What is your mastering chain?

[astralprojection]

-

[recursion loop]

During the mixing my master bus has only one plugin - Voxengo SPAN (frequency analyser, it is free and highly recommended).

 

After exporting the wav file I do some kind of lame self-mastering with these tools:

 

- U-He Presswerk - does parallel compression (about 3 dB GR) to glue the mix a bit

 

- U-He Satin - adds a bit of "fake-analogue oomph" (some mixes sound better without it)

 

- Izotope Ozone 7 - I use a custom preset which I adapt to a specific track, the goal is basically to increase loudness.

 

- Span (again)

[astralprojection]

-

[Djuna]

Why would you use a limiter if you know that there are tracks going to clip - why not just lower those tracks in volume, and create a balanced mix in the first place?

[psychasm]

no fx, before export then:

Kuassa AT1 eq

Mscdsp comp

Default Reverb in Reason/Quadalectra Stereo Expander

Ozone Limiter

 

 

In Reaper I use only free Plugins if I decide to use that app.

Waiting on Sknote for my prizes then I will use those ones for Mastering, at the moment, only free plugins

found in CM magazine,pluginboutique and KVR

[astralprojection]

-

[recursion loop]

If you want to avoid clipping while mixing just turn your levels down. I set my kickdrum around -10 to -12 dB and balance all the other things around it, thus the overall level at master bus doesn't exceed 0 dB and I have few dB headroom. Or you may just lower your masterbus fader, would be the same thing. Afaik, many mastering studios require mixdowns peaking not louder than -3 or even -6 dB. There are people at psynews who understand mastering 1000 times better than me and they can explain it from the professional point of view, but to my understanding this should be important if your track is to be mastered with analog gear (because it has non-linear response to input levels) and also many plugins emulating the behaviour of analog processing are calibrated to certain input volume.

 

You may mix into compressor if you want to acheive a special effect, where the attack and release of the compressor are set to interact with the groove of the track. But I'm not sure why you may want your track to be squached with a limiter while you mix it. Or you are talikng about limiting the individual channels? This is OK if not overdone.

 

Generally, a mix should sound good (groovy and powerful) without any compressor or limiter on master bus. This way you make sure that it will sound even better with them.

[Djuna]

THat would be the definitionf of an unbalanced mix.

For example, why use a limiter on some sounds, while might sound very good, might still clip from time to times.

A limiter takes care of that.

That doesn't make much sense: in your example, if in a mix a kickdrum clips, an instrument that's pretty stable dynamic-wise through-out a song (in most music), then you've put the kickdrum track too loud. No point in using a limiter if you yourself are overcooking the input in the first place. It's not the tool, it's the way of thinking that is a bit off.

Like Recursion Loop said, if you put the BD around -10dBFSsomething, and build the rest of the song around that, you will have less problems with headroom if the song is ready for mastering.

[astralprojection]

-