About
Recording
Original
MacArthur
Mastering
mastering
for submitting
mixes
submission
guidelines
and credits
Arthur Winer
Services
Music
the band
STEP 1: Transferring Your Source Materials
You must own or control the copyrights for all materials you submit.
STEP 1: Transferring Your Source Materials
Ideally, your mixes should not contain fade-ins or fade-outs, nor should they have been processed with stereo-bus compression/limiting. (It's OK if they contain these things; it's just not ideal).
If your mixes are in an uncompressed, high-quality digital format (DAT, CD-R, CD, Sound Designer II files, etc.), then we transfer them digitally into our computer for editing and premastering. We strongly feel that the benefits of remaining in the digital realm (lower noise floor, lack of conversion degradation) far outweigh the benefits of going back into analog.
If your mixes are in a data-reduced, lower-quality digital format (Mini-Disc, MP3 files, etc.), then we typically convert them to analog, then back into digital through our high-quality 24 bit converters. Although we will master from these formats, we strongly recommend against using lower-quality digital formats for your final mixes. Nonetheless, if you do mix to these formats, we still do everything in our power to make your premaster sound as professional as those from other sources.
If your mixes are in an analog format (cassette, 33 1/3 RPM record, 45 RPM record, etc.) we will make extremely high-quality 24 bit analog-to-digital conversions using Panasonic converters.
STEP 2: Enhancing Your Mixes
Your mixes will sound good on an audiophile's $20,000 stereo as well as on a tin-can transistor radio. They will be competitively loud enough to stand out in the juke box of your favorite bar or on the radio.
If you request it, Arthur will apply noise reduction techniques to fix source materials that you deem noisy. This step is often necessary to fix problems from consumer-quality source materials such as cassettes and records. Arthur can also use these techniques to reclaim mixes done on outdated or older formats. Regardless of the source, Arthur will apply these techniques in a way that preserves as many of the key qualities of the source materials as possible.
If you request, Arthur can apply a variety of unusual techniques (for mastering) such as adding reverb, de-essing sibilant vocals, and manipulating the "air" of a recording.
STEP 3: Editing
STEP 4: Applying Dither and Burning the Premaster
STEP 5 (Optional but FREE!): MP3 encoding
STEP 6: You Listen to (and Love!) the Reference Premaster
Our Guarantee of Quality: Need more information? Find out how to shape up your mixes before getting them mastered, and get information on Canaveral Skies Music's pricing structure. Or call (626) 796-6992 for more information.
If your mixes are in an uncompressed, high-quality digital format
If your mixes are in a data-reduced, lower-quality digital format
If your mixes are in an analog format
STEP 2: Enhancing Your Mixes
STEP 3: Editing
STEP 4: Applying Dither and Burning the Premaster
STEP 5 (Optional but FREE!): MP3 encoding
STEP 6: You Listen to (and Love!) the Reference Premaster
Canaveral Skies Music's Guarantee of Quality
Canaveral Skies Music will not knowingly work with bootlegged or stolen materials.
You provide us with the 2-track mixes of your songs on DAT, CD-R, CD, cassette, record, disk or other pre-approved (call us!) format. The songs should be in the order you would like for them to appear on the premaster and/or you should provide us with a chronological list. We strongly recommend that you make a copy of these mixes then send us the original.
Once your audio is in our computers, mastering engineer Arthur Winer will listen to each song individually and make subtle (or, if you request, extreme) adjustments to its equalization and stereo imaging. If necessary, he will apply gentle multi-band dynamics processing (compression and limiting) to insure that your mix contains the loudness, clarity, and punch necessary to help it compete with (and surpass!) other professionally mastered CDs.
Mastering engineer Arthur Winer will take your enhanced mixes and edit them together in the order your suggest. He will make educated assessments of how long the gaps between the songs (if any) will be. If you request them, Arthur will apply fade-ins and fade-outs at this time.
Finally, mastering engineer Arthur Winer will add dither and convert the 24-bit audio down to the Redbook CD standard of 16-bit, 44.1 kHz digital audio. He will then burn a real-time (1x) CD-R reference for your approval.
This service is FREE to all of our clients! If you would like, mastering engineer Arthur Winer will make Internet-ready MP3 files from your premaster. He will provide you with these on a separate disk. If you want your music to be downloaded from the Internet, then you should take advantage of this invaluable service.
We will send you a 1x reference CD-R that is an exact clone of what we will send to a duplication house. If you approve the premaster, then we will ship another 1x premaster CD-R to the duplication house of your choice. (If you'd like, we can recommend a few duplication houses).
If you require changes to the premaster, or if for any reason you are not satisfied, mastering engineer Arthur Winer will provide you with one additional version at no extra charge. We offer this as an alternative to a money-back guarantee because a premaster, by its very nature, can be duplicated whether or not we've been paid. We will, however, return your money in full if for some reason we are unable to complete the work.
All materials © Copyright 2000-2005 Canaveral Skies Music.
All rights reserved. info@canaveralskies.com