Mastering chain

[goddamn rain]

I sometimes apply quite a bit of compression in my mastering chain and have noticed that you advise to harbalise before multiband. I dont want to screw up the Harlaised track with compression, so I'm thinking of harbalising after my usual mastering processing (with the UAD-1) and then going into a limiter.

Cheers

David

[Har/Bal]

Sometimes I receive songs that look like a stuttering "w" when I open them up in Har-Bal. I just feel that I need to remove the major peaks and valleys before applying multiband compression. Its a matter of taste at this point.

Also experiment with and notice the different effects of EQ-ing before and after compression or limiting, and also the different effect if you're using multi-band compression. These subtleties are useful tools, and you need to know when to use each. It's even sometimes possible to use multiband compression as a dynamic EQ.

Earle

[mflorio]

Here's a tip :

If the peak and average traces (yellow and green, respectively) in Har-Bal are very close together, then there's really not much need I can see for multi-band compression. In this case, simply smoothing out the eq in Har-Bal is enough. But if the traces in certain ranges are relatively far apart compared to other ranges, then try a multi-band compressor. HarBal will show you exactly what frequencies need to be compressed and at what bandwidths too !

Mike

[goddamn rain]

Thanks guys, cool tips. I'm still getting used to working with Har-Bal and I must say it is wicked! I've spent the past few days getting familiar with it and I'm very impressed.

Cheers

David