3 replies to this topic

[dylab]

anyone have any tips for master audio for dvd's
I would like to get an idea of maximum levels thats safe to use

[niktu]

Are you planning to master for 5.1 or sterero?

Well, if you're doing 5.1, like stereo digital audio, -0.01dB Full Scale might be a safe maximum peak level for the 5 full bandwidth channels but the bass (the .1 of 5.1) channel is a different ball game that I haven't fully grasped yet. In an attempt to round off my surround and general mastering knowledge, I've armed myself with Bob Katz 'Mastering Audio':
http://www.amazon.co...=dp_ob_title_bk
http://www.soundonso...les/bobkatz.htm

I was planning to read up on the 5.1 mastering sections regarding bass management. I've done a bit of surround stuff but bass management for 5.1 has been a trial and error thing for me. I need to do some more reading in that area.

Sorry it's a bit of a half-arsed answer but there you go.

Regards to how you master well, like stereo mastering, that will depend on the material you're mastering. Does the audio need to have a big dynamic range - ala special effects, explosions, etc, soundscapes perhaps or are you just whacking some heavy-arsed rock or pop on a DVD? Bogan mastering (brick wall limiting) has been covered elsewhere in the forum but wouldn't be appropriate for film music as a rule of thumb.

I'm not sure if this is what you wanted but it's how I interpreted the question. Hope it helps.

Cheers

[dylab]

its for stereo
what it is, are a set of digital storytelling projects that my students have done over 3 years and I want to compile into 1 disc, and the levels are all different and audio quality of each recording is different as some were recorded on minidisc with shit mic, some in a studio and some on a zoom h4 with nice lapel mic, so want to get levels all the same, clean up some of voice, maybe cut some of lower end boom - also is there a max level these should be set ? should it be a zero db in the daw like tunes or like bradcast -14 to -18 range

cheers

[niktu]

If you want to roll your sleeves up, you probably should EQ, de-ess, de-pop, compress and limit each piece individually (rather than batch process) and then adjust peak levels last once the individual mastering has been done.  Some voices might sound thin and distant, others might sound full and loud so, you'll probably need to get in and EQ and compress like hell individually.

My first thought was to set the peak level to 0dB (or -0.01dB for the definite safety of no overs) but that could be too loud for voice only. Would love to hear some opinion from others on this. 

For setting peaks for music:
Ideally, I think everything should be mastered together and compared for spectral reference and relative volumes. For example, if you have say, an acoustic guitar piece followed by say a 'full band' piece, you might want the acoustic guitar piece to sit a couple of dB under 0dB so it doesn't appear to 'jump out' as much when you listen to the two pieces back to back. I would master the loudest piece to -0.01dBFS and then use it to reference the volume of the other songs and adjust those accordingly. This way, everything should sound like they're at similar volumes when listening to the whole DVD.

What you plan to do is no mean feat to do properly.