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Best Mastering options for Cubasis
So the Cubasis update reminded me how easy it is to make great music with great sounds, hat tip to the Cubasis team!!! I’m curious how Cubasis users turn their projects into final polished masters. I’m going to hang a poll with some options that occur to me in my set up, super curious on everybody’s opinions to get the most polished sounds.
- What do you use to Master a Cubasis song?45 votes
- The Waves’ plug-ins in Cubasis28.89%
- Grand Finale by Klevegrand20.00%
- Auria31.11%
- Software on your Mac or PC8.89%
- Audio Mastering by Igor Vaseluv4.44%
- Final Touch by Ik6.67%
Comments
I usually export to Auria for more precise mixing and plastering. Mainly to justify all of my FabFilter purchases.
I used to just use FAC Maxima, but I got the Waves IAP last months sale, and have been trying that out lately.
I have Final Touch, but seem to forget that I have it most of the time.
Oops forgot Fac Maxima! I’m terrible at this poll stuff sorry! Shame we can’t edit our polls. I guess just mention the options I forgot about and I’ll go with that.
Clearly, exporting to a PC can provide the best mastering options - if you have the proper tools. Otherwise, seems to make sense to stay on the device.
Just to clarify, I’m NOT asking for a “Which is best” poll, I just want to know what people like when finishing a tune, not most features or best possible options, otherwise I’d be shipping everything to some studio in LA somewhere, just some cozy home polishing preferences.
The Waves plugins for me are great for "anticipating" how a mix will sound like after i master them on the desktop. I only do this with certain tracks that need much more of a mastering "massage". Some others dont need desktop mastering at all.
For mastering, I usually am just using EQ slight adjustments if I think it needs it, a compressor if the dynamic range need tightened, and then a limiter to get the final level. Per Ian Shepherd, I don't master to -14 or -12 or whichever LUFS value (been listening to his podcast lately!). He suggests:
...Master no louder than -9 LUFS short-term at the loudest moments
(with True Peaks no higher than -1)...And in fact when I follow this rule, in most popular genres the integrated loudness often comes out in the -12 to -14 LUFS range...
http://productionadvice.co.uk/how-loud/#more-9206
I mixdown to 44.1/24 and use ProQ2, ProC2 and then ProL2 on the master channel and add dither to 16bit if I'm going to mixdown to 44.1/16.
I usually fiddle around inside Cubasis, with several plugins including the Wave stuff, and can’t come to an end. Then finally I throw it all into Final Touch and say ‚Dang, that’s better now‘.
I started using Grand Finale recently. Jury still out for me on that one, but my mastering skills are what need improving, not the tools.
You should add Fabfilter to the survey although for me Waves gets the job done
Are you sure that you cannot edit the poll?
You edit the original posting!
Lurssen Mastering Console, expensive but top results.
I wonder what Mastering apps (Grand finale, Larsen, etc. ) differences are to Fabfilter plugins? I’d bought ProL,Q,MB,C, and G on sales and don’t want to buy more! Would rather replicate what other apps do with FF plugins
We had this topic:
https://forum.audiob.us/discussion/26025/ios-mastering-options-comparison/p1
Right now, i collected those (beside those within Cubasis and Auria Pro):
Always planned to make another comparison, but never came around to that.
The FF have the best visualization and lots of options and presets.
Others make things more easy, offer less options and are less visual.
I still think, many of those mastering options will give comparable results.
I dont claim it to be best,but if im exporting a 2 track mix from Cubasis the waves L1 usually get some good fast results. Other times Ill export stems to Logic Pro. Before the Waves plugins were available in Cubasis I'd mostly use Bias Final Touch.
I appreciate all the opinions (and links @tja) from the the mighty forum. I think I’ll try it 100% in Cubasis and see what I think. Maybe that new Normalize function will help with my sloppy mixing. Thanks everybody.
Normalizing is different from the sort of limiting/maximizing that one generally does when mastering. If you are sticking to Cubasis, the Waves L1 isn't bad.
FabFilter Pro L2 is the best option for mastering on iOS. Lurssen and Grand Finale are the next best options.
IMO the only real purpose of mastering is to get your track ready for a specific platform (and that's historically all that mastering ever was). These days this means relatively quiet masters that are ready for streaming platforms.
Loud CD-style masters are a thing of the past, because if you submit a loud track to iTunes/Spotify/Youtube they will just make it quieter, to prevent sudden jumps in volume between one track and another. This is great news of course since it means music can have some dynamic range again rather than always being crushed by the limiter.
