dantarbill
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/04 16:31:50
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One pitch for using a separate "host" for mastering...or for using WaveLab anyway...
I think it was version 7 that added a function let you audition your plug-in chain with the output loudness normalized to match the unprocessed audio. I forget what the name of the stupid function is (and I can't open up the app and check right now because I don't have the &@#^ dongle with me)...but it is great for evaluating whether you really improved things or not. This insulates you from the "all other things being equal...louder sounds better" scenario.
I can't imagine that other mastering hosts don't have this function by now...but I don't know of a plugin that'll do this for you and SONAR as a host doesn't have this.
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brconflict
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/04 17:44:17
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Wavelab is my Mastering program. There's many great things Sonar can do, but Mastering isn't really one of them. I mean that in a sense of Professional Mastering, not demo-ing. Sonar just doesn't have the extensive metering, marking, montaging, indexing and export capabilities that Wavelab does. However, if you've ever tried mixing a project in Wavelab, you'll quickly see how far superior Sonar is to that! Believe me, I've done it.
Sonar is great at testing an output, for example. Let's say you opt to send your mix to someone else to Master. You can easily make some mixing decisions for the type of Master you want by plugging in some VSTs into the Master buss. From there, you can at least get a preemptive estimate as to how poorly your mix will translate at a higher volume with brickwall limiting or how to work at keeping some dynamic material. At least you can whip out a quick demo for your client.
Brian Sonar Platinum, Steinberg Wavelab Pro 9, MOTU 24CoreIO w/ low-slew OP-AMP mods and BLA external clock, True P8, Audient ASP008, API 512c, Chandler Germ500, Summit 2ba-221, GAP Pre-73, Peluso 22251, Peluso 2247LE, Mackie HR824, Polk Audio SRS-SDA 2.3tl w/upgraded Soniccraft crossovers and Goertz cables, powered by Pass-X350. All wiring Star-Quad XLR or Monster Cable. Power by Monster Power Signature AVS2000 voltage stabilizer and Signature Pro Power 5100 PowerCenter on a 20A isolation shielded circuit.
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cparmerlee
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/12 22:54:35
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Here's a report from my first experience with a real project under Ozone. It was a live show and the objective was to have a good enough recording to use for demos, but mainly for the musicians to study to improve the overall presentation. So it was not high risk and I didn't expect anything like studio quality. I had recorded this band in this room several times so I got a decent mic placement -- 8 tracks total for a 16-piece band. Always before, I did everything in one pass. This time I consciously avoided any "mastering" effects during the mixing process. I did noise removal (with RX4) before importing tracks into SONAR. I did track-level EQ where it made sense. I put the instruments on a sub-mix and used the vocal track to duck the band slightly. I did a little reverb on the vocal and instruments with tight mics or direct boxes so they matched the natural reverb of the room. I only compressed the tracks that were obnoxiously punchy (kick drum, vocal, and bass). I set the pan of course and mixed the levels. I didn't use any effects on the master bus except for a limiter, and it shouldn't have hit very much. I created stereo mixes for each of the tracks, then ran them into the stand-alone Ozone. Actually I started with just a couple of tracks to see how I'd like that. I found several Ozone presets that definitely improved the sound, and I studied them a little to see what they had in common. To that I added a little bit of stereo processing in Ozone. I used Insight to guide me to uniform levels. I found that there were some things I really needed to improve at the individual track level, so I saved a template of my Ozone effects and went back into SONAR. The trumpets had not been coming through the final mix as clearly as I wanted, so in Sonar, I added the Ozone dynamic EQ to the original track that had the mic covering the brass area. That allowed me to get a little more presence from the trumpets without really changing the character of the sound. That was pretty neat. After that, I worked entirely in Ozone. Ozone makes it easy to work on a whole collection of tunes. In my case I have 23 tunes from that gig. I found one combination of settings I liked for all the tunes and applied it to everything. The only adjustment I made per song was the overall loudness. Results? I think this yielded a better sounding, more uniform product, but it wasn't radically better than what I had previously done entirely within Sonar. Other than the back-tracking I did to remix after I heard things in Ozone, the work flow was pretty efficient. It probably took me a half hour longer than I would have spent otherwise, but some of that was learning curve. There isn't anything I did in Ozone that I could not have done in Sonar, but I think I will continue with this separated workflow because it does help me concentrate on different things at different stages. Regarding Ozone itself, I don't have a great basis for competitive comparison, but the GUI made a lot of sense to me. I have no criticism of the product. Here are some examples. Bear in mind it is 16 cats shoved onto a small stage with no opportunity to mic everything separately. If I were going to use these tracks more broadly, I'd go back into Sonar and use automation to set the solo levels a little better. https://files.secureserver.net/0sCHmYymAoCGxGhttps://files.secureserver.net/0sXr0icIMZhQKQhttps://files.secureserver.net/0s9R2t72mTcqA5
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John
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/12 23:10:31
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I have Sound forge 11 and though its very powerful I have not understood how an audio editor is good for mastering? Sonar on the other hand is ideal if setup for it.
