Getting track ready for mastering

[alien2k]

Hi everyone,

I have a question regarding final steps of production. Each time I will send my tracks for mastering for digital release I receive different instructions from the labels from what they want. Unfortunately it seems that I am not getting the instructions quite well . Its amazing how rude some people are when they don´t receive what they expect.... (just reminding a recent bad experience)

So what is a mastering engineer ideally expecting? I know the don´t want any compressor o limiter on the master channel. Technically speaking what can I do in order to provide him with the best as possible material to work with (leaving musical taste aside)

For instance what exactly do they mean by leveling at -3 db.

Cheers!

[Tobert]

- Send him the best mix you can do
- Leave 6 dB of headroom
- No effects on the masterbus

Should be fine.

[djhipnotikk]

- Send him the best mix you can do
- Leave 6 dB of headroom
- No effects on the masterbus

Should be fine.

this

[stringerhye]

What should you do if, without effects on the masterbus, the track doesn't reach the 6db of headroom they require.

Also just a question do mastering engineers usually work with wavs?

[alien2k]

What should you do if, without effects on the masterbus, the track doesn't reach the 6db of headroom they require.

Also just a question do mastering engineers usually work with wavs?

In my experience I have just worked with Wavs. Some people have requested me to send on 24 bits, other 32 Bits and my last request was at 16 Bits.

When you say you are not reaching the 6 db of headroom do you mean that it sounding to low? In that case you may use compression on the channels you need to increase the volume.

If it is clipping and you are not able to reach 6 db of headroom need to check your mix and find which channel is making the it clip (may be more than one). Then work on fixing them, using tools as Eq, filtering, limiting etc. In other words make your mix better.

[alien2k]

Thanks everybody who answered. I have not had any formal training in music production still I have managed to pull out some releases. The bad thing is because of not having formal education (just DJTT) I dont handle all the required technical knowledge and language which can lead to bad situation.

I started this thread because one of my tracks was going to be include on a recoplitation (gratest hits) release of a good label, which I am not going to name.

They requested my track with leveled ad -6db and on a 32Bit Wav.
My track was soundig good and mixed pretty good. But I made a mistake on the export process and lowered it much more than needed, because I was using more than one software and just learning pro tools. I sent it to the label and they sent it for mastering (obviously the needed to pay for it) but the mastering engieneer couldnt work with it because of my mistake and they thought I was using a limiter on the master channel. I got the rudest reply from the label owner, calling me many things LOL.

Well he didnt handle it the best way, but anyways I learned from it and I am sure some people may learn from it also.

[Saint]

oh wow!! this is odd, I've never heard of anyone requesting a 32bit file as 32 is only a floating point system used only internally inside DAWs as there is no standardized way to read them. 24bit fixed is far more common and Industry standard....