Sincere Apology To Ozone 4

[Claude G.]

Mea Culpa! I bad-mouthed Izotope's Ozone 4, when it was MY LACK OF KNOWLEDGE that couldn't work the magic in it.....the program is worth every penny even if you are only using ONE of the many dozen of amazing voices it has!!!! Sorry guys, I LOVE THIS THING and can't say enough good things about it!!!!!!

[masterizer]

Originally Posted by Claude G.

Mea Culpa! I bad-mouthed Izotope's Ozone 4, when it was MY LACK OF KNOWLEDGE that couldn't work the magic in it.....the program is worth every penny even if you are only using ONE of the many dozen of amazing voices it has!!!! Sorry guys, I LOVE THIS THING and can't say enough good things about it!!!!!!

Ozone 4 ≠ Mastering

[donsolo]

I'm going to disagree with you on this Masterizer.

It's not the tools that make the Mastering Engineer but the person. If that person uses Ozone and still masters sound recordings, then that is still Mastering.

Quality obviously is not part of this definition.

[engmix]

version 4 is excellent. although, i think the high end eq is not refined enough.

[Joe_caithness]

nice to see someone else is unhappy with the top end processing on this once.

Come on guys its 150 quid. it's worth it just for the mid side and stereo tweaking.

It's probably worth it for the metering and spectral analysis.

[JSG]

Originally Posted by masterizer

Ozone 4 ≠ Mastering

Where in Claude's post does he equate Ozone 4 with Mastering?

[357mag]

Originally Posted by JSG

Where in Claude's post does he equate Ozone 4 with Mastering?

He doesn't. But Ozone is marketed as a mastering suite.

[Recording David]

And his message is posted in the mastering forum

[JSG]

Originally Posted by 357mag

He doesn't. But Ozone is marketed as a mastering suite.

I understand this is the "Mastering Forum". But, I would guess that the majority of this Forum's membership are musicians learning how to engineer their own projects, in their home studios, using less than the professional gear used in Pro studios. A small percentage of those are really working full-time at their music with true hopes of "making it". Many are simply hobbyists who just enjoy making music and recording it themselves with no serious intentions of releasing a commercial project. Do you really expect those to pop for a professional ME? Many of us enjoy learning all aspects audio production, and tools like Ozone or T-Racks 3 make it a little easier to learn what "Mastering" is all about, experiment on our own music, and hopefully have a little success with the final product. What is so wrong with that?

I had owned my own studio for years but sold it several years ago. Now retired, I still write music and record in my DAW, amazed at the tools available today that was not available to me when I started years ago. I know the importance of a professional mastering job, and I would seriously recommend anyone preparing for a commercial release to spend the additional money and use an experienced ME. But for the rest of us, I encourage the use of these products. Will they do a professional job? Probably not, but in the right hands they can be useful. The magic comes from the ME/engineer, not the gear.

Sorry for the long response

[keepitsimple]

Originally Posted by engmix

although, i think the high end eq is not refined enough.

I agree. The EQ is the only module in Ozone 4 that i think it needed better refinement. So i was forced to always go back to PSP Master Q for that matter.

Other than that, the product is amazing.

and the " Mastering with Ozone" guide is VERY helpful .

[lowland]

I've been happy with Ozone 4 just giving a little extra loudness (rarely more than 1.5dB in my case, more usually 0.5-1) to finish things off, I also like the spread of colour choices and the Intelligent II algorithm. I've not so far used modules other than the loudness maximizer much, and am not that interested in them as far as my own workflow is concerned though I can see they're decent enough tools.

For me the Elephant limiter can be useful on less agressive material, but I've found it rather veiling with rock using straightforward settings and am uninclined to tweak much - perhaps I'm asking a lot, but I really want a limiter to be set-and-forget when I require so little GR; Ozone, although probably not the only limiter I'll ever need, is the closest to that ideal I've so far found.

[keepitsimple]

Elephant is good and Sonnox Limiter is awesome too.

I've started to include it in my Mastering Rack recently which consists of:

1- PSP Master Q
2- PSP Mastercomp
3- Sonnox Limiter or PSP Vintage warmer (depends on the mix ).

[masterizer]

Originally Posted by donsolo

I'm going to disagree with you on this Masterizer.

It's not the tools that make the Mastering Engineer but the person. If that person uses Ozone and still masters sound recordings, then that is still Mastering.

