Process Glossary

Pantone Colors – Pantone Matching System (PMS) colors can be printed directly onto the disc. They are solid or spot colors so that their match is accurate.

Four Color Process (CMYK) – These screened colors are blended to reproduce photographic and multicolored images. They must be laid down upon a solid white background to ensure accuracy. With white counted as an additional color this process is actually a five-color print.

Thermal Printing – For quick run turn around projects thermal printing is the norm and black works best.

Please refer to our templates page and print guidelines to facilitate your design preparation.

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The Process - Most people are familiar with the idea of recording music in a live concert or recording studio. You make tapes that store the individual performances, or takes. Ultimately these takes are assembled into a final master tape. This is sent to a replication plant, where copies are made. The process of creating the final master is called mastering. It has three steps:

1. Assembly editing: The tapes from the location recording or mix down sessions are transferred to a digital editor. The tunes are sequenced into the order you specify and correct spacing is made between cuts. Beginnings and ends of cuts are faded to black (silence) or room tone (the natural background noise of the performing space), or the cuts are cross-faded as you wish. Pops, clicks and strange noises can often be fixed at the mastering stage, depending on their source and severity.

2. Sweetening: When engineers first began cutting master discs used to produce vinyl records, they designed signal processors such as compressors, limiters, and equalizers (EQ) to prevent overloading the cutter head. They noticed that changing the settings could also have beneficial effects on the music, especially in Pop styles. Equipment and techniques were developed to further "sweeten" the sound. Since then, this has been considered the heart of the process, where clarity, smoothness, impact and "punch" are enhanced, depending on the needs of the music. The goal is to increase the emotional intensity. If the performance, arrangement and recording quality are good to start with, then the final master sounds even better than the mix tapes, and even casual listeners can notice the difference. This is what albums need in the pop markets: big, radio-ready sound and a competitive edge.

3. Output: The finished music tracks are transferred to the media needed for mass production, usually CDR (Recordable CD). This master disc can be played on any CD player, so the client can audition it and give final approval. Check out our mastering and authoring services page! Contact us for a price estimate.

Audio CD – a disc with audio files that can only play on a CD player or a computer.

CD-ROM – a disc with data files that plays on a computer but does not play on a regular CD player.

Enhanced CD – is a combination of the two media mentioned above. It has full spectrum audio and a CD-ROM portion that will play on a computer. It allows for slideshows and videos as well as data files.

Capacities
- Audio CDs, CD-ROMs and Enhanced CDs each hold approximately 700 MB of data files, or approximately 79 minutes of audio.

DVD Video - contains video files that can be played in a DVD player and a computer

DVD-ROM - contains any type of data files that can be viewed only on a computer.

Capacities
- DVD-5 – 4.7 GB of storage capacity. A DVD-5 stores up to six times the amount of information that can be put on a standard CD-ROM.
- DVD-9 – 8.5 GB of storage capacity.
- DVD-10 – 9.4 GB of storage capacity.

Replication process - generally used in production of 500+ units. The process involves producing a glass master, which serves as the basis for the metal "stampers" created soon thereafter. Each disc is individually embedded data and printed using our template with your artwork.

Duplication process - more economical budgeting option for runs fewer then 500 or time sensitive projects. Copies of your master are burned on high-speed systems designed exclusively for high quality duplication. The discs are of comparable high sound and image quality to those that are replicated.

QuickRun process – like duplication, copies of your master are copied on high-speed burning towers. The print on disc options are limited to black thermal print on a silver or white disc background.