mastering in reason

Dubsta

Dubsta

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Is it possible to master a track to a proffessional standard just using reason...when i say proffessional standard i mean good enough to send to labels and play it on radio etc.

any tips and what do you use to master your tracks with??

Is there anything i can buy or download to master with?
 
I don't know the answer to your question, but it is how I master my tracks :mr_cool:

I just push everything through a compressor with >50ms attack, maybe get it to dip 1-3dB on kicks and snares. Then push it through the Limiter, slow attack, disengage "look ahead", fast release. To taste. As I said in another post, I've experimented with punching the limiter down by 8dB on every kick and snare...and well...I'll post that example at the bottom. Really you don't want more than a 1-2dB dip on the limiter - experiment. The coup de grace is the output gain after the limiter followed by the soft clipper. Set the soft clipping to exactly 27. You can usually squeeze another 3dB!! out without TOO much distortion.

I think that this is all bullshit and digital mastering is a technique to make electro house, pop, and rock sound good on iPhone and laptop speakers. "Wow, that track is so LOUD!" DJs have always been expected to know their tracks and how to mix and EQ them live. I've noticed that if your tracks are TOO quiet, people won't even bother with them.

Here's a really loud track clipped to all hell in Reason (DAC clipping on every drum hit, yum!):
http://soundcloud.com/lucider/lucider-untitled-wip-demo

- J.P.

---------- Post added at 10:23 ---------- Previous post was at 10:16 ----------

Should give credit to Loki, BTW, his YouTube tutorials are great. When I saw them it made me feel like I could make a professional track in Reason - before that everyone would trash it and say it was just to learn.
 
Last edited:
Lucider said:
I don't know the answer to your question, but it is how I master my tracks :mr_cool:

I just push everything through a compressor with >50ms attack, maybe get it to dip 1-3dB on kicks and snares. Then push it through the Limiter, slow attack, disengage "look ahead", fast release. To taste. As I said in another post, I've experimented with punching the limiter down by 8dB on every kick and snare...and well...I'll post that example at the bottom. Really you don't want more than a 1-2dB dip on the limiter - experiment. The coup de grace is the output gain after the limiter followed by the soft clipper. Set the soft clipping to exactly 27. You can usually squeeze another 3dB!! out without TOO much distortion.

I think that this is all bullshit and digital mastering is a technique to make electro house, pop, and rock sound good on iPhone and laptop speakers. "Wow, that track is so LOUD!" DJs have always been expected to know their tracks and how to mix and EQ them live. I've noticed that if your tracks are TOO quiet, people won't even bother with them.

Here's a really loud track clipped to all hell in Reason (DAC clipping on every drum hit, yum!):
http://soundcloud.com/lucider/lucider-untitled-wip-demo

- J.P.

---------- Post added at 10:23 ---------- Previous post was at 10:16 ----------

Should give credit to Loki, BTW, his YouTube tutorials are great. When I saw them it made me feel like I could make a professional track in Reason - before that everyone would trash it and say it was just to learn.
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thanks so much mate...this is exactly what i was after.....
 
I would love to master and/or mix tracks with reason but I downloaded the demo and was really disappointed. The resolution sucks so much I can't see sh*t. Changing windows's resolution won't help. I mean the playlist can be windowed to fullscreen but the rack just won't be bigger. So that was it for me.
 
of course it is. but to me, mastering is all about multi track recording. so bounce down all tracks, import into a program like cubase and do the real mixdown like that. then mastering, which means the final combined wave file, i like to run it through some hardware bits and bobs to give it a more realistic feel but tbh a good mixdown doesnt need mastering. or at least thats what i think but what the fk do i know.
 
i've been using reason for years and if you've got version 4 onwards with the mastering suite then yes, you can definitely get your tunes sounding good enough to send to labels and to play on the radio. i agree to a point that a good mixdown doesn't need mastering. it does i think, but not much. basically get the mixdown as good as possible and it helps bigtime. apart from the usual eq'ing and compression techniques, one unit i find particularly useful in reason's mastering suite, for mixdowns aswell as mastering, is the stereo imager. if i've got a sound and want reverb on it, i tend to put a reverb unit between the sampler/synth and the mixer channel (rather than use send and return) and then put the imager as a stand alone unit after it. with the reverb applied, i then go to the imager and narrow the lower mid frequencies, setting the crossover anywhere between 400hz and 1khz. i find this cleans up a lot of muddiness and lets the top end breathe more, giving a more open sound. i also find that by using individual reverb and imager units on separate sounds rather than sharing send and returns, by applying different settings (room type, size, reverb amount etc) you can create a more defined and layered soundstage, rather than just a load of sounds with reverb on them. then on the master out itself i might have an imager but leave the lows alone and add a bit of spread to frequencies above 2khz. hope this helps
 
Thanks for the idea about mono-ing the mids and lows of reverbs. I'd never thought of specifically targeting reverb for stereo image cleanup - reverb does the opposite after all.
 
I've just had tracks signed to 3 different labels and they have all requested that i send the mixes completely dry with any mastering that i had done removed. I now leave all my new tracks dry as the labels seem to want master themselves. If your mix down is off anyway it doesn't matter how much processing you do you won't really get it sounding that much better...

I was chatting to my mate Joe over Christmas who is signed to Medschool Records remixing and working with some pretty major players and he just runs his tracks through Izoptope just to get them as loud as possible..he doesn't use any presets but just uses it to boost the volume up as loud as poss without distortion...then that's it off they go for release.

It all just seems to be about how loud your track is these days lol!






Dubsta said:
Is it possible to master a track to a proffessional standard just using reason...when i say proffessional standard i mean good enough to send to labels and play it on radio etc.

any tips and what do you use to master your tracks with??

Is there anything i can buy or download to master with?
Click to expand...
 
I must admit that I will commonly mixdown, master, and then remixdown into the master compressors and limiters after they've squashed my sound. Terrible, I know. But sometimes it seems to be the only way to get the last few dB out of the WAV.

A good example would simply be the scenario where you over compress to the point that the kick and snare aren't standing out as much. Just turn 'em up!

Major downside: the dry mixdown will be useless garbage. You'd have to completely redo the mixdown if a label requested.
 
delij said:
i've been using reason for years and if you've got version 4 onwards with the mastering suite then yes, you can definitely get your tunes sounding good enough to send to labels and to play on the radio. i agree to a point that a good mixdown doesn't need mastering. it does i think, but not much. basically get the mixdown as good as possible and it helps bigtime. apart from the usual eq'ing and compression techniques, one unit i find particularly useful in reason's mastering suite, for mixdowns aswell as mastering, is the stereo imager. if i've got a sound and want reverb on it, i tend to put a reverb unit between the sampler/synth and the mixer channel (rather than use send and return) and then put the imager as a stand alone unit after it. with the reverb applied, i then go to the imager and narrow the lower mid frequencies, setting the crossover anywhere between 400hz and 1khz. i find this cleans up a lot of muddiness and lets the top end breathe more, giving a more open sound. i also find that by using individual reverb and imager units on separate sounds rather than sharing send and returns, by applying different settings (room type, size, reverb amount etc) you can create a more defined and layered soundstage, rather than just a load of sounds with reverb on them. then on the master out itself i might have an imager but leave the lows alone and add a bit of spread to frequencies above 2khz. hope this helps
Click to expand...

cheers
 
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