A commonly asked question from newcomers to music production is often, “What is the difference between mixing and mastering?”. The advancement of music technology and in particular digital DAWs has brought great capability to the modern producer. But there are still clear distinctions between these two processes which are worth clarifying.
Mixing
Mixing is the process of building/arranging/processing audio elements to produce a track.
- Blending and combining different audio elements using volume, panning and frequency to mark their place, often in a stereo field.
- Arranging: developing the structure of a song from start to finish, and choosing which kinds of audio elements to use in each section of a track.
- Adding effects to give channels extra texture.
- Controlling gain staging, and making sure that audio tracks are not so overloud that they cause unwanted distortion (known as clipping).
Mastering
Mastering is a technical optimization process where you are trying to make the track as loud/clear as possible on its target platforms. By platforms, you specify what sound systems you are going to play a track through. The different platforms may need completely different treatments…
• Nightclubs: often need a monophonic mix or a stereo track that sounds good in mono because an untreated stereo mix is hard to use in a large space.
• Radio play: you need to optimize to focus on specific frequencies for broadcast
• Surround sound: a unique form of balancing often used in cinematic situations
• General release: mastering for conventional stereo media.
The thing about mastering which is often misunderstood, anyone can “have a go” at mastering using a standard DAW and proprietary plugins. However, if you intend to produce a track for commercial release, you’re competing with other high budget productions that have been mastered in dedicated mastering studios, by deeply experienced mastering engineers using high end hardware. Very hard to achieve the results on you own. Mixing is something you can realistically do but commercial release requires a professional mastering service, or your track will just not sound as punchy as the competition.
Mastering Software
There are definitely producers who are able to produce successful tracks using a software-only pipeline. Some of the Waves plugin suites are commonly used within DAWs. And Izotope make Ozone 9 which uses machine learning algorithms to deliver quality mastering results.
Mastering Hardware
The fact that high-end mastering hardware exists is demonstrative of the fact that it is still preferential to use exclusive tools to get the best results. Otherwise, such products would not exist when people could simply use cheaper software solutions. Take the Rupert Neve Designs Portico II Master Buss Processor. Mastering studios are willing to pay around $5,000 for one of these bad boys, and it won’t be the only piece of gear in their arsenal.
Mastering Services
Given how particularly challenging mastering is, it’s possible that you realize that you don’t need to learn this process yourself, nor buy any of the associated resources. While you could directly work with a mastering studio if you have unlimited megabucks lying around, another option is to use online mastering services. Perhaps it’s hard to gauge the quality of a mastering service in isolation, it’s a solution that many people choose. I’m not even going to make any recommendations on this one as I don’t want to be responsible for recommending a company whose talent is exaggerated.
Mastering: A DIY Approach.
I’m a cheap-ass who has no commercial intentions, so I just use my own mastering template that I developed from watching a few YouTube videos. Here’s how I structure my mastering template:
- EQ: Get the basics under control.
- Saturation: Add some key frequencies by introducing some controlled distortion.
- Stereo Spread: Make the most of the stereo field.
- Compression: Make the track hit hard.
- Limiter: The final element, to make the track as loud as possible.
I master exclusively in Logic Pro X. Logic provides great tools like the Multimeter which features different modes to help you monitor what your output track is doing.
Nobody will buy my track and/or listen to my music, so the output results are good enough for me. Feel free to contradict me on this point by buying my album. You may well be my first customer!
robomuso 