How do stereo enhancers/wideners work?

[PunkSmurf]

Hello all!

I'm a newbie to mastering. I'm currently trying to learn how to use Ozone 4 within my DAW for mastering. I find it slightly difficult to experiment with the stereo enhancer portion of the application as I'm not too sure in general what is being done to the audio in order to manipulate the stereo field. So I was wondering if anyone could explain how, in general, do these stereo enhancers work and the dangers that could lurk if overused?

Appreciate the insight!

[turtlerock]

they work by a process they call magic ..!


err seriously whenever i have had somebody start at my place i put a six month ban on using any of our spacial tools. (and we have a bunch of them)

my advice is learn to make a mix bigger and wider with just eq and level.
when your clients start saying , it sounds great and i love how you have widened the stereo image ..
well thats the day to contempt how to put your first stereo widener on a track.

if you cannot wait six months , and your using more then a 15% width enhancement
i think you have probably gone 13% too far !

[4damind]

You can search for M/S encoding (middle/side signal). Stereo widener are working primary while changing the side signal (which contains the stereo information).

You can try this yourself, while get the free Voxengo M/S encoder. There you can split a stereosignal in middle and side and process this separately.

The black magic is what will be added (some seems to working with pitch shifting and delays or adding additional harmonics to the side signal).
Simple widener only change the level from side to middle, so its more a combined M/S encoder with fader for the mixlevel of side signal to middle signal

[edit]
The free plugin is called Voxengo MSED M/S encoder/decoder and can be found here

[bob katz]

Originally Posted by PunkSmurf

Hello all!

I'm a newbie to mastering. I'm currently trying to learn how to use Ozone 4 within my DAW for mastering. I find it slightly difficult to experiment with the stereo enhancer portion of the application as I'm not too sure in general what is being done to the audio in order to manipulate the stereo field. So I was wondering if anyone could explain how, in general, do these stereo enhancers work and the dangers that could lurk if overused?

Appreciate the insight!

There are many different approaches to "stereo enhancement" and not one single method. Some processors use a form of M/S manipulation, but not all of them do. Regardless, don't be deceived by the dark side. Listen VERY carefully to the artifacts of these processors. There is no such thing as a free lunch. And this cautionary advice comes from a guy who has invented an "ambience recovery processor" that also enhances space and depth.

The things to watch out for: Loss of center channel information, washiness, a change in the mix (for the worse, not the better), and so on, to varying degrees. Put on your critical ears and listen to everything, not just the effect on the space and the depth. Some processors are far better at this than others and with lesser artifacts or whose artifacts cannot be noticed until they are pushed further.

[JCRockit]

I've read the wide knob on the Neve 8816 was supposed to work nicely?

[danika]

Originally Posted by PunkSmurf

Hello all!

I'm a newbie to mastering. I'm currently trying to learn how to use Ozone 4 within my DAW for mastering. I find it slightly difficult to experiment with the stereo enhancer portion of the application as I'm not too sure in general what is being done to the audio in order to manipulate the stereo field. So I was wondering if anyone could explain how, in general, do these stereo enhancers work and the dangers that could lurk if overused?

Appreciate the insight!

The main danger is creating consistently out-of-phase conditions which cause the problems that Bob Katz mentioned. If you're using Ozone, keep your eye on the phase correlation meter on the stereo imaging panel. If it's to the left of center most of the time, you've got problems. If your mix contains a lot of synths and electronica stuff, you can have phase problems even if you're just using simple mid-side processing without adding any delay.

[wado1942]

I'm currently trying to learn how to use Ozone 4 within my DAW for mastering. I find it slightly difficult to experiment with the stereo enhancer portion of the application as I'm not too sure in general what is being done to the audio in order to manipulate the stereo field.

This has been pretty well covered already but I just wanted to note that in my 10 years of professional mastering, I've probably pulled some kind of "stereo enhancement" on perhaps 2% of my projects. That was mostly in my early years.

when your clients start saying , it sounds great and i love how you have widened the stereo image ..
well thats the day to contempt how to put your first stereo widener on a track.

Of course by then you won't NEED a widener, bringing me back to my first response.

The things to watch out for: Loss of center channel information, washiness, a change in the mix

To expand on this, you often lose SIDE channel information when encoding to MP3/AAC/WMA, on small boom boxes & radios, not to mention when you're farther away from the speakers or in a small room. In short, there's often more side effects than desired effects. There's some methods of "stereo enhancement" that don't do this so much but still have their share of troubles. Stragely, the best stereo enhancer I've used so far, is a tiny bit of delay with some EQ on it. But as turtlerock said, just getting used to EQ and compression by themselves is a 6-month learning process. I wish I had known that at the beginning of my career. I'd probably have a much better customer base now.

[Joe_caithness]

Originally Posted by danika

The main danger is creating consistently out-of-phase conditions which cause the problems that Bob Katz mentioned. If you're using Ozone, keep your eye on the phase correlation meter on the stereo imaging panel. If it's to the left of center most of the time, you've got problems. If your mix contains a lot of synths and electronica stuff, you can have phase problems even if you're just using simple mid-side processing without adding any delay.

On demo-ing the Ozone 4 I found the stereo widining a nice way of checking mono of certain frequency bands.. It also was used at times to make over zealous percussion panning with lots of lower mid (or just un hi passed channels), sit slightly away from the snare in dance tracks for a more direct centre image.

I'd be really interested in how this process actually works speficially to the Ozone 4 before purchasing, do you know of any good literature on this specific processor?

[dcollins]

Originally Posted by wado1942

This has been pretty well covered already but I just wanted to note that in my 10 years of professional mastering, I've probably pulled some kind of "stereo enhancement" on perhaps 2% of my projects. That was mostly in my early years.

