In this article Julian Rodgers shares 6 suggestions for mastering on the tightest of budgets, zero, using nothing but free plugins.

The value available using just free plugins is remarkable. Although the facilities offered by the stock plugins available in DAWs such as Pro Tools and Logic Pro are impressive, there are free options out there that complement and sometimes surpass what you will find in stock plugins.

In this article, we focus on tools useful for those seeking to master their tracks at home. While we always recommend getting someone else involved at the mastering stage, the popularity of self-mastering is undeniable and there are lots of tools available to help you. We are also going to concentrate on plugins that are available in AAX format, as well as other plugin formats. If you don’t need AAX there are even more options available.

Flux Stereo Tool V3

Pro Tools hasn’t had a phase scope bundled with it since version 10 and being able to check for out-of-phase content is important.

However, this plugin does much more than display phase information. The Width and Pan sliders allow you to check mono compatibility, centre stereo information and increase the width, with a dedicated phase meter that will let you know if you are in danger of over-widening material.

This plugin is a must for Pro Tools users and very worthwhile for users of any DAW. How wide is too wide? This plugin will help you tell the difference.

TDR Nova

In a pro mastering house, you’ll see high-quality EQ from the likes of Maselec, Manley and Weiss. These (really expensive) equalisers are as flexible as they are sweet-sounding. Of course, many pro mastering engineers favour software and there is no shortage of software equivalents to these big-ticket hardware equalisers.

The free plugin which does more to comprehensively challenge the accepted wisdom of “premium equals quality” is Nova from TDR. This parallel dynamic EQ can cover tasks from surgical EQ for homing in on very specific resonances, through dynamic EQ, only cutting frequencies when they exceed a certain level, through to multiband or even wideband compression.

I know of at least one respected mastering engineer who uses Nova in preference to premium plugins and hardware - it’s that good.

Sonimus SonEQ

Not all EQ tasks require a scalpel, some are more broad-brush and in the same way as there is a place for both a GML and a Pultec in a studio, there is a place for a flavour/vibe EQ in this list as well as the all-powerful TDR Nova.

The SonEQ from Sonimus is the ideal complement to Nova, offering as it does a three-band EQ with a Pultec style boost/attenuate low band, which does the Pultec low-end trick rather well, a nearly-parametric mid-band and a high shelf with a choice of frequencies. The separate Drive control allows you to drive a virtual valve for harmonic colour, if needed, too.

TDR Kotelnikov

When it comes to compression, for mastering the lazy optical compressor or the edgy FET design you might favour for mixing, might not be the best choice.

Assuming that the desired amount of ‘glue’ has been applied to the mix bus, a mastering compressor is more likely to be called upon to perform more precise tasks.

For this, we return to TDR and their Kotelnikov compressor. This compressor has several features which make it perfect for mastering including a flexible sidechain filter to allow you to control the influence of the bass on the gain reduction, a very fast response for catching transients, a delta (difference) button allowing you to audition exactly what is being affected by the gain reduction and a very interesting ‘Crest Factor’ based control scheme offering independent release controls for peak and RMS events.

It’s not an emulation of a hardware compressor, it’s pure digital and it’s ideal for the kind of compression tasks you might need at the mastering stage.

LVC Audio Limited-Z

The loudness wars might be over but that doesn’t mean that mastering engineers aren’t still making tracks loud, just not that loud!

A limiter is still very much a requirement and it’s important to be able to balance the benefits of limiting against the inevitable harm of going too far.

Limited Z is a free limiter that includes a scrolling waveform display with gain-reduction history of the kind you might find in FabFilter plugins. With switchable algorithms, don’t try to move the XY pad control, that’s reserved for the paid-for version, you can select different modes and see the results in the XY pad though.

The only fly in the ointment is a limited range of three preset ceiling levels, all of which are very hot for material that is going to pass through lossy compression algorithms. To get a fully variable ceiling control you need the paid-for version.

Youlean Loudness Meter 2

Loudness measurement is no longer something that only people working in post-production need to worry about.

The major streaming platforms are all on board with loudness normalisation and if your track is too loud it will be attenuated to meet the loudness specs of that particular streaming platform. This so-called ‘loudness penalty’ means that if your track has sacrificed dynamic range for maximum level all that will happen is that your track will be the same level as everyone else’s, just with less dynamic range.

You can only accurately judge how your track will translate onto streaming platforms if you have a loudness meter, something DAWs have been slow to include as a stock plugin. The Youlean Loudness meter provides all the metrics you need to get meaningful measurements in LUFS. The scrolling display tracks integrated measurements and if you regularly upload to streaming platforms the paid-for Pro version offers presets for streaming platforms like Spotify, YouTube, Apple Music and Tidal.

Mastering is about doing only what is necessary and making good decisions based on accurate monitoring and a fresh perspective. Great gear helps but as this list shows, there are options out there for every budget, including no budget!