ok so i mix my tune in nuendo it sounds great and clear i do an audio mixdown and pick the thing that looks highest quality which ends up being a wav64 which i can't burn straight to cd for whatever reason... i open it up in sound forge i'm happy so i leave it as it is i want to burn to cd the bastard won't let me do anything higher than 44khz 16 bit is sounds shit!!!!!!!! so i go back into nuendo like i'm not having that and find some mda or wav thing that lets me go a bit higher but yah same problem... Is it possible to get something higher quality than this piffle to a cd you no I spend ages on my tunes only to have them detroyed at the last moment of completion!!!!!!!!

so can someone explain where i am going wrong please? If you're gonna dis' my software please give alternatives and reasons please.

Um.... ALL audio CDs are 44.1kHz/16-bit... that's the Redbook spec that ANY audio CD must adhere to.

You do all your production in higher res, but the last step is sample rate conversion to 44.1Khz (if you're not already ausing 44.1) and dithering down from 24-bit to 16....

CD burning software such as Wavelab or CD Architect all have those functions.
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Bruce Valeriani - Mix Engineer

So what your saying is there's nothing i can do about it, right? ok so why does the volume get reduced so much as well? is there something i can do about that? Cause it seriously goes so much quieter as well it's frustrating.

If you're talking about the level difference between your mix and a commercially-produced CD, that has nothing to do with recording at 44.1Khz/16-bit....

That level difference occurs as a result of the mastering process. Mastering involves many sound-analyzing processes, but one of those processes usually includes some form of limiting, which is a type of compression that raises the overall level of the signal at the expense of musical dynamics.
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Bruce Valeriani - Mix Engineer

Yah i didn't compress or limit my track because i was happy with the way it sounded... I left it so it was about -2 db at it's maximum peak it was pumping pretty loud but not distorting nice and clear like until i had to convert it for cd... Could I put it back into sony sound forge as the "cd ready" file (for want of a better name) and boost the volume back up then do it again and it be ok or would that totally muss it all up?

Without using Limiting, you have NO chance of coming close to commercial CD levels..... a peak level of -2dBFS doesn't really mean much. Limiting removes peaks (and therefore musical dynamics) allowing the overall lsignal level to be raised substantially - again, at the expense of losing musical dynamics.... but unfortunately, that is what the current standard is for commercially-released material.

If you don't want to lose the musical dynamics, then you have to accept the fact that your CD will be much lower in level compared to commercial ones, because it's really one or the other - you can't have both....
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Bruce Valeriani - Mix Engineer

Well, then i guess i'll have to try it and see which is the lesser of the evils... at what point do i do it after or before i have converted it to cd quality?

call me a spannor too but i didn't manage to find a limiter on sony sound forge?

thanks

I have no idea what a "spannor" is, but in Sound Forge, you can use WaveHammer. All processing should be applied BEFORE any dithering/downsampling to Redbook (CD specs)....

Be sure to make a backup copy of your raw final mix before you apply further processing to it....
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Bruce Valeriani - Mix Engineer

aww

Thank you!

ps a spanner is a tool.

BlueBearSound wrote:

I have no idea what a "spannor" is, but in Sound Forge, you can use WaveHammer. All processing should be applied BEFORE any dithering/downsampling to Redbook (CD specs).... .

SO, I am using Cubase SX3, and am still relatively new to the mastering process. Do you mean that you mixdown (raw) to 1 stereo track before you do the limiting?

What i have been doing is limiting just before the output, and doing the audio->export mixdown option.

SO, it is better to mixdown to a track, save that one, then do your signal processing on that?

RhoneRanger wrote:

BlueBearSound wrote: I have no idea what a "spannor" is, but in Sound Forge, you can use WaveHammer. All processing should be applied BEFORE any dithering/downsampling to Redbook (CD specs).... . SO, I am using Cubase SX3, and am still relatively new to the mastering process. Do you mean that you mixdown (raw) to 1 stereo track before you do the limiting? What i have been doing is limiting just before the output, and doing the audio->export mixdown option. SO, it is better to mixdown to a track, save that one, then do your signal processing on that?

If I have understood you correctly then yes... mix your track to a stereo file. Then come back a week or so later and master the stereo track. Or even better send it to a pro mastering engineer for best results.


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Recording Studio Suntans

AC wrote:

Or even better send it to a pro mastering engineer for best results.

I take it you are a pro mastering engineer?

hmm, what do they do to the file that would be different than what I could/would do?

No I am not a pro mastering engineer.

The difference would be the room they master in, sometimes hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of acoustics and monitor speakers, plus decades of listening experience.

They typically make small changes which make large differences.
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Recording Studio Suntans