Bouncing album formatted session?

[Soul El]

Shot in the dark+ finding minimal results, having never been to school for anything about this, I'm not sure where to start. I have several tracks I would like to create an album with (in house) and aside from leveling details and such, I would love a point in the right direction to the splitting and bounce (if all in one file) or individual process to conjoin said tracks to coincide to a familiar title creating a group (album). I have audacity and use it mostly for converting but other options are available, not exactly sure what to look for yet. Thx for the help, its appreciated.

[Soul El]

I'm just trying to cut an album. Is there a direction or link someone can help point me to? thx

[albee1952]

A few things to consider here:
1-Pro Tools is not a great mastering environment, and has no features for creating a final audio CD.

2-what are the session settings for bit depth and sample rate? Audio CD requires 16 bit/44.1K. If your sessions are at any other setting, take note as it will matter in a minute.

3-are you going to have the audio mastered? If yes, then bounce at the session settings and let the mastering engineer deal with dither and SRC(among other details)

4-if you are doing it all yourself, how are you dealing with mastering? Are you attempting to master AND mix at the same time?(something I don't recommend)

My preference is to bounce the best mix of each song at the session settings(24 bit 48K for most of my work). I open the stereo files in Wavelab and do any mastering(usually a Hi-pass, a warming stage with a tape sim plugin, brick wall limiter-usually Waves L2, for overall volume, and finally a dither plugin). I render all that and save as a 16 bit/44.1K interleaved wave file. Then, for burning a CD, I start a new CD in Wavelab and add the tracks in the proper order, and burn(Wavelab is one of several programs that are made to create audio CD's)

[Soul El]

Wavelab aye? OK.
Yes all in house no sending of tracks. I believe I have all the necessary plug ins I would need for a decent master. I have a Hi pass, tape warmth plug in, L2 and a dither, so what the hell right? lol Never done it before and I should be ready by next weekend. I own all the project files, so if I need to bounce pre Vitamin or L316/ L6 or Maxxvolume I can always go back in the file and do so. Will wavelab ELEMENTS provide a decent platform, or is it missing necessary parts?

[waltz mastering]

Once you get your files mastered,.. check out Hofa for assembly and burning the ddp or pmcd.
http://hofa-plugins.de/pages/start_e...p#player_maker gl

[albee1952]

I think WL Elements will do all you need. but it(IIRC) doesn't have too many insert slots, so you may need to process in 2 stages. 1 word of advice on limiters(like L2), don't let it squash more the 2-3db. If you still want/need more loudness, add a 2nd L2(I have gone as far as 3 in a row). Letting each do SOME of the work ends up sounding nicer than a single limiter that's set "to kill".

[Soul El]

Thank you guys for all the help, I picked up a copy of CD Archetect for now hoping its a decent purchase. I'll have to take a closer look at the HOFA, and thanks for the L2 advice, makes perfect sence to stage. I'm new to this side of the process and I'm shocked that I dont know anyone who knows anything about this side of things. lol damn musicians, all they wanna do is play and sound good. Shocker. lol

[waltz mastering]

CD Architect should do the trick for what you need. gl

[albee1952]

CD Architect That's another good one

[Soul El]

Thank you guys for your help, its very much appreciated.