Mastering out of Pro Tools... Advice?

[wedge]

but in 50 years, hard drives will be the sound people are looking for. Evolution.

In 50 years, there'll be another technology. Hard drives will be gone, or nearly so, much like the floppy is now. There'll probably be some sort of crystal-matrix memory or a molecular-level memory system which uses who-the-fuck-knows as a medium, but the bottom line will be gigantic amounts of storage in a ridiculously small space, and blazingly fast access times. Which leads me to my pet theory that music making technology will evolve into something that has the flexibility of digital and the resolution of analog. All will exist in the virtual domain, but the resolution will be so high as to be indestinguishable from analog: Analog being real-world, or not virtual. 1's and 0's may actually give way to bioorganic computing or something in the quantum realm. Hardly Newtonian. Just as many studios today have developed a hybrid digital-analog system in order to take advantage of the strengths of each, the future technologies of music-making will marry said strengths (editing + tone) at the foundational level so as to make the distinct notions of digital and/versus analog irrelevent. Digalog is the future. But the future ain't quite now...

[misterock]

OT But WTF since we're talking 50 years!

The year is 1905 . one hundred years ago. What a difference a century makes! Here are some of the US statistics for 1905:

The average life expectancy in the US was 47 years.

Only 14% of the homes in the US had a bathtub.

Only 8% of the homes had a telephone.

A three-minute call from Denver to New York City cost $11.00.

There were only 8,000 cars in the US, and only 144 miles of paved roads.

The maximum speed limit in most cities was 10 mph.

Alabama, Mississippi, Iowa, and Tennessee were each more heavily populated than California. With a mere 1.4 million residents, California was only the 21st most populous state in the Union.

The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower.

The average wage in the US was 22 cents an hour.

The average US worker made between $200 and $400 per year.

A competent accountant could expect to earn $2000 per year, a dentist 500 per year.

A veterinarian between $1,500 and $4,000 per year.

A mechanical engineer about $5,000 per year.

More than 95 percent of all births in the US took place at home.

Ninety % of all US physicians had no college education. Instead, they attended medical schools, many of which were condemned in the press and by the government as "substandard."

Sugar cost four cents a pound. Eggs were fourteen cents a dozen.

Coffee was fifteen cents a pound.

Most women only washed their hair once a month, and used borax or egg yolks for shampoo.

Canada passed a law prohibiting poor people from entering the country for any reason.

The five leading causes of death in the US were:

1. Pneumonia and influenza
2. Tuberculosis
3. Diarrhea
4. Heart disease
5. Stroke

The American flag had 45 stars. Arizona, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Hawaii, and Alaska hadn't been admitted to the Union yet.

The population of Las Vegas, Nevada, was 30!

Crossword puzzles, canned beer, and iced tea hadn't been invented.

There was no Mother's Day or Father's Day.

Two of 10 US adults couldn't read or write. Only 6 % of all Americans had graduated high school.

Marijuana, heroin, and morphine were all available over the counter at corner drugstores. According to one pharmacist, "Heroin clears the complexion, gives buoyancy to the mind, regulates the stomach and bowels, and is, in fact, a perfect guardian of health." (Shocking!)

Eighteen percent of households in the US had at least one full-time servant or domestic.

There were only about 230 reported murders in the entire US.

And I forwarded this from someone else without typing it myself, and sent it to you in a matter of seconds! Try to imagine what it may be like in another
100 years ... it staggers the mind

[AdamO]

Excellent reply, Jeff, thank you.
It sounds like the best way to go is to get a hand held analyzer (a reliable one) and use it in your recording space on the instrument itself, and use that as your reference when tracking with the PAZ. Otherwise I would be guessing at a visual representation as much as at the aural one from my monitors.
Again, thanks for the insight, I will be parametrically exploring.
-Adam

[I'm Painting Again]

As much as I'd love to get into tape, I just don't have the time. So maybe tape's inherent frequency response rolls off the high's and lows, unfortunately, unless I break out an old 4-track from the attic, I'm sol.

Much of the technology developed has definately been made to emulate tape, but the fact is, digital is the new frontier, that is not to bash tape, but in 50 years, hard drives will be the sound people are looking for. Evolution.

I wish I had it all, the time, the money. I try to use what I have! If I had the cash and time, I would buy a 2" and a 1/2" and every piece of outboard gear I fancied....

Until then, it's PT & Waves.

understandable..I hope you dont think im anti-digital..in fact i love digital and just spent many thousands of dollars on Lavry conversion..I was just trying to offer a possible solution to the situation of the original poster..really a 2 track could give a lot for possibly not that much money..though i would agree it probably would be a big investment of time..as for the sound of hard drives being a general preference of what people want to hear in 50 years..I'm assuming you mean digital recording in general because i dont think hard drives really have a sound..i think thats a little presumptuous..after all there are different levels of fidelity and tone in both the digital and analog domains..it seems to me..quite sadly..even a lot of the musicians I work with..who you think would care about sound quality..cant tell the difference between cd and lower res mp3..and have never even heard vinyl..but i guess thats a different thread..

I might also suggest a pair of quality line amps..or as this is a subjective artform..line amps with the "right quality"..and or an analog compressor as has been suggested already as another inexpensive alternative to getting mixes more of a "mastered" sound..

other than that a thing to do is watch what you put in to a digital rig..because that what you get out typically..know exactly where to peak your converters to give you the proper dynamic range, etc. for the material your working on..

PAZ i really dont know much about..I have something like it and everything looks the same to me on it..and i've not found it useful.. so I may be incorrect here because I havent used PAZ..but how accurate can a 400$ plug-in be when the majority of gear costing thousands doesn't even have accurate volume metering?..and this does a variety of complex analyses..looking at the some prices of test gear that veteran techs are using and the fact that those test gear companies have not been put out of business by waves leads me to believe it has a pretty scetchy resolution..even so i dont doubt its usefullness in analizing a mix..and will try to demo it and check it out because i think it sounds like a very handy tool..

[MichaelAlan]

Larry should pay me to write an article on this for TapeOp.

Now THIS sounds like Jeff!


Mike

[Piotr]

I've used the latest T-Racks software off and on. It pays to be conservative with all of the processing in this system, but I have gotten some really awesome results with it.

I recently saw a blues concert on TV which I mastered for broadcast with the T-Racks and it sounded great. It's pretty good for just about anything, as long as you don't get too much saturation going on. If you do, your CD master is gonna suck some A...

[ryanlikestorock]

T-Racks is never going to give you a pro sound, but if you learn how to use it, it should do okay for what you need. Just stop using presets. Start at zero, learn what each knob does and set it the way you need it set for your particular song. Don't even start with a preset. Just start at zero.