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TerraSin
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/12 23:32:40
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I've been looking more into the mastering software available and was wondering what the best way to go would be: WaveLab, Sound Forge or Ozone?
I have noticed a ton of complaints about Ozone 6 and the removal of a ton of functionality within the program that use to be in 5.
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John
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/12 23:43:21
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TerraSin
I've been looking more into the mastering software available and was wondering what the best way to go would be: WaveLab, Sound Forge or Ozone?
I have noticed a ton of complaints about Ozone 6 and the removal of a ton of functionality within the program that use to be in 5.
I was one that complained at first until I used Ozone 6. Yes reverb was removed but that was all. I never used reverb in Ozone anyway. I don't see how Wavelab or Sound forge are a choice for mastering. SF has some good plugins but so does Sonar.
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cparmerlee
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/12 23:45:16
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TerraSin
I've been looking more into the mastering software available and was wondering what the best way to go would be: WaveLab, Sound Forge or Ozone?
I have noticed a ton of complaints about Ozone 6 and the removal of a ton of functionality within the program that use to be in 5.
I haven't seen any complaints about the product itself. The complaints I have seen result from Izotope's decision to align their various packages to better match the stated purpose. Some of the things that were in Ozone 5 are really not "mastering" tools per se. I understand people being unhappy that those bits aren't in the Ozone 6 package, but I think you have to evaluate Ozone 6 on its own merits as a mastering tool. One of the major additions is the stand-alone mode. To me, that makes a lot of sense, as the GUI is well organized for the job of mastering.
DAW: SONAR Platinum Audio I/F: Focusrite Scarlett 18i20 gen2
OS: Windows 10 64-bit CPU: Haswell 4790 4.0 GHz, 4 core, 8 thread Memory: 16 GB Video: GTX-760Ti
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Larry Jones
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/13 02:18:50
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John
I have Sound forge 11 and though its very powerful I have not understood how an audio editor is good for mastering? Sonar on the other hand is ideal if setup for it.
I'm sure you know it's a throwback to the days when mastering engineers had better monitors and better processors than recording studios, as well as the knowledge about how to put together a stereo tape that could be made into a vinyl disc. You'd mix your project and hand it over to the mastering guy. They never got their hands on the multitrack -- all they had to work with was your quarter-inch stereo mixdown. That workflow (mix it down first and then master it) has persisted to this day, partly due to tradition and partly because it still makes sense to some (Sound Forge+plugins sitting in for the old ATR-100+a rack of gear), but with modern DAWs it's not really necessary. Sonar is capable of mixing and mastering. And if you work that way, you have the added advantage of being able to tweak the mix while mastering, which you can't do with the two-step process.
SONAR Platinum 2017.10 • CbB • Win10 • i7/2600 • 16GB RAM • Focusrite Scarlett 6i6 • NVIDIA GeForce 8400GS
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John
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/13 10:39:04
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I use the same stereo track technique in Sonar. I even have a project setup for mastering. I import the wave file into it to master.
