--- title: "Mixing & Mastering" description: "Loudness-spec mixing and mastering for theatrical, broadcast, streaming, and physical release — your music played back the way you intended it." canonical_url: "https://elephantaudio.pk/services/mix-master" type: "Service" date_modified: "2026-09-28T19:00:31+05:00" publisher: "Elephant Audio" publisher_url: "https://elephantaudio.pk" typical_timeline: "3–7 days per song for mix + master; 1–2 weeks for an EP, 3–5 weeks for a full album" best_for: "Artists, labels, film composers, podcasters, and producers who have a finished multitrack or stem set and need the final loudness-correct masters." entities: - name: "Lahore" type: "City" same_as: - "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q11739" - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lahore" - name: "Pakistan" type: "Country" same_as: - "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q843" - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan" author: name: "Abu Bakar Zahid" role: "Founder, Managing Director & Music Producer at Elephant Audio" url: "https://elephantaudio.pk/founder" same_as: - "https://www.linkedin.com/in/abubakarzahid94" - "https://www.youtube.com/@AbuBakarZahid" - "https://www.imdb.com/name/nm12369947/" - "https://open.spotify.com/artist/1vsRY1hLmqEBXcx5xeKs0m" - "https://music.apple.com/us/artist/abu-bakar-zahid/1654787374" - "https://www.deezer.com/us/artist/190524117" - "https://on.soundcloud.com/EnpcD" - "https://www.instagram.com/abubakarzahid94/" - "https://www.facebook.com/abubakarzahid9400/" - "https://twitter.com/abubakarzahid94" - "https://soundsofpakistan.com/artist/abu-bakar-zahid/" person: "Abu Bakar Zahid" person_same_as: - "https://www.linkedin.com/in/abubakarzahid94" - "https://www.youtube.com/@AbuBakarZahid" - "https://www.imdb.com/name/nm12369947/" - "https://open.spotify.com/artist/1vsRY1hLmqEBXcx5xeKs0m" - "https://music.apple.com/us/artist/abu-bakar-zahid/1654787374" - "https://www.deezer.com/us/artist/190524117" - "https://on.soundcloud.com/EnpcD" - "https://www.instagram.com/abubakarzahid94/" - "https://www.facebook.com/abubakarzahid9400/" - "https://twitter.com/abubakarzahid94" - "https://soundsofpakistan.com/artist/abu-bakar-zahid/" --- # Mixing & Mastering Loudness-spec mixing and mastering for theatrical, broadcast, streaming, and physical release — your music played back the way you intended it. 1.0M Views on featured work (combined, on the clients' own channels, as of 2026-09-10) · 3 Clients featured · 2021–2025 Featured work spans Mixing is where the song or score becomes the record. We start by listening to the multitrack against the references you sent and the genre your audience expects: a hip-hop master that sounds correct on a phone speaker, a film master that holds up in a theatre, a rock master that doesn't lose punch at -14 LUFS on Spotify. Each destination has its own number, and the unit matters less than the kind of number it is — LKFS and LUFS are the same measurement under two names, since both come from ITU-R BS.1770 and one Loudness Unit equals one decibel. Broadcast specifies: −23 LUFS under EBU R 128, −24 LKFS under ATSC A/85. Theatrical anchors to dialogue near −27 LKFS. Streaming normalises rather than specifies — Spotify toward −14 LUFS. We master to the destination, not to a house number. Stem mixing is offered for projects that come in with rough mixes already produced — we take the stems, rebalance, treat, and master from there without re-tracking. Full mixing starts from the multitrack and includes any production polish (parallel compression, vocal tuning, automation) the song needs. Mastering deliverables cover DDP for CD pressing, 24-bit / 48 kHz for streaming, broadcast wave for radio, and the platform-specific masters needed for Apple Music / Spotify / Tidal hi-res tiers. ## Deliverables - Stereo mix (and 5.1 / Atmos on request) - Mastered deliverables for each target platform - DDP image for physical CD pressing if needed - Reference test print for sign-off - Mix recall files so future changes are surgical ## Timeline 3–7 days per song for mix + master; 1–2 weeks for an EP, 3–5 weeks for a full album ## Tools - Pro Tools - FabFilter Pro-Q3 / Pro-MB / Pro-L2 - UAD plugins (1176, LA-2A, Manley) - iZotope Ozone - Soothe 2 ## Best for Artists, labels, film composers, podcasters, and producers who have a finished multitrack or stem set and need the final loudness-correct masters. ## Frequently asked questions ### What loudness do you master to? Whatever the destination requires — but broadcast and streaming are different kinds of requirement. Broadcast is a specification: −23 LUFS under EBU R 128 with a −1 dBTP ceiling, or −24 LKFS under ATSC A/85 with −2 dBTP, and a file that misses it is rejected. Theatrical anchors to dialogue near −27 LKFS. ⚠️ Streaming is not a target to master to — Spotify normalises playback toward −14 LUFS and turns anything louder down, so mastering hot gains no loudness and spends dynamic range permanently. What matters there is leaving true-peak headroom, because a quiet master with peaks near full scale cannot be lifted to the house level at all. Tell us where it plays and we calibrate from there. ### Can I send stems instead of the full multitrack? Yes. Stem mixing is a common workflow when the production is already where you want it but the balance needs another pass. We treat the stems as the new "multitrack" and master from there. ### Will you tune vocals or quantize drums? Subtle tuning and timing fixes are part of any vocal-led mix. Heavier production work — comping, full Melodyne tuning, replacing samples — is scoped before the engagement starts so it doesn't bleed into the mix budget. ### How many revision rounds are included? Two revision passes per song are standard for mixing. Mastering changes are normally a single sign-off pass — by the time the master is sent for approval, the mix is locked. ### How do you work with clients in the US across time zones? Lahore is UTC+5 — 9 to 10 hours ahead of New York and 12 to 13 ahead of Los Angeles, depending on US daylight saving. That gap is an advantage on post: notes sent at the end of a US working day arrive at the start of ours, get worked through the Lahore day, and are back before New York is awake. Live sessions are booked in our morning, which is your previous evening. Studio hours are 10:00-19:00 PKT, Monday to Saturday. ### Can you deliver to US broadcast and streaming specification? Yes — the target is set in the brief and the master is made to it. US broadcast follows ATSC A/85 under the CALM Act, which anchors to -24 LKFS; European broadcast follows EBU R128 at -23 LUFS. They are close but not the same number, and a master cut for one is not correct for the other. ⚠️ Streaming is not one number and not one kind of number: Spotify publishes −14 LUFS as playback normalisation, YouTube and Apple Music publish no figure at all, and Netflix is a delivery specification in the theatrical range, dialogue-gated, behind a partner login. Tell us the platform and the territory and you get the right master, with true-peak headroom to suit. ## Related work - [Airlift Express — Zindagi kay safar ko sabar na banaein](https://elephantaudio.pk/portfolio/zindagi-ka-safar/raw) - [Raven Song — Raven Song — Official Trailer](https://elephantaudio.pk/portfolio/netflix/raw) - [Pakistan Cricket Board — Ho Raha Hai TVC 1 — Office Celebration (PAK v NZ)](https://elephantaudio.pk/portfolio/ho-raha-hai/raw) ## Studio - **Studio:** Elephant Audio — Lahore, Pakistan - **Founder:** Abu Bakar Zahid — Founder, Managing Director & Music Producer at Elephant Audio - **Website:** https://elephantaudio.pk - **Contact:** abubakar@elephantaudio.pk