Production Masterclass - MASTERING 101
Added 2023-04-05 18:51:05 +0000 UTCHi all,
This is such an extensive, tough topic to cover in a reasonable amount of time, but I know this is one of the most requested for everyone :)
I figured we'd start off with a bang and go right into mastering, my thoughts on it, my personal self-mastering process, my mentality, and some deep dive tricks on clipping, rebalancing, and limiting.
Mastering is an art of specialization, and one that many people spend a long long time doing...it's a full time career for many. I'm obviously not a mastering engineer by trade, but I've spent a lot of time studying and mastering my own music so I have a lot of insight to offer!
Any questions, comments, feedback - I'm new to doing long-form production videos and this is a very big topic to cover.
I think we should do a follow-up video in a week or two where I master a few of your demos too, so you can see how a lot of this applies to real-world scenarios.
Thanks for your support as always
-Don
Comments
let me know if this helps: https://www.patreon.com/posts/guide-mixing-low-124375155
Don Skotnicki
2025-10-02 19:47:18 +0000 UTCI would love more info on phase alignment. I do it with ssl x phase to marry kick and bass, but I don’t do anything else in terms of phase aligning different tracks with each other. Any direction on this? Thank you dude 🙏
Reg
2025-09-30 21:43:40 +0000 UTCphase shift isn't the only issue with mid/side EQ and this was sort of the lesson - all processing has weird artifacts/negative effects/downsides to it. example - mid/side EQ has a strange effect on stereo image (which i am pretty sure i explained in here tbh with a shaker loop). since it's really based on the "sum" and "difference", the changes you make become a constant throughout the sound you're affecting, which essentially harms the stereo image. so - covering the entire bus or song with these things will probably have not-super-obvious effect, but after making decisions like this stacked on top of others, things start to add up and your mix doesn't feel right. my ethic is if it sounds good - it's probably good - but localizing these decisions as much as possible is likely best.
Don Skotnicki
2024-06-24 03:19:06 +0000 UTCwhen you talk about, say mid side for example and you say go back to the individual channel and fix it there instead of the whole track on your master, don't you have the same problem shifting phase but now its just on the individual channel. hope that makes sense lol
Aaron Rossi
2024-06-22 08:57:57 +0000 UTC