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johnnyV
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/13 12:02:16
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Excellent post cparmerlee, Great insight into a live session and how you applied a new process. I would have liked to listen but I see you chose a download , please post to soundcloud or somewhere , downloads are spooky, I have no idea how big the files are and I'm on pay as you go bandwidth here. A few posts back I think someone put it perfectly. If you are proficient and comfortable with software like Sound Forge or Wave Lab your workflow is improved by that process. If not you might be better off using what you know already. Someone who has been using Sonar forever and knows it inside out,, then tries working with a huge complicated program for the first time will open it ,, look at 1% of it's features and go and run and hide. Software is all about the user interface and how easy any given task can be performed. It's not about what plug ins are included at all. Plug ins can be shared between apps and purchased. I still use Wave lab because it was the first Audio application I learned way back in 2002. It's user interface is super straight forward and seems everything works as you would expect it to work. I tried Cakewalk Guitar studio at the same time and found it missing many audio editing tools. I also found, and still find it's user interface ridiculously overly complicated. The other factor was Wave Lab worked flawlessly with my Creative Sound card but of course Sonar didn't. Wave Lab is software I understand and have used daily for 12 years. So obviously I can work faster and get better results. But I'll accredit that to it's interface more than any other reason. I have since tried all the Wave editors and Wave lab has less levels of mouse clicks to run tools.. That seems nit picky but we are talking workflow and it's frustrating to have to wade through menus and keyboard shortcuts just to do a simple edit like level or EQ. My other favorite is Gold Wave for Batch conversion. Wave Lab now requires an encoder licence like Sonar. So to answer the OP. I bet if you take the time to learn how to use Ozone or any other dedicated software for mastering, you will elevate your skills and workflow. This will take time. No powerful software can be used without a steep learning curve. But if you are familiar with using Sonar to master, then you might be better off focusing on that instead. But you'll need a few add on's to make that work. Ozone is one of the better ones it would seem.
post edited by johnnyV - 2014/11/13 15:10:48
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brconflict
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/13 14:34:46
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John
TerraSin
I've been looking more into the mastering software available and was wondering what the best way to go would be: WaveLab, Sound Forge or Ozone?
I have noticed a ton of complaints about Ozone 6 and the removal of a ton of functionality within the program that use to be in 5.
I was one that complained at first until I used Ozone 6. Yes reverb was removed but that was all. I never used reverb in Ozone anyway.
I don't see how Wavelab or Sound forge are a choice for mastering. SF has some good plugins but so does Sonar.
John what exactly is your criteria for choosing a Mastering program? I'm curious why you wouldn't think something like Wavelab would be a good choice for Mastering. There's some great Mastering houses that use it, while others find PT better.
Brian Sonar Platinum, Steinberg Wavelab Pro 9, MOTU 24CoreIO w/ low-slew OP-AMP mods and BLA external clock, True P8, Audient ASP008, API 512c, Chandler Germ500, Summit 2ba-221, GAP Pre-73, Peluso 22251, Peluso 2247LE, Mackie HR824, Polk Audio SRS-SDA 2.3tl w/upgraded Soniccraft crossovers and Goertz cables, powered by Pass-X350. All wiring Star-Quad XLR or Monster Cable. Power by Monster Power Signature AVS2000 voltage stabilizer and Signature Pro Power 5100 PowerCenter on a 20A isolation shielded circuit.
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John
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/13 15:33:46
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brconflict
John
TerraSin
I've been looking more into the mastering software available and was wondering what the best way to go would be: WaveLab, Sound Forge or Ozone?
I have noticed a ton of complaints about Ozone 6 and the removal of a ton of functionality within the program that use to be in 5.
I was one that complained at first until I used Ozone 6. Yes reverb was removed but that was all. I never used reverb in Ozone anyway.
I don't see how Wavelab or Sound forge are a choice for mastering. SF has some good plugins but so does Sonar.
John what exactly is your criteria for choosing a Mastering program? I'm curious why you wouldn't think something like Wavelab would be a good choice for Mastering. There's some great Mastering houses that use it, while others find PT better.
