Mastering Cubase or Wavelab

So I bought the mixing mastering package (with cubase 8 and wavelab 9) and Im wondering, should I master with cubase or wavelab? Should I just mix with cubase then master in wavelab? Or should i Do somethin else?

I expect you will get different answers to this, as there is maybe no hard and fast rule.

I tend to master within Cubase, usually using Izotope Ozone as my plugin of choice for final eq and maximizing on the stereo out bus. If you have a lower power processor, it may not be too happy with this as Ozone can be quite processor hungry, in which case it would be better to do final mastering later in Wavelab.
I do a lot of production music, which requires cut down lengths. Nine times out of ten I am able to produce these quickly using Wavelab from the full length master which came from Cubase. But now and again you have to go back to Cubase to produce the cut downs.
Some production music companies actually ask that composers do not master their tracks, as they prefer to do that themselves in post.
So, bottom line there is no definitive way to use these programs, it’s more all about your own preferred workflow.

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If you are going to produce a commercial CD you need to code the tracks according to a standard called “The Red Book”. That is not included in Cubase.

I find WaveLab to be easier to use when sequencing an album and to get the pauses (or no pauses) in between correct.

I also think leveleing of each track has a better GUI in Wavelab.

WabeLab has some pluggs that Cubase has not, but that is mostly for noise correction.

Cubase should work for most productions. (Don’t remember if Cubase has a band compressor)

As mentioned here iZotope is a great tool. Personally I find the enclosed presets of no use, but you have all the components that you need inside iZotope to tweak a great master for yourself. However you will get far, and even most likely to your goal with what is included in Cubase/WaveLab. It is matter of liking and on how picky you are in sound. Normally it takes years of ear training to tell the quality in one plug from another. The skill to tweak them is of more importance. 3. party pluggs ARE better (well you get what you pay for), but if you do not know how to turn the knobs you wont be able to utilize the difference. I know a guy who produces for Disney with Steinberg plugs only.

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In Cubase you make, in Wavelab you bake.

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loved it XD

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TY it helped a lot. I will stick with buying the pack wavelab/cubase and maybe after some training i will buy ozone.

Ty :3 you guys are awesome

Fred:

I don’t know how much money you want to put into it but I would like to mention some alternatives to iZotope.

There are 3 + 1 “main components” that determines a mix and a master (besides instruments and effect plugins like distortion, filter, flanger and alike). The 3 are
Panning
EQ
Reverb

Think of a mix as a room where you place the instruments. Place them so you can “see” all of them, non blocking another.

Panning to place them left to right. EQ to place them up and down (treble to bass) and reverb to place them back and forth.

Reverb should always be the same for all instruments to make a “in the same room” feeling. When I say “always” there are of course occasions when you want to deliberately deviate from that as a special effect, but then it should be by determination and not by chance. So reverb is something you set up as a bus and use “send” for (saves a lot of cpu too) while the other two are placed on each track.

For panning Cubase is, to a 99% degree, more than good enough. (slightly cumbersome if you want to record panning manually).

For EQ sound quality I find Cubase to be good enough. The GUI is however rather cumbersome. I prefer the EQ from FabFilter.

For Reverb, there is a matter of sound liking and GUI. My preferred ones are: IR live from Wavelabs, FogConvolver from Audio Thing and Valhalla vintage reverb. The two first ones are so called Convolution reverbs. For all practical reasons that means that you use more or less actual reflections that someone has recorded, and there are a ton of reflections to download for free or bought. Altiverb has the status as the “king of convolvers” but I have noe personal experience on that one. There are good reverbs in Cubase too, even a convolver, but I find it too cumbersome to use, especially for importing reflections.

The +1 is the compressor.

Think of the compressor as an “energy” facilitator. You can increase or decrease “energy” for each instrument in the mix with it. The compressor is perhaps the one of the 4 components mentioned here where it is easiest to hear differences between all alternatives on the market. I prefer Soft Tubes Tube-Tech CL 1B, but there are others very good ones too, and bear in mind that I rarely do EDM music. I am sure I would prefer another if I were.

In the master the Compressor is what gives you “punch” (think of a boxers energy). A multiband compressor could be of great use for some tracks (CL1B is not but the one in iZotope is and the one in Wavelab). It is the EQ that makes it “shiny”.

For mastering, a Limiter could also come in handy, especially if you are into more modern music, like EDM. The limiter has sound qualities like a compressor (in fact it is a compressor with a roof top limit). I prefer the ones from IK Multimedia.

For all pluggs “subtle” is normally more than enough, unless you are looking for special effects.

Dont take my word for what is “best” but perhaps to use them as a kind of starting point to find the ones that you are comfortable with. There are a lot of free stuff, but they normally don’t match up with something you pay close to 400USD for. No rules without exception and the ones from Voxengo get honorable mentioning. Many plugs give you a “try before you buy” so just go ahead and dive into the jungle!

seems to be true , but , wavelab le’s got bad tools…
Not enough for my needs…

It should be of no surprise that the stripped version of Wavelab is …eh… stripped. However through Wavelab you have access to all installed 3. party pluggs.

Well I think you are right, but, I do not like to use 3rd party plugins
And if I remember well,
My 64 version cannot use 32’s
Most plugs are 32… :confused: :confused: :confused: My Bridger was a demo…
…

Don’t understand. You are saying that Wavelab got bad tools but you do not want to use 3. party pluggs? The ones in Wavlabe are not going to get significantly better, so either you are stuck with bad ones or you need to drop your resistance towards 3. party pluggs. = ???

And btw. most pluggs are 64 bit now.

Then upgrade to Wavelab Elements 9.5. It’s just 29 bucks.

Wavelab Elements offers better plugins and tools for mastering than Cubase Elements. Wavelab LE is missing many features and most of the plugins included with Wavelab Elements.

Oh! Really! Just that! Thank you! I’ll try that soon!

Ok! I’ll try that too…

Thanks to all!

Now leaving this topic!

Bye!