good idea… 
looking forward to it…
I’d like typical tips on EQ’ing. You know, like what instrument is more “phonogenic” on what band and so on…
i’d also like to hear about what audio listening equipment you use for mastering… what monitors, what headphones etc.
also, what you listen for specifically in level balances, etc.
Well, I use a MOTU 828mkII FireWire interface, Dynaudio Acoustics BM5As studio monitors, and AKG K 240 S studio headphones, but I don’t quite see how that can be useful information to a beginner? Sure, they might want to buy exactly the same equipment as I use, but then again they might not be entirely suitable to someone else.
Can you elaborate a bit more on that last part? What exactly do you mean with “level balances”?
Well, that’s getting into mixing territory. For a very general guide on that, check out this page, but replace all 2.8 values you see with 2.9. The author made an error writing that article, but the original article is now only available to subscribed members. For more precise Q values, though, check out my Kaufman Q chart.
Once you’ve come to grips with that EQ primer, use a spectrum analyser to find the exact frequency ranges of a particular instrument.
Well, I think going into mastering different styles would be a bit too in-depth. It would mean a lot more for me to write, but I also don’t want to give away too much information either since I’m hoping to work as an online mastering engineer one day soon.
Actually, mastering isn’t all that different for different styles. The only differences would be in the way you’d use EQ, and things like compression and limiting thresholds. But even then the differences are quite subtle, and I don’t think writing about those would be of all that much benefit actually.
Same with the movie idea. If I show people my own approach to mastering, and exactly how I go about doing it…well, you get the idea.
As for your “single track handling” point, that’s part of the mixing process. I will touch up on that though, as I’ve mixed mixing and mastering up all too many times in the past too. I have already written some general mixing tips for my new web site though, but it’s going to take another few weeks for me to have it ready and uploaded.
A large portion of the mastering is also just input from own personal approach out of experience.
Telling the important do’s and don’ts and specially why not seems however pretty important IMHO.
Didn’t have enough time to reply to this part yesterday, but if I understand what you’re saying, then, yes, there is a difference, and you would want to use the second approach.
In the mixing process, you want to render each of your instrument tracks (in the case of using a dedicated multitrack audio editor) and mix them together into a final state using effects like EQ and compression. This gives you full control over each instrument and allows you to fix up problems that might occur when you combine two or more instrument tracks.
If, on the other hand, you were to rely on mastering EQ to fix any problems that might occur between two or more instruments (frequency clashing, for instance), then you’re greatly restricting your options because you can only do so much. I guess you could attempt to use dynamic equalisation to separate two tracks that occupy the same frequency space, but it would be damn hard. Best way is to go back to the drawing board and fix all EQ problems, stereo widening and everything else there.
Mastering EQ is only aimed at treating the entire mix as a whole by boosting or cutting large frequency ranges (i.e. not the individual instruments, but the combination of those instruments).
Anyway, the tutorial is nearing completion already actually, and will end up about 8 pages of text - hopefully not too long. I’ll upload a preliminary version next week some time and will be open to suggestions or corrections.
Yeah, I realised I was being too arrogant about the whole thing, and I’ve added in a lot more helpful tips like important do’s and don’t’s now. It’s more or less a whole outline of how you could typically go about mastering your own music.
The only thing it doesn’t give away is the years of experience you need to produce good masters, but it will give you a good starting point in order to master your music with (hopefully) satisfactory results.
Oh thanks Atlantis 
I look forward to see your tutorial where hopefully I will be able to learn some little more about this whole subject…
simple stuff like, how loud should the hihats be vs the snare drum, how loud should the synth pads be compared to the lead instruments, etc etc
Atlantis,
I didn’t read the entire post, so I’m not sure if this has been mentioned…
I think on a CTG thread about mastering you were discussing using EQ to pinpoint precise notes and frequencies. I believe it came up when you were asking for the lowest and highest notes played in the track. I would be interested in knowing a little about this process. If you were to create a tutorial, a simple lookup table with this information would be cool (although I can probably find this on the web fairly easily).
I realize that you don’t want to divulge anything too closely related to your work, but I think covering this topic would be excellent.