Good question. It is a good idea to use Wavelab or Sound Forge for mastering if that is what you have. If you are a mastering house of course using them is a good idea but this is a Sonar forum. All of us have Sonar. It is more then capable of loading a two channel stereo file and doing any sort of processing you can think of. Actually mastering with Sonar is overkill but then so is using Wavelab or Sound Forge for mastering. They are great at sample accurate wave form editing. That is something one would use at the pre mixing stage not the mixing or the mastering stage. Moving a mix over to one of the audio editors to me seems unnecessary for just mastering it. Not only that, but they are not suited to it either. Sonar can send audio out for external processing. It could use hardware for aspects of mastering (using custom hardware). I don't know how that would so easily be done with an audio editor. We know that Sonar can use 64 bit FP processing as well as 64 bit FP throughput. So what is gained with an audio editor doing mastering? To me nothing. One might say a multi track DAW is too much too. But you already have it. It wont care if you have only one stereo track in it. One neat thing about Ozone 6 is its ability to be a standalone mastering program. It can also load VSTs to add greater versatility. It may be the ideal mastering program. No need to use Sonar or a audio editor.
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brconflict
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/13 16:11:47
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John
brconflict
John
TerraSin
I've been looking more into the mastering software available and was wondering what the best way to go would be: WaveLab, Sound Forge or Ozone?
I have noticed a ton of complaints about Ozone 6 and the removal of a ton of functionality within the program that use to be in 5.
I was one that complained at first until I used Ozone 6. Yes reverb was removed but that was all. I never used reverb in Ozone anyway.
I don't see how Wavelab or Sound forge are a choice for mastering. SF has some good plugins but so does Sonar.
John what exactly is your criteria for choosing a Mastering program? I'm curious why you wouldn't think something like Wavelab would be a good choice for Mastering. There's some great Mastering houses that use it, while others find PT better.
Good question. It is a good idea to use Wavelab or Sound Forge for mastering if that is what you have.
If you are a mastering house of course using them is a good idea but this is a Sonar forum. All of us have Sonar. It is more then capable of loading a two channel stereo file and doing any sort of processing you can think of.
Actually mastering with Sonar is overkill but then so is using Wavelab or Sound Forge for mastering. They are great at sample accurate wave form editing. That is something one would use at the pre mixing stage not the mixing or the mastering stage.
Moving a mix over to one of the audio editors to me seems unnecessary for just mastering it. Not only that, but they are not suited to it either. Sonar can send audio out for external processing. It could use hardware for aspects of mastering (using custom hardware). I don't know how that would so easily be done with an audio editor.
We know that Sonar can use 64 bit FP processing as well as 64 bit FP throughput.
So what is gained with an audio editor doing mastering? To me nothing. One might say a multi track DAW is too much too. But you already have it. It wont care if you have only one stereo track in it.
One neat thing about Ozone 6 is its ability to be a standalone mastering program. It can also load VSTs to add greater versatility. It may be the ideal mastering program. No need to use Sonar or a audio editor.
That makes sense, but there's a distinction between this type of Mastering and Mastering to a specific medium or pressing plant. To me, Mastering is the process of sequencing, processing heads and tails, managing silence, adding CD-track markers, analyzing the audio spectrum (or editing out artifacts in a spectrum), extensive metering, workflow, and export options, including DDP packaging. I see what you mean that editing and processing the actual audio is easily done in Sonar, but I find Wavelab right-sized and geared directly toward Mastering. Anyway, I just wanted to see if I read that correctly, or how you defined Mastering. There's a big gray area there, these days. Even my term use is incorrect in the eyes of someone cutting Vinyl lacquers. heh.
