Exciters can be great methods of brightening up mids and highs, while imaging/stereo wideniing can broaden a narrow soundng mix. Recognising where your master falls down compared to professional masters is a time-worn practice, but the more you actively consider them, the better your ears will become at identifying and correcting accordingly. Other reference points you will want to consider are stereo width, brightness, bass/sub-bass compression and overall cohesiveness. Match EQ goes a step further and algorithmically matches the EQ of your track to the reference’s EQ. Tonal Balancer allows you to add the audio file of your reference track and give you a direct, real-time comparison of your master against the refernce. In Ozone 8 and 9 LINK, there is a powerful plugin called Tonal Shaper, and in Ozone 9 there is also Match EQ.
There are some great plugins out there that can help you do this, too. Comparing your work to that of better mastering engineers can only help yours improve. But if you feel your music is more unique, try and find tracks that have a similar EQ balance. If you’re aiming for a specific sound, there might be hundreds of tracks to reference with, which is handy. In addition, reference your master against similar-sounding tracks. Don’t just twiddle dials for the hell of it. You should A/B every change you make and ask yourself whether it has made a positive difference. It can’t be overstated how useful it is to reference what you’re doing at every stage of the master. With that in mind, in mastering try and EQ for balance and tone, not correction. Fortunately, rather than spending time back and forth with your mastering engineer, you can simply open up the mix project, fix the problem(s) and bounce out a new pre-master. Mastering is a process of delicate additions and subtle reductions – chances are that trying to fix a big EQ imbalance will force you to create more problems than you solve. While you can certainly brush over minor mix issues with smart mastering, any major mistakes should be addressed at mix level.
The space will help you approach the master with a fresh mindset. You might want to work on a different track in between, or do something else entirely. If you’re going to master your own tracks, do yourself a favor and take some time out between mixing and mastering.
Professional mastering can take a lifetime to, well, to master, but if you have a good ear and plenty of patience, it’s more than possible to teach yourself the basics and build from there.Īdam Hignell runs through a few fundamental principles of the art of mastering: 1. Depending on your skill-level at the mixing stage, it can be useful to learn how to master your tracks as well.
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