Mastering Tips



Media Storage

For those of you not on major labels, it is important that prior to and subsequent to your mastering session that you keep your original masters in good condition. To do this there are several easy steps that you can take to insure that your masters arrive in excellent shape and stay that way long after the session. These recommendations apply to both digital and analog tape media. For more thorough and detailed information on media storage issues click on the following link to the national archives: www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub54

Store tapes "tails" out. This means that the tape has been played through to the end and not rewound.

Play tapes or "library wind" tapes to the end prior to storage. Fast-forwarding will pack the tape unevenly and leave the outer edges of the tape vulnerable to damage.

Keep tapes away from electromagnetic fields.  That means keep them away from speakers & speaker cabinets which typically contain powerful magnets !  If possible label any shipping containers with a warning that magnetically sensitive material is enclosed.

Do not expose tapes to direct sunlight.

Do not drop tapes.  This can loosen or shift the pack and expose the tape surface to the elements.

Store and ship tapes on end. This prevents the tape-pack from shifting due to gravity or vibration.

Keep tapes in a humidity and climate controlled environment. The National Archive recommends a temperature range of 40F- 70F and a relative humidity (rh) range of 25% - 55% for optimum playability. Tapes stored under these conditions will last approximately 10 years. For long-term storage and archiving, a temperature range of 40F - 64F with a relative humidity between 20% & 40% is recommended. Tapes stored under these conditions should last 50+ years. It is important to note that the temperature and humidity ranges need to be relatively constant with a temperature variance of no more than 7F, and, a relative humidity variance of no more than 10%. If your tapes are shipped outside of these conditions, environmental acclimation is required. That is, if you are shipping your tapes during the winter or summer months, 1/4" and 1/2" tapes require one hour to acclimate for temperature and one full day to acclimate for relative humidity. Sony 1630 U-Matic tapes require four hours to acclimate for temperature and eight days to acclimate to relative humidity. DAT, ADAT, Exabyte and DA-88 tapes, like U-Matic tapes, also require longer to acclimate. Therefore, we ask that tapes arrive at least one day ahead of the scheduled mastering date, especially during the winter and summer months. If the session is from archival material, we like to have the tapes one week ahead of the scheduled mastering date.

Relative to the previous paragraph on storage, if you are shipping your tapes to the session, try not to ship over a weekend. Generally this means that your tapes will be sitting in a container on a loading dock or parking lot for this period of time. During the extreme cold of winter and the heat of summer, your tapes could be exposed to undesirable temperatures and humidity conditions. We recommend shipping your tapes via overnight courier Monday through Thursday.

For CDR and Magneto Optical media, even though they are less sensitive than tape, the same conditions are recommended. Obviously, protecting the media from scratches, fingerprints, and dust should be a priority.

Keep tapes away from smoke and other airborne contaminants.

For those of you traveling with or shipping tapes, the common practice of wrapping tapes in aluminum foil is of no use. Walk through x-rays and metal detectors at airports are no threat to your tapes. However, the hand-held metal detectors are a threat to your tapes. If you are going to be "wanded" at an airport security checkpoint, ask to remove the tapes and have them hand inspected. The only airport scanners that are potentially dangerous to your tapes are the new post-9/11 luggage scanners found in all major US and European airports. These detectors do emit a strong enough magnetic field to partially erase tapes. Therefore, when shipping tapes from or to overseas, always pack the tapes with 2" or more of nonmagnetic packing material around all sides. This amount of space should be enough to prevent any accidental erasure.

Most importantly, always make a safety copy of your masters prior to shipping! It is rare, but has happened, that masters have been lost or partially erased during shipment to our facility. Don't be caught without a backup in those situations. Better yet, if you have the capability to run two simultaneous masters when printing your mixes, do so. This saves a generation.



Copyright

Prior to your mastering date, if you have not already done so, you should copyright all of your compositions. This will protect you from any unauthorized performances, copies, or theft of your creative works. All of the necessary forms are available online at www.loc.gov/copyright . Fill out the form and ship, along with one copy of your recording, back to the Library of Congress with the required fee (approximately $35.)
Note - Mailing yourself a copy of music will not protect your copyright nor hold up in court !



Performing Rights

These organizations collect royalties due to both you and your publisher (if applicable.) Performing rights organizations collect money from radio and television stations, special event facilities, moving picture organizations, retail businesses, internet publishers, and jukeboxes. They then distribute the funds to the applicable publisher and artist in exchange for a small commission. All of the performing rights organizations also offer many complementary services to their members in addition royalty collection.


Click on the following links to learn more about the various organizations.

