Thinking about getting a mastering app... What do you use?

[bayswater]

I did look at Blue Cat. But I was only using DSP-Q as a host for 32 bit VIs while waiting for their 64 bit updates. So it did the job. Now I just host everything in DP or in a Logic slave.

[Phil O]

When expert mastering is required,I send my clients to this guy out in Newton, MA.
http://www.peerlessmastering.com/

For clients with tighter budgets, I do the mastering myself and do it all in DP. DP can do everything I need and I burn the CD master with Toast. For dithering I was using Apogee's UV22HR on my converters, but lately I've been using Ozone's dithering and getting good results.

My work flow:

Rather than using chunks in DP for individual songs, each song get's it's own project. I usually work in 32bit FP at 44.1KHz with BWAV as my default format. In each project I have a stereo track with the song's title. This will be for real-time bounce once the mix is complete.

When all songs are mixed I import them all to a Mastering project (16 bit file format) where there's one song per track. I have a Keyboard Maestro macro set up that creates a new empty track for each imported song. These tracks will be used for real-time dither and bounce of all the songs once the mastering is done. Routing is set up so that dithering of ALL songs can be done in a single pass. That means if I have 12 songs I can do the bounce of all 12 in the time of the longest song (say 4 minutes). All 12 are bounced simultaneously. Because the file format in this project is set at 16 bit, the bit reduction and dithering is all done in the Ozone plugin on each track, and when the bounce is done all songs are ready for Toast (where time between tracks is set up). To listen to each track, I simply mute all tracks then option-click (in the SE window) the play button of the track I want to listen to. You can do this on the fly and compare track-to-track very easily.

I have insert settings and clippings for fade-ins fade-outs etc. Metering is set up on a Master Fader in my template. Yada, yada, yada. It all goes very quickly.

Phil

[edit] Forgot to mention. The Ozone plugin is the last in the insert chain, so all Trim, EQ, etc. is done before it reaches dither and is still at 32bit FP.

[Killahurts]

SoundBlade certainly looks great but I don't see what advantages it has over what I already have. I use DP to get it there and DSP-Q to add the Red Book features. True, I have Ozone and RX Advanced, Xenon and other plugs.

I just don't see what else SoundBlade brings to the table besides a great looking interface... and support for 384kHz recording?

Soundblade does one cool thing that I can't do without.. when you burn an audio reference disc, It creates a DDP master file set, puts it into a folder, and burns the audio disc from that. I will not send an audio disc to the plant for replication, only a DDP. This gives me an audio reference disc that will sound exactly like the replicated discs will sound, and it works every time. I come from the old days of CD replication, and had been burned more than once with the sonics on the disc.

Besides, I've been using Sonic Solutions stuff since 1994. I like the way it draws the waveforms, very elegant. Also very powerful editing- back in the day it was the best by far, but by now others have caught up and are just as cool. I send my stuff out to be mastered nowadays, but I still have my mastering guy send me the final files and I lay them up in the Sonic and create the DDP going to the plant.

[bayswater]

Soundblade does one cool thing that I can't do without.. when you burn an audio reference disc, It creates a DDP master file set, puts it into a folder, and burns the audio disc from that.

From the DSP-Q V4 manual:
"DSP-Quattro allows you to save and load the AudioCD Layout, saving and restoring on file your working session, and to export off-line the audio on output from the AudioCD Layout into a new audio file or into a folder compliant to the standard DDP format. Moreover, DSP-Quattro allows also to build a AudioCD Layout by importing the regions of an audio file, an AudioCD image file or from a folder containing a DDP compliant group of files."

[Phil O]

has anyone checked out this program yet?
http://hofa-plugins.de/en/plugins/cd-burn-ddp/

[musicman691]

has anyone checked out this program yet?
http://hofa-plugins.de/en/plugins/cd-burn-ddp/

Thanks for the link; this is just assemble and burn s/w right; no editing like DSP-Q right?

I noticed something in the screenshots on their site: they show a couple of buttons: 'burn cd' and 'burn DPP'. I know it's supposed to be 'burn DDP' but still.....

OT: to show how we can make word/phrase associations to the oddest of things when I see DDP I think of the old WCW wrestler Diamond Dallas Page (DDP)

[monkey man]

Ha!

How he got Kimberly to marry him I'll never know...

Wrestling fan since early '80s here, I'm ashamed to admit.

[billf]

Wrestling fan since early '80s here, I'm ashamed to admit.

Wrestling? Like this?

[monkey man]

Dang. Billy, your clandestine pootective skills seem unaffected by the ravages of time.

Nice work, mate. I'll admit to nothing, 'though. Pictorial evidence counts for nought in Jungleville.

[musicman691]

Ha!

How he got Kimberly to marry him I'll never know...

Wrestling fan since early '80s here, I'm ashamed to admit.

He must have something Kimberly wanted

Got you beat - Bruno Sammartino back in the very early 60's. Haven't watched much of the current WWE product though.

[billf]

I'll admit to nothing

Oh sure, does that mean you won't admit that you secretly use Pro Tools for mastering?

[mikehalloran]

Thanks for the link; this is just assemble and burn s/w right; no editing like DSP-Q right?

It's a plugin and a very old one at that. I remember it from OS 9. You do all the heavy lifting in DP – this just exports or burns the result. I see nothing that lets me believe it made it to 64bit. I can't even find the original Danish language site to see if the info is there (I have a daughter who's fluent)

Those who remember BIAS Peak before a certain version (5, perhaps?) will remember that Roxio Jam was bundled with it to enter codes, create DDP and burn CDs. I stopped updating after Peak 4 which included Jam 5.

[apanacci]

Been using Peak for years, love it. Bought WaveLab when Peak died , steep learning curve. I also have DSP Quatro and it feels a lot like Peak. In my studio my Mac Pro is at 10.9.5. Peak works fine on that , but tried it on my MPB with Yosemite on my 2nd hard drive and it is acting weird. When I need to move to Yosemite I will move over to DSP Quatro.

[David Polich]

I just downloaded and tried the demo of SoundBlade. It wouldn't open on launch - just got the spinning beach ball. Contacted Sound Blade support, they said "certain VST's crash the program, try holding down the option key while starting". That worked, but in the preferneces menu of the program, there is no option for selecting "VST's" or "AU's" No plug-in preferneces at all.

Combine that with a horrid color scheme (yellow waveform against a white background) no way to open just a single-lane project, having to go through multiple menu selections just to load a plug-in, non-resizeable windows, limited prefernces selections....I can't recommend this poorly conceived mastering app.

[musicman691]

I just downloaded and tried the demo of SoundBlade. It wouldn't open on launch - just got the spinning beach ball. Contacted Sound Blade support, they said "certain VST's crash the program, try holding down the option key while starting". That worked, but in the preferneces menu of the program, there is no option for selecting "VST's" or "AU's" No plug-in preferneces at all.

Combine that with a horrid color scheme (yellow waveform against a white background) no way to open just a single-lane project, having to go through multiple menu selections just to load a plug-in, non-resizeable windows, limited prefernces selections....I can't recommend this poorly conceived mastering app.

Good they had a demo; am thankful for the developers that have them as they've saved me a ton of money in the past. But to go through all the troubles you had and imagine if you had actually purchased it (three levels and none is cheap - $295/$695/$1495 - unconscionable.

I ended up getting DSP-Quattro and am loving it. I have plenty of quality plugins to use inside it if the built-in don't satisfy me. Only one complaint - not easy to tell the right from the left in a stereo (2 channel) waveform. If I could have one color for the left and another for the right it would be perfect - but this is minor.