Audio Mastering – Relationship Of Ear & Mind

Audio mastering is probably just about the most important and the most difficult factors of music production. In order to master from home, what you will definitely need is a really good audio software, such as, Sony Sound Forge Pro, Steinberg Wave Lab Studio & Adobe Audition.

Audio mastering can often be mistaken for mixing – it is not, in fact it is a totally separate practice, but exactly what is it you might ask?

Mastering, or finalizing, will be the final stage of the practice of making audio. It’s the audio step that comes just before the pressing of a CD, and most professionals would say this is a crucial part of creating an awesome CD. Therefore, once you have finished recording and mixing your tunes, you need to master them. It’s the ultimate high quality version of the production.

Mastering requires the shaping, sculpting, equalizing and compression of your finalized songs. It is vital because it is exactly what creates the clarity, volume and intensity of your completed songs. Without it, your songs just don’t have that same high quality sound.

Till recently, mastering was mainly done in the studio by a mastering professional, however, with great advances in technology you can get good audio mastering software and you are able to master your own tracks yourself more cheaply from home, giving you access to that same great professional sound.

Mastering is not a straightforward practice. It may be pretty challenging and takes a complete separate set of skills to creating the actual music. Nevertheless this doesn’t mean only professionals should do the mastering. With all the good online audio software available, it would be silly to not do it yourself!

Audio mastering not only tightens your recently studio recorded tracks but it can also do miracles for tracks that you might have recorded in a live gig recording. You might just copy the recording and sell that, but mastering the track gives a lot better listening experience and can help to make your homemade track sound a lot more professional.

If you are using audio mastering software, you have to make certain that you go through the following methods to get your track to a professional standard.

1.Volume level maximisation

2.Balance frequencies

3.Reduce any unnecessary noise

4.Encoding

5.Re-check for any glitches.

By using your ears and your understanding of what each processor may provide, you start to develop strategies for making the master stand out. Any audio mastering software you choose should guide you through the aforementioned steps, but how easy these steps are will depend on the design of the user interface. Most audio mastering software are specialized editing audio programs, that offers useful navigation to enable you to zoom right in on wave forms and draw out any clicks.

This will depend on how demanding the tracks you want to master are, or how tight you want the mastering to become. Some mastering can be achieved using traditional multi-track beat making program.

Although these programs really don’t do all of the tricks that the pro software will do, they are able to perform some small things that the pros cannot… therefore it really depends upon what you want. You should do your homework on the audio mastering software so that you can choose a program that’s within your budget and really does everything you’re looking for.

An advantage of audio mastering is that you will get an chance to practice and to learn about the program. You may not always do your own mastering, but you will begin to understand the skills that can help you to realize your own music composition. Mastering audio is all about listening and making choices.  It is increasing your own potential to listen carefully, being aware what tool to utilize and when, along with a strong sense of what sounds right.

Lastly, always back up your original mixed data prior to mastering. If the track is later on remastered for any reason — for a high-resolution re-release, a compilation, or for any additional use, you will need a mix that’s as easy to remaster as possible.