Oppinions on Mastering EQ

[AaronDylan]

Ok first of all thx for some replies in the guide to mastering thread!

There is one thing about mastering i think is pretty weird!

EQ ing the master!

First of all I´m very shy to apply any kind of boost or cut in the master because it will effect the whole sound and im scared boosting in something it doesn´t need or cutting something you took hours to mix on!!!
Just wanted to know how some of you out there think about it`?
because its a often called option to get the master sounding better!

So what do you think about eqin the master?

 

[Audiosprite]

the masterer knows best. i let him do whatever the hell he wants.

 

[timislegend]

sure, why not.

 

[AaronDylan]

if you got a good masterer buddy ok!

but i was asking in general about mastering whoever does it!

by the way if your mastering engineer just bought some new gear or will try some new stuff he might fuck it up! and then you will do whatever you want with him..

 

[acappa]

Well man, I always have to Eq my master, always I need to remove some muddiness in the 280-500 area that instantly makes the whole mix clearer. I´ve experienced this on and on so now I thinhk, why just remove some of that area in drums, guitars, vocals, and that way, avoid the need of making those cuts in the master, and again it doesn´t work for me. I´ve ended up thinking it´s all about a sum of frecuencies that makes that muddiness....
I usually apply some compression and some saturation in the master bus, then in the mastering bus, EQ cutting the 300hz area, some low end @ 80hz and some highs depending on the material, then I compress (all of that is analog) and then I convert to digital to maximize&limitate and do the dithering, that´s all!

 

[pikachu69]

Every single song to be mastered needs to be treated as such, a single element of a whole product. No two songs are the same therefore no two masters are created or processed the same way. It is ENTIRELY based on how well the mix engineer did his job to what tools a mastering engineer will use, so there is no one tool, plugin or preset that can answer what you are asking for. You need to decide what is missing and master from there. If a mix is well balanced both volume and frequency wise a mastering engineer may only use some clipping and/or limiting to achieve the desired volume. If a mix is unbalanced volume wise more compression and M/S technique may be used, if the frequency balance is off then eq and/or multi band compression may be used.
As far as mastering EQ goes (I do alot of mastering) I LOVE HAR-BAL.
There is also a link on there site to a great intro to mastering...

http://www.har-bal.com/index.php?/mastering-tutorial.php

Check it out, its great.

 

[AaronDylan]

cheers pikachu! that´s what im talking about

nice link

 

[Trevoire520]

Generally when "mastering" I tend to give the lows and highs a small shelf boost, maybe a little cut somewhere in the mids. It all depends on the source material though so it's impossible to give you any hard and fast rules.

 

[drope934]

I'm certainly not a pro but someone one day told me this and it helped me a lot:
1st: rest your ears, wait at least a few hours after finishing the mix because you might not hear somethings very wrong because you are used to it.
2: Use your ears, close your eyes and listen, then try to move it (the eq) subtly if needed, if you need to move it a lot, return to your mix then return to step 1.

Personally I do a first mastering one day, then another time the other day and I A/B those and chose the one I prefer and tweak it a bit if I have to.

my 2 cents

 

[Plec]

What you guys are talking about is still going under the "mixing" process. Just because you're treating your mix bus doesn't make it mastering. If you're sitting in the same room you mixed in, with the same monitors and the same person doing it (you) it's still just mix bus processing and nothing else. You're still mixing...

Like I wrote in the other mastering thread... if you got everything perfectly right on a metal album mix... you just don't need mastering as a sound enhancing process.

 

[wetpenny]

Every single song to be mastered needs to be treated as such, a single element of a whole product. No two songs are the same therefore no two masters are created or processed the same way. It is ENTIRELY based on how well the mix engineer did his job to what tools a mastering engineer will use, so there is no one tool, plugin or preset that can answer what you are asking for. You need to decide what is missing and master from there. If a mix is well balanced both volume and frequency wise a mastering engineer may only use some clipping and/or limiting to achieve the desired volume. If a mix is unbalanced volume wise more compression and M/S technique may be used, if the frequency balance is off then eq and/or multi band compression may be used.
As far as mastering EQ goes (I do alot of mastering) I LOVE HAR-BAL.
There is also a link on there site to a great intro to mastering...

http://www.har-bal.com/index.php?/mastering-tutorial.php

Check it out, its great.

wise words,cool link!