All Record Labels Should Try Low Cost Online Mastering - An Insight

Mastering of music has typically cost GBP 50.00- GBP 120.00 per track, this is an essential procedure at the end of the audio production process but also a considerable expense. Many record labels will entrust their mastering to an engineer with which they have worked with for a number of years. This is understandable and of course this familiarity has benefits. A trustworthy engineer who can provide consistent results. However as we all know the budgets within the music industry have shrunk considerably as the industry has adapted to the challenges that the internet and online distribution has necessitated.With this change there has been an adapting model within the operation of mastering studios, namely online mastering. This type of mastering is a model whereby mixed tracks are sent to an online mastering studio to be sonically sweetened, adjusted for best translation across music playback systems and compiled onto a CD Pre-Master ready for duplication. The major benefit of this model of mastering is that online mixing and mastering costs can be as little as a 1/5th of a typical attended mastering studio. Many labels will instantly think that there must be serious corner cutting for this pricing to be achievable. It has to be said that there is certainly a great many online mastering facilities which will not have the engineer experience to legitimately master the music to a high standard, in addition there needs to be great care in choosing the online mastering studio as there are some inexperienced operators (as with any industry). I put forward the case for online mastering which is low cost and assists record labels in making maximum profits against the investment in their artist rosters.