ASCAP
BMI
SESAC

Other organizations that protect, inform and assist artists:

NARAS
RIAA


CD Text & Information

CD-TEXT is an extension of the Red Book Compact Disc specifications standard for audio CDs that was created to allow storage of  information such as artist name, album title, track names and so on in the subcode of an audio CD.  Since it's release in 1996, CD-TEXT has been adopted slowly and support by many CD players and especially CD-ROM drives has been inconsistent.  Most car CD players and many multidisc players now support CD-TEXT (such as your DVD player at home).  Many computer-based media players, such as later versions of WinAmp, Realplayer, EAC, Nero and others support CD-TEXT as long as the CD-ROM drive in the computer also supports CD-TEXT.  But many popular computer applications do not utilize CD-TEXT information, most notably iTunes and Windows Media Player. They use a different method to get CD information - online databases.

Online databases are used to store CD information as well as other metadata including album art, lyrics and to provide this data to any device that has access to the database.  In fact the original online database, CDDB (created by Ti Kan and Steve Scherf), predated the release of the CD-Text spec.  The original CDDB contained CD profiles that could be accessed via the internet. Each CD profile was created by a fingerprinting process involving calculations on track start times, track duration and total length information stored in the table of contents of the CD.  If a record for the CD was not found, a new profile could be created and submitted to the database.  Now CDDB is know as Gracenote (used by iTunes) and there are many other databases available as well, most notable AMG (Lasso), Muze, freedb and MusicBrainz.  Although the CD identification process used by these databases may differ from the original CDDB process, the concept is the same and duplicate, erroneous and multiple entries do occur with some systems (especially in systems that report user-submitted data such as Gracenote & freedb.)

 

The information supplied by online databases can easily be confused with similar data stored within MP3 or AAC (iTunes format) files.  These files actually do contain metadata in the header of the file (called ID3 tags for MP3's).  This information is often supplemented using data from online databases within many applications.

What to do with your new CD's

Now that you have a bit of background what do you do to make sure your listeners can get your CD track information without digging into the liner notes? Assuming that you were careful to notify your mastering engineer of any title changes or typos so that your production CDs contain accurate CD-TEXT information, the next step is to tackle the online databases.  Unfortunately every database has a different procedure but below is a list based on the player in question:

iTunes - insert your CD, click on the first track and select 'file', then 'get info' and enter the track information (You can also click in the edit fields or, on a PC, hit [ctrl]+[I].)  When you have entered all the track information go to 'advanced', 'submit CD track names', fill in the requested information and hit [OK].   

Windows Media Player - You must send a copy of your CD to AMG.  Use the link below to get address information.

There are many players that reference the freedb database.  Visit the website to see a list of supported players you can use to submit CD information (see link below) .  Popular applications are Exact Audio Copy and Nero.


Links:

AMG(All Media Guide)


Registering with Windows and Itunes

After you take care of the CD-text, the next step is to submit your CD to the online databases to ensure that your song names and other information about your CD will appear when the CD is placed into a computer. Unfortunately every database has a different procedure but below is a list based on the player in question:

iTunes - insert your CD, click on the first track and select 'file', then 'get info' and enter the track information (You can also click in the edit fields or, on a PC, hit [ctrl]+[I].) When you have entered all the track information go to 'advanced', 'submit CD track names', fill in the requested information and hit [OK].

Windows Media Player - You must send a copy of your CD to AMG. Use the link below to get address information.




What are ISRC Codes and why register?

• For information, on why ISRC codes are important check out the Official RIAA Website

• To get your codes, click on Download Application link on the RIAA Website linked above and save it.

• Fill it in, sign it and fax it to 202-775-7253 listed the bottom of the form page.

• You will get your codes from the RIAA by email or fax. It will be a simple set of letters/numbers similar to this: US JVM or it may look like this US-JVM-06-00001 The US is the country - the 3 letters are "you" - the 06 is the year, and the number after that (00001) is the song designation number.

You only apply ONCE for a code in your country. Your code stays with you forever! You as an artist, record company, production entity, etc. keep your code (the US-JVM in the above example) and simply change the year identifier each new year. Then you just pick how you want to continue the sequence of designation numbers for any songs under your control. If you released 32 songs in 2006, you can start the next year with the designation number at 00033 or 00001 if you wish.

NOTE! • This is really easy, but you are responsible to record, store and maintain written or filed records of the code(s) that the RIAA gives you!
• You are responsible to know which songs/pieces of music you assign your individual codes to, as well as the sequence on any album or song collection you release!
• File or keep your codes in a secure place in case you ever need to refer back to them (for instance if a digital download company or other person requests your information).