Peace
-Sonus
Aha, well that’s going into mixing territory. There are no exact values for that since our ears perceive volume based on the average, or RMS, volume, so you can’t expect that having a kick peak at 0.0 dB will always mean that the hihat should peak at -12.0 dB or whatever. The best solution would be to use a spectrum analyser and ensure that you’re translating a gradually sloping frequency curve when the view is set to logarithmic.
Bloody IE. Just lost my entire post.
In short, the lowest note and highest note thing was just a way for me to deal with things I couldn’t deal with at the time. When setting up a multiband compressor, ideally you want to set up the crossover frequencies so that an instrument doesn’t spill into an adjacent band. Knowing the highest and lowest note of an instrument helped me to do that without having to do much extra work.
All that, as well as using ‘note-frequencies’ EQ (or whatever it may have been you’re referring to) on a mixdown, are a thing of the past now, as real mastering EQ requires a different approach that doesn’t take the individual instruments into account. What I was doing when EQing a mixdown with regards to the frequency locations of certain instruments, was just correcting the internal mixing of the track, whereas really I should’ve focused on mastering and translating a consistent frequency curve to the track.
Probably difficult to understand, but all this will be covered in the tutorial, and will actually give away a lot more info much closer to my work than any of that previous information. Just forget anything I may have said in the past as most of it, although it’s been really valuable learning material, isn’t even that accurate, and it certainly still wasn’t mastering what I was doing anyway.
The note-frequency table is available here though: http://atlantis.plastiqueweb.com/documents…frequencies.txt, which I still use extensively while mixing and mastering.
atlantis, i was wondering how much you charge ? how much is 1 track? i thought it was pretty cool that you offer a free demo for prospective buyers. i might be interested in your services (in a while, after i have produced a good enough track)
I’m planning to start out with a price close to 25 euros per track, which should be a good tradeoff between the 65 euros+ other online mastering services charge and the relatively lesser amount of experience I have. But, with the free demo, you can always cancel your submission if you’re not happy with it, though I doubt that’d happen. 
I actually have a brand new website ready to be launched in just a few more weeks, as in a week or two I’m moving flats and it’ll take me a while to get set up again. But let me know when you have something and we’ll see if we can arrange something.
i’m from america, so (does conversion), $32 , not bad. i was honestly thinking it would be somewhere more in the hundreds. although it does add up if you do a whole album. would you have some kind of discount for an entire album of 10-15 tracks?
i think i’ll probably employ your services whenever i’ve got somethin i’m ready for though, just so i can say… “i got my track professionally mastered” 
i also had one more question… how closely do you work with the producer? i.e. if you see something wrong with the track that you need to fix to make a good master, but you can’t do it without the producer altering something in the track… do you have him go back to the original and change stuff and then resend? just wonderin
I’ve uploaded a draft version here: http://atlantis.plastiqueweb.com/documents…o_mastering.txt
Some sections are still incomplete, but I’m open to suggestions or any criticism as to how I can improve what’s already there. Any additional points that might be worth mentioning too?
Sorry about the word wrap problem - didn’t realise this 'til after I’d taken the file to where I could upload it from. Just open it in Notepad and select Word Wrap from the Format menu.
Sure, I’m sure we can come to an arrangement in mastering a whole album. I haven’t finalised any decisions on pricing plans yet, but as soon as I move into a new place in the coming weeks and get a connection installed, I can get things underway and see how they go.
For an entire album, though, you’d be looking perhaps around 350-400 USD.
I’ll try to remember to pass you on a link of Benefit of the Boomerang’s album once it’s done (provided it will be freely distributable online). It’s an entire album of his and should give you the sort of indication of what I’m capable of at this stage, even though the quality of your mixes is still going to have a big influence on the final mastering quality of course.
And I work as close to the producer as possible. If something isn’t right in the mix, I’ll let you know and make any suggested changes. I’ll also send you mastered previews to ensure you’re 100% satisfied with the results before payment is made and I send you the final wave file.
Er, please don’t mix up “mixdown” and “mastering”… two completely different things. “Professional” producers usually do their mixdown themselves but let a mastering engineer do the mastering, but of course this varies, some do everything themselves and then you have the people that have a seperate engineer for each specific function. Mixdown = mixing down tracks, applying EQ and compression etc. Mastering = multiband compression, limiting, etc over the final mixdown usually adapted to fit the final media (vinyl, CD, etc).