Need an honest answer from the honest forum.

If you are looking for advice on how to use Har-Bal best, or you have some tips of your own, post them here!
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Phi Lion
Posts: 39
Joined: Sat Jan 07, 2006 9:16 pm

Need an honest answer from the honest forum.

Post by Phi Lion »

Hi guys.

I recently had a rock song to master and i feel i did a good job, the guy even said he liked the overall tone of my master better than the other masters he had mastered by reputable mastering engineers, just that theirs were louder.

I said i can do louder.
So i sent him a louder master, 7db louder is how much louder he wanted it.

He didn't like what i did.

Now i don't own any outboard and it made me doubt weather or not you can obtain very loud levels with plugins as good as you can with analog gear.

Is this the case?



I mean the song was averaging -9 rms throughout the song, and i don't care who you are its going to sound muffled. The high end does funny things and you have to steal some off the bottom.

I would love to hear what you guys think about this as I'm sure you are dealing with this every day.
I know that if i ask this anywhere else i will just get crap about outboard gear, but what ever the answers are here i can trust them.


I used t-racks which i feel is one of the best mastering programmes out there. I don't care what the "golden ears" say about it.
Its got a good warm feel and if you use it correctly it can really give the song some punch
and weight.

I haven't come across a compressor limiter combination that works the way t-racks does in the digital world.

Thanks for any thoughts.

I hate it when a client isn't happy, and you doubt your abilities.



So i guess what im asking is

Is it possible to gain the insane levels in the digital world as good as the analog world as i do not own any analog equipment?
HarBal
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Post by HarBal »

Take it on the chin and move on. Some people are difficult to satisfy. We've had our share of people bitching about Har-Bal.

If you really want to continue with it I'd suggest you ask him for an example of the track he's mentally comparing it to. At least then you may better understand what he's after. The other thing you might want to try is volume riding using envelopes in you DAW to bring the levels up. It may help you get a louder sound with less automated compression/limiting and hopefully less artifacts.

Cheers,


Paavo.
SynthRiot
Posts: 10
Joined: Fri Jul 29, 2005 3:11 am
Location: Germany - Bavaria - Munich

Post by SynthRiot »

Phi Lion

1 What is the RMS number you aim for ?

2 Can you publish a download link so that I can load the untreated file for research purposes :-) ?

SynthRiot
It's the question that drives us ...
Bracelet Z
Posts: 30
Joined: Mon Feb 21, 2005 6:12 pm
Location: LT

Post by Bracelet Z »

Hello!

Paavo, You wrote: "The other thing you might want to try is volume riding using envelopes in you DAW to bring the levels up. It may help you get a louder sound with less automated compression/limiting and hopefully less artifacts".

What did You mean by this? How to ride volume using envelopes? English is not my native language so it is difficult to understand some expressions sometimes.

Sincerely
Bracelet Z
HarBal
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Post by HarBal »

I meant most DAW's offer automation whereby you can change the setting of some parameter, say panning or track volume, by an envelope that you draw on the track time line. I mean't drawing such an envelope to "ride the volume" of the track. The "volume riding" is what they called it in the days before automated mixdown where the engineer would manually adjust the slider down when he new a loud part was about to come in. I believe it is still referred to volume riding.

Cheers,


Paavo.
dbmusic
Posts: 5
Joined: Mon Oct 31, 2005 3:37 pm

Post by dbmusic »

Though you don't mention specifics of why he disliked the louder version, IMO the louder you get the more important it is to control the low end. Learning to make sure all frequencies less than 300 Hz are mono and setting a sharp rolloff of all frequecies less than 40 Hz worked wonders for me. Having stereo bass signal and too much low end frequencies can muddy the output and suck the energy out of the final output.
har-bal
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Re: Need an honest answer from the honest forum.

Post by har-bal »

Phi Lion wrote:Hi guys.

I recently had a rock song to master and i feel i did a good job, the guy even said he liked the overall tone of my master better than the other masters he had mastered by reputable mastering engineers, just that theirs were louder.

I said i can do louder.
So i sent him a louder master, 7db louder is how much louder he wanted it.

He didn't like what i did.

Now i don't own any outboard and it made me doubt weather or not you can obtain very loud levels with plugins as good as you can with analog gear.

Is this the case?



I mean the song was averaging -9 rms throughout the song, and i don't care who you are its going to sound muffled. The high end does funny things and you have to steal some off the bottom.

I would love to hear what you guys think about this as I'm sure you are dealing with this every day.
I know that if i ask this anywhere else i will just get crap about outboard gear, but what ever the answers are here i can trust them.


I used t-racks which i feel is one of the best mastering programmes out there. I don't care what the "golden ears" say about it.
Its got a good warm feel and if you use it correctly it can really give the song some punch
and weight.

I haven't come across a compressor limiter combination that works the way t-racks does in the digital world.

Thanks for any thoughts.

I hate it when a client isn't happy, and you doubt your abilities.



So i guess what im asking is

Is it possible to gain the insane levels in the digital world as good as the analog world as i do not own any analog equipment?


I can tell you this. I shoot for an RMS level between 11 and 13dBs depending on the genre of music and I have not had an unhappy client. If they start off telling me they want it louder than that, I will advise they go somewhere else for their mastering in a nice manner.

They is absolutely no point to having a track louder than RMS 11dBs. Above this level and you are compromising the dynamic range.

Cheers

Earle
Phi Lion
Posts: 39
Joined: Sat Jan 07, 2006 9:16 pm

Post by Phi Lion »

Right on man.


Thats what i was after.


:P :P :P :P
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