0:28

Hey , inside the Mix podcast fans , it's

0:30

Classic Mike from the Beat Bakery here . Follow

0:32

us on all the socials at Beat Bakery

0:34

UK . You are listening to Inside the Mix

0:36

podcast and here's your host , mark

0:38

Matthews . Hello and welcome to

0:41

the Inside the Mix podcast . I'm Mark

0:43

Matthews , your host , musician , producer

0:45

and mix and mastering engineer . You've

0:47

come to the right place if you want to know more about your

0:50

favourite synth music artists , music

0:52

engineering and production , songwriting and

0:54

the music industry . I've been writing

0:56

, producing , mixing and mastering music for over 15

0:58

years and I want to share what I've learnt with

1:01

you . Hello , folks , and welcome

1:03

back to the Inside the Mix podcast . If

1:05

you are a new listener , do hit that

1:07

subscribe button and if you're watching on

1:09

YouTube , make sure you hit that notification

1:11

bell so you get notified when there

1:13

are new episodes or when we go

1:16

live . If you are a returning

1:18

listener , a big welcome back . The

1:20

previous episode was episode 100

1:23

, the centenary . We celebrated

1:25

our centenary , folks here at the Inside

1:27

the Mix podcast Amazing stuff and this

1:29

is episode 101

1:32

. Interestingly , when I first created

1:34

an email address back when I was 10 , I

1:36

used 101 in it Tenuous

1:39

link , but I thought I'd throw it in there At

1:42

the time of this episode going live , I am

1:44

prepping for a short glamping

1:46

break in Glastonbury

1:48

of all places . Now , unfortunately it's

1:50

not the festival that has been in gone , but

1:52

it is just outside of Glastonbury

1:55

and I love Glastonbury . My girlfriend

1:57

and I regularly visit there . It's just

1:59

up the road for much probably about an hour , hour and a half

2:01

and it's fantastic . Absolutely

2:03

love it . If you haven't been there before

2:05

, do go visit . I absolutely love it around there . I'm

2:08

originally from that neck of the woods anyway , so

2:10

I am biased , but that's what

2:12

I'll be doing when this episode goes live

2:14

. This episode , episode 101

2:17

, is continuing with the mastering theme

2:19

, so we are setting up our mastering

2:21

session . In the previous episode , episode

2:24

100 , I demonstrated how

2:26

you can create a mastering template

2:28

. In episode 99 , we also

2:30

looked at Lough's Loudness

2:33

Unit Full Scale . So in

2:35

this episode what we're going to do is we're going

2:37

to look at how we can prep the session

2:39

further by identifying

2:42

the True Peak levels and the short

2:44

term Lough's levels as well

2:46

, and how we can then add markers

2:49

in Reaper or your DAW so you

2:51

know where they are . So when you're doing your

2:53

master you can refer straight

2:56

away to that point where you know there

2:58

is a True Peak or you know there is

3:00

the maximum short term Lough's

3:02

reading . But slow your roll

3:04

. Before we carry on any further , head over

3:07

to synthmusicmasteringcom and

3:09

download my guide to the

3:11

five essential free mastering

3:14

plugins . Let's dive into this episode

3:16

. So this is a relatively straightforward process

3:18

, folks . What I've done is I've opened Rx

3:21

Audio Editor . I've got just the standard

3:23

edition here and I've imported the mix

3:25

into Rx Audio Editor

3:27

. I've opened Waveforms stats

3:30

. So I've got the statistics for the waveforms

3:32

for this and I can see here . I've

3:34

got True Peak , sample Peak , total RMS

3:36

, I've got Max Momentary Short

3:38

Term and Integrated Loudness

3:41

and Loudness Range . I'm reading those off if you're

3:43

not watching this on YouTube . And

3:45

the great thing is what I can do with this is I can

3:47

click on this orange sort of icon

3:50

to the right of the reading and

3:52

it will tell me in the bottom left where that

3:55

True Peak level is . So I can see it's at 23

3:57

seconds or 23.926

3:59

seconds . So I'm going to make a note of that

4:01

. That's my True Peak , okay . So

4:04

I'm going to do the same for Max Short Term Loudness

4:06

. So in the Loudness , or rather in

4:08

the Waveform statistics , I've got

4:10

Max Short Term Loudness is minus 24.7

4:13

and that happens at 25.205

4:17

. So , just to go back , my True Peak happens

4:19

at 23.926

4:22

and it's minus 12.5 . I've

4:24

got those two readings . I'm now gonna jump over

4:27

to my DAW and I'm going

4:29

to create markers using those

4:31

two values . But before we do that , I

4:33

just wanna give a big shout out to Panorama

4:35

Mixing and Mastering and Nick Di Lorenzo , because I

4:38

actually got this particular part of my workflow

4:40

from Panorama Mixing and Mastering

4:42

and the amazing YouTube videos

4:44

, so please do go check that out . I wanted

4:46

to give a shout out to Nick

4:48

because it is a fantastic

4:51

technique for you to use in your mastering

4:53

and I use this all the time in every

4:55

mastering session , and I wanted to share this

4:57

with the Inside the Mix podcast audience . In

4:59

case you weren't aware of Panorama Mixing and Mastering

5:01

, please do go check them out . Also

5:03

, rx Audio Editor isn't free

5:06

, so what I wanna know from you guys is this is

5:08

there a free application

5:10

or plugin similar to Rx

5:12

Audio Editor ? Let me know in

5:14

the comments on YouTube or send me a message

5:16

on Instagram at Inside the Mix podcast

5:19

. I would love to know if there is a free

5:21

application or plugin similar to

5:23

Rx Audio Editor . So here I am

5:25

, back in Reaper , and Reaper is my DAW

5:27

