Mastering in Renoise

[breemix]

@KURTZ

Indeed the sound is clearly more or less “altered” in the spectrum, because of the cross filters technique in the multiband send device, and because of the makeup/saturation, in some compression stages, so when I add this to my mixes : I don’t expect something truely linear and truely “transparent”. My problem is to get a sound that has more presence, but that is not too uniform, and when we go on this ground, we have to make compromises.

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Mastering a track is art of compromises…
You have to deal with the ideal mix and the real one.
For best results, you need to use professional plugins tools and also material.

• Use a mastering flat headphone like K271 MKII AKG to hear all the mix errors (cracks, stereo range, etc…)

• Use a good pair of flat monitoring for mix balance (never mix with a headphone)

• Check your master track with many different speakers (big, small ones, many headphones) and environment (house, car, garage, street, subway, wc />/> )

• Don’t work too long time on a mastering session, you need to clean your ears. Take time and days to listen to your work.

• Remember there is no formula to make a mastering session. It depends of the mix, of the music style, and the material you have.

• Remember also that mastering a good mix gives you few work. If you can not find the best result, check your mix !

• After 1000 hours of mastering in your studio, you will know your speakers ! />/>

• Keep the dynamic ! Too much compression kill the music and your ears ! Loudness war - Wikipedia

• Read the Bob Katz book.

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[MdX_MaxX]

@BreemiX

• Use a good pair of flat monitoring for mix balance (never mix with a headphone)

Question: Is mixing on headphones all that terrible if it’s really all I’ve got?

I mean, I have speakers, but they’re cheap $20 Logitech 2.1 speakers, and I feel as though mixing on those would be doing a disservice to the music…

Whereas I’ve got a Sennheiser HD 280 Pro for headphones, which are obviously much higher quality.

I just make music for fun but I at least want it to sound decent…

[breemix]

@MdX MaxX

Whereas I’ve got a Sennheiser HD 280 Pro for headphones, which are obviously much higher quality.

Well, the Sennheiser HD 280 Pro is far to be flat. No bass inside, so it is very hard to make a master with it.
It’s good for mix session, not for mastering.
Be careful to not to boost too much your bass !

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[Ivno]

It’s a matter of knowing your gear, if the HD280 are clear enough then you can work around their sound signature, since you have millions of examples to compare your music to.
I personally work with the AKG K550 and they are more than clear and flat in my ears to know what can and should not be done.
Again, it wouldn’t hurt to at least try your music with your cheapo 2.1 because music “in the open” can sound different, plus not everyone is going to have 200€ headphones to listen to things with.