Mastering tips

Hey guys!!

Just trying to master my own stuff (I know paying for mastering is obviously preferable)

 

Just wondering if anybody could give me some tips on how to make it sound 'better'

 

Cheers!!

The mix sounds really clean, and that is preferably the most important thing to make a good master.

Use a reference track, a lot of masterings plugins have this built-in their feature. But either way, try and match the dynamics, transients etc, with the reference mix, there are a lot of ways to do this, but multiband compressors, limiters, and EQ'ing is probably the best way to do this.

 

Here is also one tip, put the master in mono, and try to get the synths/instruments, etc  to sound like they would do in stereo. There are a lot of tools that can help you with that, but don't overdo it. If you're working with a lot of synth layering, simple panning can help with that. 

This is probably the simplest one https://polyversemusic.com/products/wider

And always check your mix/master on a lot of different systems (like your phone, laptop etc, P.A, car speakers etc) one of the most important things to why we need mastering is just to make the listening experience good on preferably most systems.

Mate!

 

Thank you so much for so many tips.

I'm a mastering engineer. I'd recommend watching some Youtube tutorials on it and copy their workflow. I'd avoid the all-in-one solutions like Ozone. They have some good features but rarely produce results as good as your own plugin chain.

Here's a tip- really try to not just add things for no reason. Understand WHY you're adding it and A/B it on and off so you can hear what you're effecting.

Also, lots of little changes and boosts make a good master. Light EQ- 1 or two db, light compression, light saturation, etc. Little boosts should raise your original -6db level up a bit in loudness. Then your final limiter will do the rest to get your levels to Beatport standards. Shoot for -7LUFS. If you can't get your song that loud without it sounding bad, there's something wrong with your mix. Go back and fix it there.

Also don't sleep on Izotope's Tonal Balance. It's the single best plugin that will help you get a great mix and master. Worth it's weight in gold.