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Author Topic: Mastering Advice Needed  (Read 1541 times)

Gary

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Mastering Advice Needed
« on: April 27, 2008, 02:16:07 PM »
I'm currently mixing/ mastering my band's latest demo at home. I'll be mastering to .WAV at 16bit for the audio CD but need to end up with mp3's to put on myspace/ website.

My first question is should I:

a) create the finished audio CD then rip mp3s from it

or

b) Master separately to mp3

Which will give me better quality or doesn't it matter? The other question is that my mastering software has a separate dithering section. I understand that the output quantize needs to match the destination file type (e.g. 16 bit quantize for 16 bit destination file type) and this is fine for .WAV but what should I set it to if I'm mastering to mp3?

Please be aware that this is stretching the outer limits of my technical knowledge so words of one syllable would be preferred)

Any advice gratefully received.

Johnny Mac

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Mastering Advice Needed
« Reply #1 on: April 27, 2008, 07:15:31 PM »
I'd convert the files from WAV to MP3 if I were you, most mastering files  types don't include MP3.

I've read you can record in 24 bit then dither in 16 bit for the mastering.
There's so many options in recording it can get a bit bewildering!
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Oli

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Mastering Advice Needed
« Reply #2 on: April 28, 2008, 12:03:01 AM »
Ideally, you'd mix twice- once for the CD, and another separate mix for the MP3 version. Both formats are different with regards to quality, bitrate etc. but also, they are both played on different things. Your CD version, is likely to have playtime in hi-fi's, home theatre systems, cars etc. but the mp3 is likely to only be played on low-fidelity equipment; iPods/mp3 players and computer speakers. Because of this, the approach to mixing the mp3 version is much different. You will want to mix on the kind of speakers that people will be listening on- computer speakers and ear-buds. Otherwise you'll end up with a mix that sounds good in the car, but lacking on myspace and on your iPod :) It is an art to get a mix that sounds good on both, but it's better to mix with the end media in mind :)

Don't convert to mp3 until at the end- listen to it critically when you've converted it, and see if the mix can be improved- or if there are compression artifacts, and adjust your mix accordingly :)

Edit: I'm not sure what the myspace audio upload interface is like, but if you can upload in WAV format, then do it instead of converting to mp3 and uploading there- you don't want to have to go:

WAV > MP3 > Upload (and convert again to myspace standard)

the extra stage of compression won't do any favours to the audio... but i'm not sure what options you have when uploading.
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Mastering Advice Needed
« Reply #3 on: April 28, 2008, 12:18:05 AM »
well when you upload it to myspace it converts it to mp3 pro i believe so the quality is killed there.

But yeah id just master it for the cd and when your happy burn it
then rip it as mp3.

Gary

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Mastering Advice Needed
« Reply #4 on: May 03, 2008, 07:25:03 PM »
OK. Mastered to .wav, burned the CD and ripped the mp3s from that. Seemed like mastering direct to mp3 just unbalanced things (if that makes sense). Results are up in the players forum and will be posted to myspace as soon as I received approval from the rest of the band.

Thanks for the advice, guys. Seems to have worked.