LIMITING & DITHERING (with Slate Digital FG-X)

During this course, students will find two sections on limiting and dithering. The first section focusses on Slate Digital’s FG-X. The second sections looks at the important aspect pf dithering in more detail.

It is impossible to overstate the importance of the final mastering stage when mixing, as it can make or break a recording.

The FG-X Mastering Processor is Slate Digital’s award-winning mastering plugin that combines an ultra-transparent compressor, the industry’s most coveted loudness enhancer, and a comprehensive metering panel.

FG-X can make your mixes louder without altering the dynamics, removing punch, or skewing your mix balances.

The FG-Level Loudness enhancer module uses a proprietary process called “Intelligent Transient Preservation”, or ITP.

ITP looks ahead at your mix peaks and optimizes a custom saturation curve that best preserves its characteristics.

For example, if it sees a kick drum, it will create a saturation curve that best preserves low end energy.

If it sees a snare drum, it will saturate it with a curve that best retains midrange punch.

Overall, the ITP will keep your mixes punchy and dynamic while making them competitively loud.

Dynamic Perception is a process that will simulate more dynamics in your mix, which can be helpful in the loudness process as dynamics are reduced

It’s a very powerful control that can really help retain the original dynamics of your mix, or even add a bit more.

Lo Punch can raise the level of the low-end punch of the mix (like the kick drum level, for instance) while Detail will raise the level of the high-end punch (such as a snare drum).

These controls are intended to be used to customize the amount of transient articulation in the final master.

The FG-Comp is a world-class mastering compressor and leveler, capable of extremely transparent compression that is unrivaled in both the digital and analog domains.