Brian Sonar Platinum, Steinberg Wavelab Pro 9, MOTU 24CoreIO w/ low-slew OP-AMP mods and BLA external clock, True P8, Audient ASP008, API 512c, Chandler Germ500, Summit 2ba-221, GAP Pre-73, Peluso 22251, Peluso 2247LE, Mackie HR824, Polk Audio SRS-SDA 2.3tl w/upgraded Soniccraft crossovers and Goertz cables, powered by Pass-X350. All wiring Star-Quad XLR or Monster Cable. Power by Monster Power Signature AVS2000 voltage stabilizer and Signature Pro Power 5100 PowerCenter on a 20A isolation shielded circuit.
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John
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/13 16:28:37
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brconflict
John
brconflict
John
TerraSin
I've been looking more into the mastering software available and was wondering what the best way to go would be: WaveLab, Sound Forge or Ozone?
I have noticed a ton of complaints about Ozone 6 and the removal of a ton of functionality within the program that use to be in 5.
I was one that complained at first until I used Ozone 6. Yes reverb was removed but that was all. I never used reverb in Ozone anyway.
I don't see how Wavelab or Sound forge are a choice for mastering. SF has some good plugins but so does Sonar.
John what exactly is your criteria for choosing a Mastering program? I'm curious why you wouldn't think something like Wavelab would be a good choice for Mastering. There's some great Mastering houses that use it, while others find PT better.
Good question. It is a good idea to use Wavelab or Sound Forge for mastering if that is what you have.
If you are a mastering house of course using them is a good idea but this is a Sonar forum. All of us have Sonar. It is more then capable of loading a two channel stereo file and doing any sort of processing you can think of.
Actually mastering with Sonar is overkill but then so is using Wavelab or Sound Forge for mastering. They are great at sample accurate wave form editing. That is something one would use at the pre mixing stage not the mixing or the mastering stage.
Moving a mix over to one of the audio editors to me seems unnecessary for just mastering it. Not only that, but they are not suited to it either. Sonar can send audio out for external processing. It could use hardware for aspects of mastering (using custom hardware). I don't know how that would so easily be done with an audio editor.
We know that Sonar can use 64 bit FP processing as well as 64 bit FP throughput.
So what is gained with an audio editor doing mastering? To me nothing. One might say a multi track DAW is too much too. But you already have it. It wont care if you have only one stereo track in it.
One neat thing about Ozone 6 is its ability to be a standalone mastering program. It can also load VSTs to add greater versatility. It may be the ideal mastering program. No need to use Sonar or a audio editor.
That makes sense, but there's a distinction between this type of Mastering and Mastering to a specific medium or pressing plant. To me, Mastering is the process of sequencing, processing heads and tails, managing silence, adding CD-track markers, analyzing the audio spectrum (or editing out artifacts in a spectrum), extensive metering, workflow, and export options, including DDP packaging. I see what you mean that editing and processing the actual audio is easily done in Sonar, but I find Wavelab right-sized and geared directly toward Mastering.
Anyway, I just wanted to see if I read that correctly, or how you defined Mastering. There's a big gray area there, these days. Even my term use is incorrect in the eyes of someone cutting Vinyl lacquers. heh.
You make a good point. I also use CD Architect do burn to CD as an album.
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TerraSin
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/13 20:57:17
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cparmerleeI haven't seen any complaints about the product itself. The complaints I have seen result from Izotope's decision to align their various packages to better match the stated purpose. Some of the things that were in Ozone 5 are really not "mastering" tools per se. I understand people being unhappy that those bits aren't in the Ozone 6 package, but I think you have to evaluate Ozone 6 on its own merits as a mastering tool. One of the major additions is the stand-alone mode. To me, that makes a lot of sense, as the GUI is well organized for the job of mastering. Take a look at Gearslutz. They have been doing nothing but complaining about it.
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cparmerlee
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/13 22:11:27
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TerraSin
cparmerleeI haven't seen any complaints about the product itself. The complaints I have seen result from Izotope's decision to align their various packages to better match the stated purpose. Some of the things that were in Ozone 5 are really not "mastering" tools per se. I understand people being unhappy that those bits aren't in the Ozone 6 package, but I think you have to evaluate Ozone 6 on its own merits as a mastering tool. One of the major additions is the stand-alone mode. To me, that makes a lot of sense, as the GUI is well organized for the job of mastering.
