Matchering by SOUND.TOOLS

We're glad to share source code of closed Matchering project by SOUND.TOOLS to you.

Matchering was a novel online mastering service with a simple idea - you should upload 2 tracks:

• TARGET (the track which you want to master, yours or not yours, you want it sounds like the reference);
• REFERENCE (another track, yours or not yours, you want your target sounds like it);

The result of Matchering is the TARGET track with the same RMS, FR, peak amplitude, stereo width as the REFERENCE track has.

This information was at our site:

We developed the unique automatic flexible processing algorithm, which offers a novel online mastering experience, where you show us: how your track should sound by sending the REFERENCE.

Matchering will make your track sounds like you want:

• 1st step - To match characteristics of your TARGET and the REFERENCE tracks;
• 2nd step - To master your TARGET track with the REFERENCE track's mastering settings.

It opens a wide range of opportunities:

• You can make your track instantly sounds like your favorite artist's;
• You can make all the tracks of your new album to sound the same very quickly;
• You can find new aspects of your sound in experiments;
• You can do everything as you want, because of: Your References, Your Rules.

And now you can make your own Matchering at home. Let's begin!

Installation Prerequisites

OS

Microsoft Windows 64-bit (for setup with sound limiting), or any OS which MATLAB supports.

Basic Software

• MATLAB (tested on 2016a and newer);
• Signal Processing Toolbox for MATLAB;
• Curve Fitting Toolbox for MATLAB.

With this setup you will get results without sound limiting. If you have some brickwall limiter plug-in in your DAW, you may use it with these results.

(Optional) If you want automated sound limiting, get this:

• (Optional) mrswatson64.exe from MrsWatson;
• (Optional) Some brickwall limiter VST2x64 DLL - original Matchering used Elephant.dll from Voxengo Elephant.

Why didn't we make limiting in MATLAB?

Making own quality brickwall limiting algorithm is very huge subject. And we had no time for it.

Usage

1. Get our scripts;
2. Place them in some place like C:\matchering;
3. Edit runscript.m:
   • pathWorkspace is the path to your tracks, for e.g. 'C:\matchering\workspace\';
   • fileTarget is your TARGET track, for e.g. 'target.wav' (supported formats);
   • fileReference is your REFERENCE track, for e.g. 'reference.wav' (supported formats);
   • pathTemp is the path for internal temp files, for e.g. 'C:\matchering\temp\';
   • pathBin is the path with mrswatson64.exe and some brickwall limiter VST2x64 DLL, for e.g. 'C:\matchering\bin\', keep it blank if you setup without sound limiting, like '';
   • (Optional) fileBrickwallLimiter is the name of brickwall limiter VST2x64 DLL, ignored if pathBin is blank;
   • Note: leave \ in the end of all path variables, also these folders must exist and MATLAB should have proper folder permissions;
   • Other DSP variables keep as is;
4. Run run.bat or runconsole.bat;
5. After processing your result file(s) will be in pathWorkspace folder.

If you have sound limiting setup, you will get two WAV files: limited 24-bit and 16-bit.

Otherwise you will get only one WAV file: not limited 32-bit floating point for future limiting in DAW.

Error Codes

Our matchering.m module returns an integer that indicates a process, a success or a specific error.

Code	Meaning
2	In queue for processing
3	Loading and analysing
4	Matching levels
5	Matching frequencies
6	Correcting levels
7	Final processing and saving
8	Export in various audio formats
9	Task complete
30	Audio stream error in both files!
31	Audio stream error in target file!
32	Audio stream error in reference file!
33	Track length exceeded in both files!
34	Track length exceeded in target file!
35	Track length exceeded in reference file!
36	Number of channels exceeded in both files!
37	Number of channels exceeded in target file!
38	Number of channels exceeded in reference file!
39	Track length is too small in both files!
40	Track length is too small in target file!
41	Track length is too small in reference file!
42	Track length exceeded in reference file and too small in target file!
43	Track length exceeded in target file and too small in reference file!

Donate

If our script saved your time or money, you may support us.

Thank you!

Our Thoughts

Why can't such online service be succeed nowadays?

• Very little potential audience. Let's explain: all audio people (100%) minus audio novices who don't know about mastering (40%) minus pro audio guys who can make mastering by themselves (20%) minus guys who don't believe in automated mastering (30%), the remaining 10% is the group of people who open to novel things, but this group is too small;
• Mastering engineers think such services will replace them => no support from pro audio guys like KVR community.

It's just numbers!

We have bad news for you, if you think that good audio mastering can be done only with very expensive analog studio equipment. It's a myth that brings money to a certain group of people. The times of vinyl and cassettes are passed. All audio is digital now: it's all about bytes - integers and floats. All modern audio can be processed via DSP techniques. And everything can be done by it. Just use good audio software and plug-ins or learn DSP with some suitable programming languages to make your own stuff. 😉

Why did Matchering close?

• Too much marketing investments needed to convince people that Matchering works. And it works with more precision than handmade mastering in most cases;
• Too much investments in hardware needed before going paid:
  • Paid online service needs to keep all done masterings at user's personal area => too many HDDs needed;
  • Also it needs to be quickly accessible anywhere in the world => too many VPSes from different suppliers needed;
  • Also it needs highly qualified support service for clients => salary payments needed;
  • Etc.

This amount of money was unaffordable for three ordinary students from Eastern Europe.

Why was it supposed to be successful? (As we thought)

Do you remember Prisma? Matchering is like audio-Prisma for sound options like RMS, FR, peak amplitude and stereo width.

Why are online mastering services without references useless?

Online mastering services without possibility to upload a REFERENCE is a black box. How can it know how your track should sound? There are so much different genres and styles, and all of them need their individual approach to processing. And there are so much different soundings in them. And without a REFERENCE it's imposible to get good results. It's pure mathematics.

Potential rewrite on open source platform

We believe that some some enthusiasts can rewrite Matchering on Python's NumPy.

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