Welcome to Sage Audio. Today we’re talking about How to Master for Streaming
But first, if you have a mix that you need mastered send it to us
at SageAudio.com to receive a free mastered sample of it.
Why Master Music?
The purpose behind mastering music is to prepare a recording for consumer-grade equipment - this
means that the master should adhere to the technical limitations of the equipment
or specifications of the medium. Typically when mastering,
we want to retain the mix’s timbre while increasing its perceived loudness.
Any changes made to the signal during mastering should be minimal,
improve the sound and enjoyability, and be made as objective as possible.
How to EQ a Master
When equalizing a master, try to avoid any changes greater than 3dB - also,
I find that using subtractive equalization first
is helpful. Furthermore, I typically avoid very narrow bands since this results in an unnatural
sound - whereas a 1-octave bandwidth or a Q value of 1.414 will sound musical.
Try low latency linear phase processing, or natural phase settings if available,
since zero-latency may cause unwanted boosts or dips to your signal.
How to Compress a Master
In many instances, you won't need to compress a master since the mix will
already be compressed enough, however, if you’re trying to achieve a louder master,
or glue details together, use compression. My favorite method is to use an internal
side-chain filter to ensure the lows don’t trigger compression.
Then I’ll time the compression to my host BPM using 60000/BPM as my formula.
This value or a half or quarter of this number will be my release time.
How to Saturate a Master
To saturate a master you need to use both soft-knee compression and harmonic distortion
or use a saturation plugin that combines the effects. For a warmer-sounding master, use a
tube saturator - for a cleaner, slightly clearer sound, use a tape or transistor saturator plugin.
To see what harmonics you’d add to a signal with a particular saturator,
run a sine wave through the saturator and see what harmonics form with a frequency analyzer.
How to Excite a Master
Exciters are frequency-specific distortion plugins that target the high frequencies, in turn adding
clarity to your instrument or master. The best way to add this is with a dedicated exciter plugin -
which is somewhat rare but some good options are the Logic stock exciter, and Fresh Air by Slate.
When mastering keep this effect subtle - since you’re working with the full stereo track,
excitement can become aggressive much sooner than you expect.
How to Create Detail in a Master
Of the many ways to add detail to a master, my favorites are low-level compression and parallel
compression. In fact, you can combine the two for an interesting effect - first set up your
aux send, then heavily compress; next introduce low-level compression to bring out the detail.
Then blend the compressed send back in. This is an unorthodox method,
but it accomplished both downward and upward compression, resulting in a unique sound.
How to Stereo Expand a Master
You need to be particularly careful when using stereo expansion on a master since some forms
cause aggressive and unwanted phase cancellation. I personally prefer to use mid-side equalization,
or mid-side compression to achieve a wider stereo image since I find these to sound most natural.
For a more vintage sound, use crosstalk on a tape machine plugin to widen your image.
How to Limit Your Master
Limiting your master can be difficult since you want the master to sound commercially loud,
but while preserving the original timbre, dynamics, and transients as much as possible. For
a louder sound, you may need to sacrifice some of these elements by using the limiter aggressively.
A good starting point when limiting is using a 50ms release time, achieving roughly 3 to
6dB of attenuation, setting a ceiling of -1dBTP, and using at least 4x oversampling if available.
How to Measure Your Master
When measuring your master, a true-peak meter measures the level or peaks,
and a LUFS meter measures the signal’s perceived loudness. Ideally, your dBTP will be around -1,
and your LUFS will be somewhere between -16 LUFS for dynamic genres, and -7 LUFS for loud genres.
Loudness normalization will play a role as well and may turn your track
up or down before streaming, so keep that in mind when determining levels.
If you have a mix that you need mastered send it to us at SageAudio.com to receive
a free mastered sample of it.
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