mastering process

[rhythmtech]

lol yeah totally true man

To folllow on from the mastering process, whats your process for your mixdown?

I know it will vary from track to track etc but is it a general rule to EQ and compress every sound?

The EQ I use the now which I find real easy to use is fab filter, been using (I think) pretty well as with certain sounds Ive been cutting out frequencies which have then made the sounds sit better within the mix

Sometimes I find it hard to boost certain frequencies because basically I dont know what I should be boosting

Anyone got tips/process/plugins they use to get a good mixdown.

Got a good tip from the horrorrist and that was to have your levels sitting half way and not have every thing at zero, stoped the peaking, made more space etc and you can always boost the track at the mastering process, but that tips pretty common sense.

Like the idea of making my tracks within ableton and then taking the track into pro tools to mixdown, also heard of ppl mastering in pro tools aswell

Again any help is hugely grateful guys :)

theres a world of misinformation out there and it seems you've already been fed some.

keeping things "half way" on the meter is pure BS. internal mixing engines work at 32 bit float (protools hd is 48bit) so the chances of ever digitally clipping is an impossibility EXCEPT on the master fader which does need to be below 0db.

where digital clipping might occur is within plugins. you need to be very careful on certain plugins. but on the other hand some analog emulation plugins are designed to be driven hard (uad PLUGINS BEING A CASE IN POINT).

theres also a lot more to a mixthan just eq and compression. you need to understand how the music flows and how each element works with the other.

for a quality mix you could be looking at 20 hours work.

personally i think 80% of released techno is mixed appallingly with absolutly no consideration given to the bigger picture. yes it is important to have that kick eq'd perfectly but that needs to be done in context with everything else.

theres a reason why working engineers spend a long long time learning before they even touch a mix, and thats why we charge what we do.

as far as plugins go i would highly recommend slate digital, softube, UAD, waves analog emulations and soundtoys.

you really do get what you pay for and i would advise anyone to save the extra few quid and go with quality software/hardware.