Quality obviously is not part of this definition.

I agree that the Mastering Engineer is essential but, a majority of the people that use ozone consider it to be the "mastering" step. What do the presets say? "mastering" "cd-master" "hot master" ect. Alot of people that buy ozone for "mastering" don't even know what mastering is, they don't tweak it and just scroll through presets. Personally I dislike the eq because it has an fft, if your eyes are making better judgments than your ears, its time to find a new field.

[sanddigger1]

Originally Posted by masterizer

Personally I dislike the eq because it has an fft, if your eyes are making better judgments than your ears, its time to find a new field.

There's an option to turn the FFT display of the EQ off.
Ozone is very tweakable, it is an handy little toolbox. It is easy to use it bad, but once you've learned that magic boxes dont exist and that you dont have to use everything at the same time just because it's there, some modules added to the right signal chain may be very useful.

[camerondye]

I love the new limiter (Intelligent II) in Ozone 4, clearer than 3...very nice. I usually only use the limiter, metering and the dithering but need to try the rest on 4 just to be able to talk intelligently about it. I did mess with the Harmonic Exciter and you can turn it on without it being absolutely awful which is a big step in the right direction. Haven't used the M/S mode yet, but it will be a lifesaver when I need it. Also it's great that they have added the K-System metering...very cool.

Great Product
cam

[357mag]

I've only used Ozone a little so far but am impressed with what it contains. But I would like to take this opportunity to ask you what is the difference between the Compressor and the Loudness Maximizer. Seems to me they accomplish the same thing.

[borg64]

I'm sure you already knew this, but just in case someone missed it:

You can increase Ozone's frequency resolution at the expense of more CPU. It's called Filter size and can be found under Options, and works for the Digital and Matching modes. The default value is quite low, and although some of it might be mind tricks, I really like this EQ with this setting maxed out, as long as I stick with 'less is more'. Latency shoots through the roof though.

[mljung]

Originally Posted by borg64

You can increase Ozone's frequency resolution at the expense of more CPU. It's called Filter size and can be found under Options, and works for the Digital and Matching modes. The default value is quite low, and although some of it might be mind tricks, I really like this EQ with this setting maxed out, as long as I stick with 'less is more'. Latency shoots through the roof though.

That's true, but you should know that there's a bug at the moment that leaves an echo if you use high filter sizes in M-S mode. I'm told from iZotope support that an update is on it's way.

[macc]

Originally Posted by lowland

For me the Elephant limiter can be useful on less agressive material, but I've found it rather veiling with rock using straightforward settings and am uninclined to tweak much - perhaps I'm asking a lot, but I really want a limiter to be set-and-forget when I require so little GR

Set the EL-Dyn thingy off, transient time (? middle knob anyway) to min, trans shape (? right knob) to max. That's the best start, just save it as a preset and then set your GR

[lowland]

Originally Posted by macc

Set the EL-Dyn thingy off, transient time (? middle knob anyway) to min, trans shape (? right knob) to max. That's the best start, just save it as a preset and then set your GR

Thanks Macc, helpful as always.

[keepitsimple]

Originally Posted by macc

Set the EL-Dyn thingy off, transient time (? middle knob anyway) to min, trans shape (? right knob) to max. That's the best start, just save it as a preset and then set your GR

Or you can just chug PSP vintage warmer on the master bus, choose the preset "Mix finalize 1" , turn the ceiling to -0.01, output to -0.01, lower the "drive" knob to 4, set the speed knob to 30, turn off "Fat" mode and adjust the high and low frequencies to you taste.

Done.

[macc]

Originally Posted by lowland

Thanks Macc, helpful as always.

I am aware of repeating myself ad nauseum on this bit, but that el-dyn thing is IMO the source of all the 'trouble' - it should be off by default IMO. It's all about El-dyn off, then jiggling the release and trans time/shape knobs. The balance of those three is the key.

I only use the El-Dyn when going for extreme GR, I set everything else up for minimum distotion/best sound and choose from modes 1-5 according to what sounds best on the material.

To put it another way, that 'veiling' is very useful when going for high GR.

Aaaaaanyway....

[borg64]

Originally Posted by mljung

That's true, but you should know that there's a bug at the moment that leaves an echo if you use high filter sizes in M-S mode. I'm told from iZotope support that an update is on it's way.

