Stereo Mixing Process

[bokip]

Hello all. I'm demoing using a Mackie 1602 FW Interface.

I've been reading about mixing stereo guitars ... panning hard Left and Right, and delaying one of the tracks by 10-25ms etc. I have a question about this technique:

My intuition is that this will sound like the sound is travelling from Left to Right (if the Right guitar is delayed), as if you are standing in a room and the amp is facing sideways (ie. the sound reaches the further ear slghtly later).

My question: should this be taken into account when adding other instruments? Should an overall balance be sought out (ie. mixing an underlying stereo acoustic guitar with the delay on the Left track?). I'm scared that if I mix many stereo instruments with a right-channel delay for width, that it will be unbalanced towards the left?


If I'm way off, please let me know!

[blue monk]

I suppose it will only make the sound more fat.
If you are worried then you could inverse the technique by using a delay on the left channel for one track and on the right channel for another track.

But actually I think this won`t even be necessary because:
1. You assume that this short delay would be affecting the balance - which I don`t expect.
2. I doubt that all the treated instruments always play notes at the same time.
3. I don`t think it`s desirable to do that to too many tracks at a time because the effect is surely greated if you don`t overuse it.

[ScottyD]

On double tracked guitars I pan hard left and right most of the time, or sometimes like 70-80%. I have never tried delaying one side, but now I might have to!

-ScottyD

[Chadlington]

many guitarist who have 2 cabinets delay one side. I think 7 or 9 milliseconds is popular. I believe the only reason for this is to make 1 guitar player sound much bigger and to create a stereo image. I wouldn't worry about the imbalances. Duplicating the same track left & right is nothing more than a mono signal. A short delay will give it a slight offset which is good. That is the factor that makes it stereo. It's better to record a double so that there aren't phase issues, but I wouldn't worry about the imbalances. If you notice, that is the case on a lot of rock records.

[PureFluke]

Hey bokip,

Delaying one signal by a few milliseconds is supposed to give the effect of two guitars playing almost indentical parts, and thus fatten the sound. This kind of works if your feeling lazy, or its a live track, and you can't do over dubs.

I my, humble, opinion, tracking the guitar part twice, indentically and then panning these two takes left and right can be much more effective. Just make sure the sound sources are pretty siilar. For example, keeping the mics, and amp the same and changing from a Les Paul to a PRS, and doing to indentical takes may create the sound you're after.

As for the sound travelling from one side to the other; don't worry about it, worse case scenario (if the dealy is too big) it'll just sound like a very loud echo. Hope this helps!

[wheever]

Originally Posted by PureFluke

I my, humble, opinion, tracking the guitar part twice, indentically and then panning these two takes left and right can be much more effective.

+1 for double-tracking. Totally different beast than the dual-mono/delay route. Makes the guitar big and thick and juicy.

[YZ!]

Originally Posted by PureFluke

Hey bokip,

I my, humble, opinion, tracking the guitar part twice, identically and then panning these two takes left and right can be much more effective. Just make sure the sound sources are pretty similar. For example, keeping the mics, and amp the same and changing from a Les Paul to a PRS, and doing to identical takes may create the sound you're after.

No need to change guitars.

No one plays exactly the same, twice.

Track the part once, then record a second track with the same guitar, amp, mic.

Pan to taste.

[NoEgo]

Originally Posted by PureFluke

Hey bokip,

Delaying one signal by a few milliseconds is supposed to give the effect of two guitars playing almost indentical parts, and thus fatten the sound. This kind of works if your feeling lazy, or its a live track, and you can't do over dubs.

I my, humble, opinion, tracking the guitar part twice, indentically and then panning these two takes left and right can be much more effective. Just make sure the sound sources are pretty siilar. For example, keeping the mics, and amp the same and changing from a Les Paul to a PRS, and doing to indentical takes may create the sound you're after.

As for the sound travelling from one side to the other; don't worry about it, worse case scenario (if the dealy is too big) it'll just sound like a very loud echo. Hope this helps!

What he said...
Playing them is the best delay (panned hard left and right) cause its all over the place and not "unatural." The delay effect I have always known is the cheaters way to get a doubling (panned hard left and right) but it is constant and is not near as good as the real thing. I have an Eventide unit that comes close, but it is still repetitive regardless. I have used it in a pinch but no one can be so exact that there isn't a difference number 1, and if you did this all the time well I think the mix would be getting pretty busy. Less focus thats for sure.

[sergioelectro]

Could someone elaborate on those delays techniques used on mono signals to make the image wider ?

I would like to learn them.

