Mastering

Mastering is an art generally considered best left to a professional mastering engineer; however, if you are simply creating CDs for your family and friends, there is really no reason not to do some simple mastering for your own recordings. As for mastering demo CDs, it really depends on how much you are willing to spend.

Mastering mainly consists of following these processes in order:

• Equalization
• Ordering the Songs
• Compressing/Limiting
• Reverb
• Normalizing

Equalization

I do all of my equalization as part of the mixing process. I equalize each track as needed to obtain the final sound I'm looking for. The most difficult part of equalizing (EQing) a mix is getting the bass track right. This will probably take a little practice and require getting used to your monitors. After EQing a song, I play it back on as many systems as I can. This includes, the home stereo, boom boxes, and car stereos. I never use headphones for EQing because they are too misleading.

I find having a reference CD extremely valuable. Find a professional CD that has a similar sound to what you are aiming for, and compare your recordings to it.

Ordering the Songs

You should decide on the order of the songs at this point. The order will affect how loud each track needs to be. The CD should flow naturally from song to song. Also pay special attention to the songs that you choose for the first and last tracks. When doing the following processes, consider how the songs move from one to the next.

Compression/Limiting

Compression in the final mix depends greatly on the style of music you are recording. Most popular music these days is compressed extensively to make it loud. The idea is to make your CD louder than everyone else's. If you really care about the dynamics of your recording, go easy on the compression. I try to use just enough compression to smooth out the sound but not enough to take the life out of it.

If you want to make your recordings loud, you should use a limiter. Limiters are available as software plugins. I like to run the final mix through a compressor followed by a limiter. I usually set the compressor for a 1:2 ratio and set the threshold so I'm getting about a 3db gain reduction. I set the limiter's threshold so that I get a gain reduction of 3db to 6db . The amount depends greatly on the sound I'm looking for.

This step should be done with respect to the other songs on the CD. You need to aim for a consistent sound throughout the CD. If a certain song really needs to be louder than the others you can use compression and limiting to make it so. If a song needs to be quieter, I opt to use less compression rathar than lowering the volume of the recording.

Reverb

I often add a very small amount of reverb to the final mix. It's easy to add too much, so keep the amount very small. Just add enough to give the recording a natural feel.

I usually route the reverb before the compressor and limiter. It's best to keep the compressor and limiter at the end of the chain.

Normalizing

Normalizing usually refers to setting the volume so that the loudest peaks in the recording reach zero db exactly. When making a CD it may not make sense to normalize every song. You should set the volume of a song based on how it should sound in relation to the other songs; however most of the time, you will probably find normalizing all of the tracks works very well.

I actually try to avoid using the normalize function of my software. Instead I try to set the master volume level in the songs when mixing down so that the peaks are right at zero db. It is more work than using the normalize function, but it actually produces a better recording because it makes full use of the dynamic range.

As a final touch I enable the dithering option in the master output. This function provides a subtle improvement to the quiet passages in the recording. If you are recording songs that are loud throughout, dithering won't be of any benefit.

If you follow these guidelines, you should be able with practice, to make very good recordings. In addition to the things I have mentioned, the quality of your listening area is a big factor in how your finished recordings turn out. There are many books and websites covering this topic. If you are up to it, it would really pay off to learn more about acoustically treating your listening area. You can do several inexpensive things you can do to an untreated room to improve it In the meantime, get started recording and have fun.