So IMO mastering should really just be achieving the desired output loudness of the track. Everything else should be done in the mix. If you're not happy with the EQ, fix that in the mix
Mastering is for delivery to a specific platform.
I've posted this video a few times already, but as you mentioned LUFS in an earlier post I think you'll find it interesting:
i like grand finale but its not been reliably stable for me with its crashing. final touch has been my goto for a while now but i enjoy master record as well. Im still impressed by how well final touch works.
After some tests, I deleted the following:
Partly because of them doing both too much and too few, partly because they do not provide a decent way to dial in values - values can only be set very, very time consuming and imprecise, and not repeatable.
To be honest, I may have saved Grand Finale, but it calculates the LUFS wrong, as tested with the Punk Noise file from some mastering website. In addition, it's limiter is fixed at 0 dB.
And as I have the Fabfilters, I reduced my options to better concentrate on results instead.
I have Fab Filter Pro L2. Anyone disagree w richarddyot’s starement about it being better than Lurssen? I hope he’s right as I have been considering purchasing Lurssen while the half price sale is on.
I don’t use FFPL2 using iPhone only. Lurssen is my effect of choice to finish a track on iOS and laptop. Easy to use, sounds great, adds some analog coloration/warmth too which I like. Sounds a little bit like T-Racks too, and better than Ozone IMO. Adds a lot to my tracks, but I’m really not a mastering expert, and certainly neutrality is better. I love to design sounds but I’m sometimes a bit lazy with final song mixing, and Lurssen helps a lot glueing everything (your mix needs to be good enough, no miracle here). Good thing is Lurssen has some nice automations too, and you can also use it on drums for example with great results. At the end, sound is something so personal, your own taste will have last word
Fwiw, I don't think I have ever seen someone who has used FFPL2 not there no it was the best limiter/maximizer available.
On iOS I think FF Pro-L (v1 or 2) is defintely the most well rounded and easy to use option, provided you don't mind using Auria to access it. Best advice I can give is don't take the names of the limiting algorithms it uses too literally. "Dynamic" for instance always was something I equated in use as "transient enhancer".
There's other tools that are probably capable of equal results, but often I find the controls they offer just seem over-excessive in their scope or only are really audible at their extreme settings.
If you don't want to be tied to Auria or an iPad, check out FAC Maxima. So far that's probably my second favorite, though some of the controls are VERY subtle in what they do so it can be a bit confusing at times making sure you're not imagining that you're hearing a change as you tweak things. A common issue with a lot of mastering limiters to be fair, my go to is Limitless on the desktop and that has the same issue.
What, exactly is "normalize" ? My parents tried to do that to me for many years. Unsuccessfully.
@Janosax : @ikmultimedia should give you a comission.. I think you’ve just sold a Lurssen, lol
I really like the way Lurssen sounds. To echo @Janosax, it adds something very pleasing to my mixes. I also like that you can import a bunch of tracks, change the order of them, and get them all gelling together for that cohesive album vibe. It’s got some very useful export options as well. Finally, it’s universal, so I’ve got it on my iPhone too, which is nice.
I think it’s a matter of what gets you off. Pro L definitely sounds great, but I’ve never enjoyed using it.
You're pretty normal around here. It was not always the parents but your "normal" here. You match the "norm". Sorry. Welcome aboard, nerd. Now listen up.
Here's my take on the 3 major "automatic volume adjusters" (using some Wikipedia text for a reference).
Audio normalization applies a constant amount of gain to bring the volume up to a target level (the norm). Because the same amount of gain is applied across the entire recording, the signal-to-noise ratio and relative dynamics are unchanged.
Audio Compression reduces the volume of loud sounds or amplifies quiet sounds compressing an audio signal's dynamic range. This was used to abusive levels on CD's to insure your music would always be played loud on the radio to sell more product.
Audio Limiter allows signals below a specified input power or level to pass unaffected while attenuating (lowering) the peaks of stronger signals that exceed a threshold. Limiting is a type of compression intended to avoid Clipping in a digital system (trying to go louder than a finite number of bits would allow).
POP QUIZ:
Which Squashes the dynamics to a narrower range?
Which makes everything louder?
Which prevents the worst form of distortion and sometimes hardware damage (i.e. speakers get blown out)?
Pop quiz
1: Compressor
2-Normailozer
3-Limiter
Thanks, @McDtracy, I actually think this will help me in future mastering. Still, hen I normalized my last track, the kick got boomy and I reverted to my original, preferring the abnormalizer
as is my wont.