Like a lot of people, my send tracks have Fabfilter stuff on most of the time. The dynamic EQ parameter they introduced with Pro-EQ 3 is awesome. I use it almost exclusively rather than the classic knobs, as it allows much more contextual corrections – this comes handy for instance when I want to prevent the medium frequencies to pile up during in high nuances without taking away the warmth of softer moments.
Something I like to do as well is using a dynamic high shelf (upwards) around 4k - 5k, on strings and brass. When the music starts blasting, it helps the former standing out and the latter getting brassy enough, again without unwanted sound alteration during soft moments. The trick is simply to identify (manually if you have to) the "
forte threshold" that will trigger the EQ.
I also clean the useless low frequencies of individual instruments with a lowcut to give myself as much room as I can during mixing. The "hear what you're cutting" function is a blessing for that.
Except for Fab compression when necesseray, I rarely process orchestral send tracks further. I keep that for SFX, synth percs, pads, etc. Occasionally, if can't quite find the right mic sound for a solo instrument, I'll just take its Close or Spot, and then apply Virtual Sound Stage 2 to place it in the room.
I use Altiverb in separate buses, one for each mic position of a same room : this allows me to distributes the sections accordingly to their distance from the conductor. Strings are the closest, then woodwinds, then brass, then percussion, then choirs. Of course that's a general rule of thumb, soloists, "overdub percs" and such are another story. My reverb buses are set to -6dB by default, although I sometimes tweak that.
On the master, I use Pro-Q 3 again with two to three knobs : the first one is a lowcut around 38 Hz, just to make sure there's no parasite stuff left below. It shouldn't because I already cleaned that area during mixing, but hey, it helps me sleep better. The second is a more progressive lowcut in Side mode around 100 to 150 Hz, to focus a bit my low frequencies. I won't always enable the third one, but sometimes depending on the track I will set a subtle upwards high shelf in Side mode at 5k - 6kHz, for a bonus stereo definition feeling.
Pro-C 2 follows, in Mastering mode. I rarely go over 1:1,5 ratio. My release is rather short, even if I often tweak my attack depending on whether I want the reduction to be very subtle or a bit more radical.
Then Pro-L 2. Most of my music ends up on YouTube, so I set the ceiling at -1dB. I generally increase the gain by 6dB, a bit more if the track is very soft.
And then I export a mp3 file at 128 kbps