I hardly ever use M-S in Ozone, always thought it made something sound very iffy and kinda suspected I was doing it wrong. Now I know why, thanks for the info.

[Claude G.]

Originally Posted by JSG

I understand this is the "Mastering Forum". But, I would guess that the majority of this Forum's membership are musicians learning how to engineer their own projects, in their home studios, using less than the professional gear used in Pro studios. A small percentage of those are really working full-time at their music with true hopes of "making it". Many are simply hobbyists who just enjoy making music and recording it themselves with no serious intentions of releasing a commercial project. Do you really expect those to pop for a professional ME? Many of us enjoy learning all aspects audio production, and tools like Ozone or T-Racks 3 make it a little easier to learn what "Mastering" is all about, experiment on our own music, and hopefully have a little success with the final product. What is so wrong with that?

I had owned my own studio for years but sold it several years ago. Now retired, I still write music and record in my DAW, amazed at the tools available today that was not available to me when I started years ago. I know the importance of a professional mastering job, and I would seriously recommend anyone preparing for a commercial release to spend the additional money and use an experienced ME. But for the rest of us, I encourage the use of these products. Will they do a professional job? Probably not, but in the right hands they can be useful. The magic comes from the ME/engineer, not the gear.

Sorry for the long response

BINGO! That is exacly my situation.......and at 60...I'm not expecting anyone in their right mind to "discover me" and declare that I am the next Miles....I have been making quite a great living as a Lawyer for the past 32 years!!!!

[JPeters86]

I only use the limiter actually which I really like. The other stuff didn't really get me going. I usually take off some peaks with T-Racks soft clipper and then limit 2-3 db in the loudest parts with Ozone.

[aleatoric]

I like the limiter as well (in intelligent II mode). Sounds really nice to my ears.

[lerone]

I think most mastering engineers could knock out a stellar sounding album with Ozone or Tracks, providing the conversion, louspeakers, amp, room ect was tip top. Its not quite the same as hardware, I know, but truly professional results can be achieved with the know how.

[JSG]

Originally Posted by Claude G.

BINGO! That is exacly my situation.......and at 60...I'm not expecting anyone in their right mind to "discover me" and declare that I am the next Miles....I have been making quite a great living as a Lawyer for the past 32 years!!!!

Thanks Claude, at least someone agrees with my little rant. Because of the economy and the proliferation of home studios over the last two decades (not to mention an increasingly competitive music industry) I can understand the need for ME's to look at Ozone and T- Racks with more than a little disdain. They are trying to make a legitimate living while having compete with those of us who think we can do the job at home. However, they also need to realize as long as companies develop Mastering Software programs there will be people eager to buy and use it. Like you, I'm up there in years (61), and just have a blast making music. I also had a lucrative professional career that allows me the ability to immserse myself in all of this music technology.

[camerondye]

Originally Posted by 357mag

I've only used Ozone a little so far but am impressed with what it contains. But I would like to take this opportunity to ask you what is the difference between the Compressor and the Loudness Maximizer. Seems to me they accomplish the same thing.

They are completely different deals....

The compressor is a multi-band compressor able to set up to 4 different compression settings for up to 4 different areas of the sound spectrum. You can also run the compression in Mid/Side mode for some more options on a stereo track.

The limiter chops off the top off in order to get the volume up and also includes the dither, the max volume point, the character of the limiter and DC Offset.

It's definitely a good thing they are separate because I rarely use the MB compressor and love the Loudness Maximizer/Dither.
cam

[Claude G.]

Originally Posted by JSG

Thanks Claude, at least someone agrees with my little rant. Because of the economy and the proliferation of home studios over the last two decades (not to mention an increasingly competitive music industry) I can understand the need for ME's to look at Ozone and T- Racks with more than a little disdain. They are trying to make a legitimate living while having compete with those of us who think we can do the job at home. However, they also need to realize as long as companies develop Mastering Software programs there will be people eager to buy and use it. Like you, I'm up there in years (61), and just have a blast making music. I also had a lucrative professional career that allows me the ability to immserse myself in all of this music technology.

Amen! NOT everyone who loves music and is involved in it in one way or another is some dreamy-eyed artist waiting to be discovered and "make it big". Some of us (I suspect many in this forum..) just love music & want to create something themselves; whether the ultimate recording is "pro" or not is immaterial......