably clear stereo image and I finally understand what depth means and hearing 'into a mix'. So far I am more than impressed with what I have heard.
Since this post began I have talked to both you and Earle extensively and learnt so much about my monitors and room and I think for the first time I truly understand the detrimental effect a room can have on a mix. I will run this by you and see if it makes sence. I am mixing in an untreated room (for the moment anyway) so when mixing I use ARC and with much success as it really reveals the mix. The problem is that with this plugin I can only listen through it when using my DAW. the rest of the time I listen to anything (which is often) it is running through the untreated speakers and the rooms color shines through. I am so used to the 'room' sound that when I mix with ARC I almost seem to mix ARC out and make my mixes sound how the room would normally make it sound. I confirmed that today when I saw by pure chance that my curve in Har-Bal (that you picked up on as being way to strong in the mids) was almost un upside down version of what ARC was doing to the signal, in effect a reversal of ARC. I need to find a way of perminantly eqing my set up when not using ARC untill I can setup my new mixing room next year. I have a Drive Rack in my PA setup not being used, will that be a safe alternitive to use? If I use it does that mean I will not need ARC any more?

Thanks,

Nigel.
mix-o-matic 2000
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