Take a look at Gearslutz. They have been doing nothing but complaining about it.
But again, are the complaints about the features or is it just people whining because reverb was removed and the Advanced package is too expensive? I didn't find any real fault with the product. I thought it was all quite intuitive and quickly allowed me to get some good results.
DAW: SONAR Platinum Audio I/F: Focusrite Scarlett 18i20 gen2
OS: Windows 10 64-bit CPU: Haswell 4790 4.0 GHz, 4 core, 8 thread Memory: 16 GB Video: GTX-760Ti
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Gone!! 
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2014/11/14 03:47:20
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dantarbill
One pitch for using a separate "host" for mastering...or for using WaveLab anyway...
I think it was version 7 that added a function let you audition your plug-in chain with the output loudness normalized to match the unprocessed audio. I forget what the name of the stupid function is (and I can't open up the app and check right now because I don't have the &@#^ dongle with me)...but it is great for evaluating whether you really improved things or not. This insulates you from the "all other things being equal...louder sounds better" scenario.
I can't imagine that other mastering hosts don't have this function by now...but I don't know of a plugin that'll do this for you and SONAR as a host doesn't have this.
Ozone 6 does this, as does Ozone 5 Ozone 6 isn't as bad as all the threads seem to suggest, it's actually quite good, love the stand alone. Is it better than 5 or worse than 5 ? who cares, I have both 5 Adv and 6 Adv, it's all pretty subjective anyway, some people just love Ozone 6. There is really only one way to find out . . . Nothing against Sonar, it's great, I have all the PC modules (cakewalk), all I know is, I can get a far better sound in an instant with Ozone 5 or 6 Adv, then I can get through a far greater amount of time spent fiddling with native sonar stuff. That frees me up to play, which is what I love best. Sounds good to me, and that's all I care about, because ultimately it's only me I have to please.
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Brett
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 00:38:50
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Bumping an old thread (yes I've read the whole thing) I've just mastered a collection of songs for a CD using Sonar and I'm looking at mastering software for better workflow. I like using Sonar as I'm familiar with it and the all the tools, I was able to work quickly and got good results. I loaded each song (file) as a seperate track and used track solo to listen and work on each track. (Perhaps loading all the songs into one track would be better?) The biggest issues was having multiple FX plugins open for each track. Exporting the individual tracks is easy once you've worked it out (ie the output files are the correct length not all the length of the project, ie the longest song). I also used some free software called Toscanalyzer; in addition to some very interesting analysis functions it is very easy to preview songs. Load the entire CD then you can ad cue points to jump around the CD, or press any section to play. You can very quickly hear the sonic differences between tracks. Combining those two functions with in one piece of software would be fantastic. Most of the software I've looked at appears to be (just) wave file editors. Only Ozone seems to incorporate the concept of tracks (songs). That would be a major work flow improvement. Does any other software handle tracks like this? In this project I didn't have to produce a CD image, I could just individual supply wav files, I put appropriate fades and silence at the end of files. I'm not sure how important things like cross fades are. Brett Toscanalyzer: http://www.studiotoolz.net/toscanalyzer/
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BenMMusTech
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 00:54:46
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I use sonar for mastering...it's fine for said task...although I use Waves Hcomp as a compressor and Waves Kramer Master Tape too...but the pro channel EQ set to pure is designed for mastering...the concrete limiter is fantastic too...once I figured out how to use the bass boost soft clip properly...it really is the bomb...I tend to gather all my tracks after they have been mastered and use either pyro audio creator or sound forge for cleaning up the ends and cd creation or mp3s I honestly don't see the need for a seperate two track editor for mastering...
Ben.
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Brett
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 01:00:37
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Ben, how does Soundforge handle multiple files?
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Kamikaze
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 03:18:20
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At the risk of asking a dumb question. If master the audio of my tracks, set their relative levels in Sonar, what is missing by making the CD in iTunes?