of choice , as you would have found out in episode 100

5:30

, do go check that one out . And here

5:32

I've got my True Peak Reading

5:34

and my Max Short Term Luffs Reading

5:36

, represented by markers

5:39

. You can do this in any DAW , because any

5:41

DAW is gonna give you the ability to use

5:43

markers . So I've disabled Snap

5:45

to Grid in Reaper by pressing Option

5:48

S , because I don't want my markers to snap to

5:50

the grid when I am dragging them . Or

5:52

, alternatively , you can just click on the horseshoe

5:54

at the top left but Shortcuts People

5:56

, option S . So the first one

5:58

, true Peak . I'm looking at my list to

6:00

the right of me here and it's 23.926

6:03

. So let's drag that . I'm gonna get as close

6:05

as I can , 23.928

6:07

. That will do . Now I've got Short Term Luffs

6:10

and this is a little different . My reading is

6:12

25.205

6:14

seconds , so I'm gonna drag it and get as close

6:16

as I can . So I've got 25.20 . But

6:19

I'm actually now gonna drag it to 22.205

6:23

or as close as , because , remember , short

6:26

Term Luffs are three seconds . It's

6:28

a reading taken over three seconds . So let's

6:31

drag that back . So 23.205

6:34

. Let's get as close as I can and

6:37

23.206 . So I now

6:39

know if I set a three second

6:42

loop region . So I'll turn Snap back on

6:44

three second loop region or approximate

6:46

two . I'm gonna get my Max Short

6:48

Term Luffs value . So why is this important

6:51

? You might be thinking . Well , with True Peak

6:53

, what I can do is this I now know my

6:55

exact True Peak level . So when I

6:57

am auditioning my master and I'm checking

6:59

out that True Peak , when I'm limiting or

7:01

clipping , I know immediately where

7:03

my True Peak is in the track and it's gonna

7:05

eliminate any of that scrolling through

7:08

the track and arbitrarily

7:10

picking a point or trying to identify

7:13

where that True Peak is . I now

7:15

know exactly where it is . So with the Max

7:17

Short Term Luffs , what this enables me

7:19

to do is , quickly , I can go in and

7:21

see any changes that I've made

7:23

with regards to gain compensation or

7:25

maybe some saturation or anything along

7:28

those lines . I can quickly set that three

7:30

second loop region and I'll be

7:32

able to see exactly how my Max

7:34

Short Term Luffs have changed

7:37

with regards to the processing

7:39

that I have done , for the final marker

7:41

I have is this head marker and this is

7:43

0.3 seconds of

7:46

silence right at the beginning . The reason

7:48

I do this and there's a little fade there

7:50

as well . Actually you can't see it , but on YouTube , if

7:52

I were to zoom in , you'd be able to see this tiny little fade

7:54

and Reaper automatically adds it at the beginning . But

7:56

anyway , this marker , this head

7:58

marker , this three millisecond

8:01

silence is there so

8:03

that when this is uploaded to a

8:05

platform , a streaming platform , it

8:08

just negates any possibility that

8:10

there'll be a harsh clip or harsh intro

8:12

at the beginning , because I've got this tiny little

8:14

bit of silence and I've noticed this

8:16

on SoundCloud . There's a song I uploaded a

8:18

few years back and I didn't have this at

8:20

the beginning and the start there's almost like

8:22

this initial really harsh transient

8:24

hit , and I've put this in to try

8:27

and negate that . So there we

8:29

go , folks . More essential tips to

8:31

improve your mastering session preparation

8:34

. These tips are designed to

8:36

make it easier and quicker for

8:38

you in the mastering process so you can

8:40

spend more time actually being

8:42

creative rather than wondering

8:44

where these values are . By doing

8:47

this , immediately , you're gonna know where your true

8:49

peak is . You're also immediately gonna

8:51

know where your short term , your max short

8:53

term LUFs value is , and you've got that

8:55

point . Three second silence

8:57

at the beginning as well . So really

8:59

, really good stuff . As I mentioned right at the beginning

9:01

as well . If you know of a free

9:04

audio editor similar

9:06

to RX , please do let me know in the comments

9:08

on YouTube or send me a DM

9:10

on at inside the mix podcast

9:12

on Instagram . But just to summarize what

9:14

we've done today you've got your mix right

9:16

. You're gonna drag that into your audio

9:19

editor . I've used RX audio editor

9:21

. You're gonna use waveform statistics

9:23

to find out the true peak level and also

9:25

the max short term LUFs level . Okay

9:28

, you're gonna jump into your DAW

9:30

and you're gonna set markers for both those

9:32

values . The big difference is , with

9:35

the max short term LUFs value , you're

9:37

gonna have a three second lead in

9:39

time to it . So if your max short

9:41

term LUFs value is 25 seconds

9:43

, you're gonna set your marker at 22

9:46

seconds . So you've got that three second

9:48

lead in and you can create that cycle

9:50

region . And a final bit have that

9:52

initial start that head marker right

9:54

at the beginning , there , at point three seconds

9:57

. That way you can negate any harsh transients

9:59

that may appear on

10:02

streaming platforms . I'm not saying it will , but I just

10:04

put it in there as like a belt and braces

10:06

approach . You know what I mean , without saying

10:08

if you're from the UK , if you don't Google it , it

10:10

does make sense . So before you go , folks , make

10:13

sure you head over to synthmusikmasteringcom

10:15

and download my five essential free

10:17

mastering plugins . Alternatively

10:19

, you can click on the link in the episode

10:22

description .