Thanks a lot

Sergio

[bokip]

Sergio, if you listen to guitar on most rock records, you'll notice that the guitars sound 'wide', as in there are two distinct guitars sounding on opposite sides of you. There are two ways to do this:

1. Record one guitar track. Clone it to a new track. Pan one 100% left, the other 100% right. If you stop here, it sounds like nothing's changed because you have the exact same sound in both ears, which your brain interprets as 'center'. To change this, introduce a delay on one of the tracks (either by physically shifting it over a little bit, or using a delay plugin). Try 10-25ms. Now the tracks are different from each other, and the guitars sound 'thicker' as there are two distinct guitar sounds coming into your two ears.

2. or you can simply record two takes of the same guitar part, and pan them in separate directions. This is better, and I would even suggest introducing a slight delay on one of the tracks for further separation.

[Unclenny]

Never had much success with double tracking....it's definitely a skill issue.

So I like to record my electric guits with two different amps (different mic's) onto two seperate mono tracks. EQ tracks to taste (or not, if you're really good at mic placement).

Get those tracks onto a stereo track, insert a stereo delay with just a little delay (different on each side) and have some fun with it. By playing with the wet/dry you can move the guitar around quite a bit.

With the other instruments in place you'll find a spot for your guitar.

[Crazy Drummer69]

In my latest recording I used 3 mics to capture the guitars simultaneously. I used an SM57 and a Senheiser to close-mic the cab, and an MXL990 10 feet away to use as a room mic. I panned the SM57 and e609 66%-75% to one side and the MXL990 100% to the same side. I also used 25ms delay on the MXL990 and a -10dB drop in volume. You can hear it here: Crazy Drummer69 | Ultimate-Guitar.Com

[truthnlife13]

experimenting with a 57/421 combo inside a reflexion filter on the grill with a c414 xls and a sm81 in a m/s config about 6ft out giving me 5 tracks after encoding the MS mics. then I double with different guitar and slightly different amp settings for a total of 10 tracks for 2 takes. Then I blend and pan to fit the song. I am happy so far and gives lots of options at mixdown. I am next gonna try adding a D112 behind the cab. Obviously the big battle in all of this is phase coherence or lack thereof depending on taste. the sublte mic moves on each mic changes things dramatically which is really cool.

[Storyville]

I would avoid this technique if at all possible for a number of reasons.
1. I find it tends to make my brain here a "weird" stereo image, rather than a "wide" image.
2. It's indicative that the source sound in and of itself is not full enough. Track a cab with a single mic often causes this problem. Using multiple mics is often the best way to track a guitar.
3. This can cause phase issues when summing to mono, especially if you are below 10ms in delay.
4. Using this technique on multiple sound sources diminishes the image, especially if stacked the same way (always delaying on one side), and will actually suffocate the mix rather than opening it up.

Use multiple mics. Use the clone and pan technique as a last resort. Thems my two cents.

[truthnlife13]

Originally Posted by Storyville

I would avoid this technique if at all possible for a number of reasons.
1. I find it tends to make my brain here a "weird" stereo image, rather than a "wide" image.
2. It's indicative that the source sound in and of itself is not full enough. Track a cab with a single mic often causes this problem. Using multiple mics is often the best way to track a guitar.
3. This can cause phase issues when summing to mono, especially if you are below 10ms in delay.
4. Using this technique on multiple sound sources diminishes the image, especially if stacked the same way (always delaying on one side), and will actually suffocate the mix rather than opening it up.

Use multiple mics. Use the clone and pan technique as a last resort. Thems my two cents.

any technique can be useful for a given situation but in general I have found that the only way to really get fat sound is to actually double the part by playing it twice. Cloning or even a doubler plug never seems to sound as good as doing it twice. However the great thing about recording and music is there is no right or wrong way just another way.

[rufus13]

Binaural signal location in a 2 channel system depends on one or 2 things: amplitude differences or time differences. Think about how microphone recording works: coincident microphones record "stereo" from a "one-point" (almost) pickup and use their patterns to make the amplitude different. It works, and it sums to mono well (not much destructive cancellation). Spaced microphones using an omnidirectional pattern get almost the same signal from the source, but the one farthest from the source gets the signal later. This sounds like "stereo" over headphones, too. Spaced microphones may not sound good when summed to mono. Using both techniques (spaced and aimed directional microphones) gives a "stereo" result using both time difference and amplitude difference with moderately-good mono-summing results.

Back in 1934, when Bell Labs was experimenting with "stereo" and "binaural" techniques, they discovered that the best-sounding localizable sound came over THREE channels, Left, Center, Right. Left & Right channel with a phantom center or a center speaker derived from left and right were always inferior.

Even inexpensive consumer reproduction gear can now play 5.1 surround, meaning that L-C-R is not out of reach. But, most people mix their music productions to L&R stereo, so there isn't any incentive to set up an L-C-R music playback for most people. It's the chicken and egg problem, and we don't have chickens or eggs.

Inexpensive digital mixers like DM-24 can make 3-channel L-C-R mixes. All it requires is a little manual-reading and the desire to do so.

Cheers.