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Kamikaze
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 03:22:04
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Never bothered looking at Ozone before as I thought it's pricing would be like it's advanced pricing and was surprised PlugInBoutique sell plain Ozone6 for 130 quid. And looking at the demo was surprised how friendly it looked. The moveable modules reminded me of the PX64
post edited by Kamikaze - 2015/07/14 03:31:33
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BenMMusTech
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 03:32:23
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Brett
Ben, how does Soundforge handle multiple files?
Hi Brett...I'm not sure as I have not made a CD in Sound Forge...it seems so quaint...a CD that is. Personally it should be fine...I know that if you want a simple redbook audio CD, Pyro Audio Creator still works...at least it did last year when I used it last. Ben
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Brett
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 03:44:00
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Kamikaze
At the risk of asking a dumb question. If master the audio of my tracks, set their relative levels in Sonar, what is missing by making the CD in iTunes?
Nothing, it's a just a matter of work flow. (I'm not sure exactly what you can do in itunes, there maybe some advanced functionality missing)
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Brett
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 03:46:18
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BenMMusTech
Hi Brett...I'm not sure as I have not made a CD in Sound Forge...it seems so quaint...a CD that is. Personally it should be fine...I know that if you want a simple redbook audio CD, Pyro Audio Creator still works...at least it did last year when I used it last.
Ben
Here in Japan all bands, especially Indy bands put out CDs which are sold at gigs. It's not the CD burning that I'm worried about, it's mastering (the audio) of all the tracks together in one session and being able to jump around between tracks. Maybe I'm not explaining that particularly well ;) Brett
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Bristol_Jonesey
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 04:39:07
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I import all of my finished mixes (exported at 32 bit from each project) into my mastering project.
Each song goes onto it's own track and spaced out appropriately along the timeline. Each track gets nudged into place for best flow.
Because I mix to K-14, all of my tracks sit happily at 0dB and are all of a similar comparative volume
I insert markers art the start of each song so it's quick & easy to simply select a different song by selecting the marker in the Control Bar (Markers) Module.
All tracks go to my master bus which has my mastering chain which consists of several T-Racks modules: a bit of light compression, light EQ and a bit of limiting gets the overall levels up to near commercial outputs.
The chain also has Bluecat's metering plugin
I then export the album at 16 bit 44.1KHz for importing into Sony's CD Architect for burning.
CDA can set your track indices exactly where you want them and will also add CD text.
The 16 bit wav is used for MP3 encoding for which I use the Goldwave editor with free Lame encoder
CbB, Platinum, 64 bit throughoutCustom built i7 3930, 32Gb RAM, 2 x 1Tb Internal HDD, 1 x 1TB system SSD (Win 7), 1 x 500Gb system SSD (Win 10), 2 x 1Tb External HDD's, Dual boot Win 7 & Win 10 64 Bit, Saffire Pro 26, ISA One, Adam P11A,
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mudgel
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Re: Separate mastering suite versus "mastering" within Sonar?
2015/07/14 07:42:40
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For mastering a single track I don't find a need to leave Sonar or I can do it in stand alone Ozone 6 Adv.
On the other hand if I have an album to master I put the finished mixed stereo file into Sound Forge 11. I can use the same plugins as in Sonar, but the markers, regions and scripting available make easy work of cutting up a project and making it Red Book compliant. Even if not for CD I can still do multiple scripted processes inside SF11 that Sonar can't touch.
Sure you can master in Sonar if all you're doing is polishing levels and finalising a mix. But if I have a lot of work to do then I use Sound Forge.
Mike V. (MUDGEL) STUDIO: Win 10 Pro x64, SPlat & CbB x64, PC: ASUS Z370-A, INTEL i7 8700k, 32GIG DDR4 2400, OC 4.7Ghz. Storage: 7 TB SATA III, 750GiG SSD & Samsung 500 Gig 960 EVO NVMe M.2. Monitors: Adam A7X, JBL 10” Sub. Audio I/O & DSP Server: DIGIGRID IOS & IOX. Screen: Raven MTi + 43" HD 4K TV Monitor. Keyboard Controller: Native Instruments Komplete Kontrol S88.
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