PRODUCT
PRODUCT
TESTS
Nugen Audio MasterCheck Pro
By Adam Gallant
In May of 2017 , Spotify lowered its loudness target to -14 LKFS , providing its listeners with more dynamic range and fidelity – another sign that perhaps the loudness wars are behind us . With most music consumption happening via popular streaming services , mixing and mastering engineers require modernized tools that make measuring the volume information of our content thorough and tailored to streaming services .
Nugen ’ s MasterCheck Pro is a loudness measuring and metering tool that has the added benefit of simulating real-world , consumer endpoint listening . It is a tool that takes the guesswork out of optimizing mixes and masters to specifications in a loudness-normalized environment such as Spotify , Apple Music , YouTube , Pandora , Tidal , television broadcast , and more .
Hitting Loudness Targets In the world of streaming music , there is no longer a benefit to providing a “ hot ” master . The vast majority of service providers will effectively turn loud content down at playback to avoid consumers reaching for the volume knob as songs change . This means our limited-to-as-loud-as-possible mixes will end up sounding dull and lacking dynamics / transients when piped down to listeners via the most popular streaming services .
Nugen MasterCheck Pro makes it easy to pull up a variety of popular loudness targets and gives the engineer the full advantage of mixing and mastering with the increased dynamics that would otherwise be lost to the loudness normalization process . The target loudness is dependent on the plug-in ’ s selected preset , and Master- Check allows for user presets with custom targets to easily be created in the settings section .
Measuring Dynamics With MasterCheck on your master buss , as audio plays , the plug-in will measure the program loudness . This value is continually updated and displays a reading for all the audio measured since the last reset . By default , MasterCheck will reset the meter every time playback is stopped and then restarted .
MasterCheck displays loudness measurements in LKFS and peak-to-loudness ratio ( PLR ) in both vertical bar format and numerical values . It displays the standard short – term loudness meter on the left , a peak-to-loudness ratio indicator bar , and a stereo true peak meter ( which reveals inter-sample peaks ) on the right . There is also a switch for mid-side display and customizable colour indicators for user-defined workflows .
Avoid Clipping Music streaming service providers use compression codecs to reduce file size and bandwidth . The amount of compression can be dependant on connection quality / bandwidth , your subscription tier ( as in Spotify Premium allowing higher resolution downloads at 320 kbps vs . their standard stream of 160 kbps ), and the type of codec used ( MP3 , AAC , Ogg Vorbis , etc .).
Nugen MasterCheck Pro allows producers to hear what mixes and masters will sound like through a wide variety of codecs and compression levels , all the while displaying clips with its inter-sample true-peak metering . Note that this feature is only available via MasterCheck Pro and not the regular version . A nice design element of this Pro feature is that the plug-in can display up to five codecs simultaneously , speeding up the QA process .
A / B Your Mixes This plug-in also has a quick way to compare your material to other commercial mixes with an external reference input . By simply importing audio into your session and placing the included Nugen Send plug-in on that channel , MasterCheck will display loudness information from the send in the target loudness area . External references can also be monitored for tone matching commercially released material to your work-in-progress master . Also , this tool can be used to normalize your mix buss processing to your untreated mix buss . This takes the guesswork out of level matching your mix buss compression when A / Bing the untreated mix to the processed mix . A / Bing has become an important part of our studio ’ s QA process when mastering music . This plug-in allows us to quickly and more accurately measure and compare our reference material to the job at-hand .
Summary Nugen MasterCheck Pro is a tool that encompasses the most up-to-date codecs and end user listening experiences , right inside your DAW . No more surprises when your material starts streaming via YouTube . Producers and engineers can now quickly deliver masters for specific outlets that are fully optimized for lack of clipping and appropriate loudness , retaining depth and fidelity . This product is a reminder that today ’ s standards for loudness normalization reward dynamic masters and mixes . I can see this tool being very useful for not only music producers , but also podcast creators who often suffer from poor-quality audio caused by heavy compression from streaming services . This simulated consumer listening , in my opinion , is what puts Nugen MasterCheck Pro at the head of the pack in terms of metering and finalizing .
Adam Gallant has worked in all facets of digital audio production , from music composition to location and post audio for television and film . He currently owns and operates The
Hill Sound Studio in Charlottetown , PE .
24 PROFESSIONAL SOUND