I too enjoy Bob Katz's book. Highly recommended.
I'd say a proper listening environment goes a long way to helping you
master. Just knowing what you've got can be revelatory sometimes.
Dan is spot on in noting that mastering is about assembling the big
picture...sequencing, pacing, making it all gel.
I use compression sparingly sometimes because nature recordings are
often quite dynamic in raw form.
Danny
--- In Rob Danielson <> wrote:
>
> At 9:22 AM -0800 2/26/07, Dan Dugan wrote:
> >
> >Some thoughts:
> >
> >Whereas mixing concentrates on each "song" or segment of the
> >production, mastering tries to make the whole album work together by
> >sequencing, level adjusting, and equalization when needed.
> >
> >You try to make it work both at high level on superb speakers or
> >headphones and at low level on a little system or in a car. That
> >usually means reducing the dynamic range, better done by mixing than
> >by any automated process like compression.
> >
> >-Dan Dugan
>
> Well summarized. Mixing is immersion in tonal balance and dynamics
> for me. I don't see a need to master if each of the mixes to be
> grouped, succeeds. Differences in qualities that are consist with the
> settings are desirable. A bad mix is very evident when played next
> to a good one.
>
> Perhaps documentary video mixing comes the closest in practice in
> terms of really dealing with live recordings, but with only a tiny
> fraction of the nuance to spatial depth and imaging. Movies _could_
> be doing it but they don't seem to-- with live recordings at least.
>
> Mixing always makes me appreciate astute in the field micing-- its
> very, very hard to make a good recording if the mics were not very
> favorably placed. Its always fun to observe another recordist work
> with well-mic'd material.
>
> I will use compression on occasion in a multi-track mix, but when
> there is only one, "sublime" layer, the settings I need to tame the
> peaks seem to affect the dynamic range too severely, change tonal
> balance and compact the spatial planes more than required. I can only
> define about 4-6 spatial "planes" in mix _without_ compression, so,
> 98% of the time, I get out the old scissor icon and address each
> transient peak as an event.
>
> Many audio processing "plugs" are aimed towards an effect opposite
> from what I'm after-- which can be telling and educational to explore
> in itself. No mic/recording chain or plug is perfect. I often wonder
> if there are couple of "revolutionary" plugs waiting to be made that
> do understand what nature and field recordists want from their
> recordings. Young recordists, learn to code! Rob D.
>
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