2% sounds about right. Stereo "enhancement" belongs in mixing, anyway.


DC

[chironomidae]

Originally Posted by PunkSmurf

Hello all!

I'm a newbie to mastering. I'm currently trying to learn how to use Ozone 4 within my DAW for mastering. I find it slightly difficult to experiment with the stereo enhancer portion of the application as I'm not too sure in general what is being done to the audio in order to manipulate the stereo field. So I was wondering if anyone could explain how, in general, do these stereo enhancers work and the dangers that could lurk if overused?

Appreciate the insight!

While your post's body asks if stereo enhancers work, your subject line asks how do stereo enhancers work. Most people have answered the if, but so far nobody has answered the how. I just wanted to back up a bit and try to answer your question on a basic level.

My understanding is that the most basic widener works by adding very small amounts of delay to one side of the signal, putting it slightly out of phase with the other side. This has the effect of making the signal uncorrelated, so that instead of one unified sound coming from both speakers, the sound from one speaker is just barely different from the sound coming out of the other. This gives the sound a more enveloping feel, instead of sounding as if it's coming from a single point in space. However, this can cause a myriad of problems, especially when the stereo signal is summed to mono. Problems can range from comb filtering to complete signal cancellation.

I think most stereo enhancers do other things, such as only applying EQ to only the Side signal, leaving the Middle signal unaltered (look up M/S processing for more information if you're not familiar with the term). Still more stereo enhancers use other psychoacoustic techniques which are trade secrets.

[JJ Golden]

I Agree with you Dave. The Pan pots are the true stereo enhancers.

Punk Smurf: The source material/mix has a lot to do with how well (Believable) some stereo enhancers with will work. I haven't used Ozone 4, but I know some enhancers will only work if there is enough stereo information in the mix to begin with. i.e. if you've got a fairly mono mix with only some brittle cymbals etc. on the sides, that's what will be widened and won't improve anything. Hope this helps a little.

JJG

[danika]

Originally Posted by Joe_caithness

On demo-ing the Ozone 4 I found the stereo widining a nice way of checking mono of certain frequency bands.. It also was used at times to make over zealous percussion panning with lots of lower mid (or just un hi passed channels), sit slightly away from the snare in dance tracks for a more direct centre image.

I'd be really interested in how this process actually works speficially to the Ozone 4 before purchasing, do you know of any good literature on this specific processor?

Take a look at the Ozone Mastering Guide. Although it doesn't say for sure, it certainly implies that Ozone is using mid-side processing. I've used the function enough to satisfy myself that's what it's doing if you don't add any delay. If you fiddle with the delay parameters for each band, Ozone will delay one channel relative to the other to create some artificial difference. That's when you can really get in trouble with phase problems if you don't watch it.

[Joe_caithness]

Originally Posted by danika

Take a look at the Ozone Mastering Guide. Although it doesn't say for sure, it certainly implies that Ozone is using mid-side processing. I've used the function enough to satisfy myself that's what it's doing if you don't add any delay. If you fiddle with the delay parameters for each band, Ozone will delay one channel relative to the other to create some artificial difference. That's when you can really get in trouble with phase problems if you don't watch it.

thanks, will look into this!

[donsolo]

Ozone has M/S processing all over it. The Stereo Widening IMO (it's an opinion, maybe someone from izotope can speak with better information) is that the amount on the widener changes the balance between the M and S signals.

The Delay adds delay of some sort, I don't mess with that, it causes headaches.

Usually just boosting the side a bit makes it a bit wider sounding.

[Alexey Lukin]

Originally Posted by donsolo

The Stereo Widening IMO (it's an opinion, maybe someone from izotope can speak with better information) is that the amount on the widener changes the balance between the M and S signals.

Exactly. Ozone can do different amounts of widening in up to 4 crossover bands, or continuously vary it with frequency using the M/S EQ module.

[rhizomeman]

My experience with Ozone 4 widener is that, when using it I very quickly noticed a drop in mid-lows to low frequencies in the center. Stayed the hell away from it after that and now stick with mainly panning in the mix to create a good stereo field/space.

[Adam Dempsey]

Other than an over-prevalence of M-S manipulation, most basic width enhancers simply polarity invert one channel and send a variable degree to the other channel, and vice-versa. Then some gain make up.
Is it applied regularly in pro mastering? No. Width – and equally importantly depth – is all in the mix (though can sometimes work on elements of a mix to help create contrast or emphasis).
Again, when you consider that most directional cues are mids - high freqs, getting your EQ spectrum balanced is key, and often enough.

[question]

A related question.

I write music for film, and often mix my own music.
Since the dialogue is almost always in the middle, I have found that using fairly extreme panning helps to let the music coexist better behind the dialogue.

I am wondering if using some sort of stereo widening would also be useful for this purpose, or only asking for trouble with mono compatibility.

Many people still have mono televisions!

Any film music mixers use stereo widening for these purposes?

Thanks

[Adam Dempsey]

Any film music mixers use stereo widening for these purposes?

Do any pro film mixers mix for stereo or 2.1 only? It's derived from the 5.1. Without 5.1 yes, I could hear how extra width could help make a centre image 'hole' for mono dialogue. In any case I can't imagine things sounding wider or spacier than what's dictated on screen, within the frame. Don't most film mixers generally work to that (ie, all things in context)?

[question]

Adam, thanks for the response.

Sorry that I was not clear.
I am referring primarily to stereo music for TV.
Do composers who work primarily for TV films use any stereo widening techniques?
I am talking specifically about mixing the (stereo) music before the dub, not adding widening to any element other than the music.

Thanks

[Table Of Tone]

I've been using the widening on the Lavry DA11.
It's pretty subtle and the first position seems to suit most things that would benefit from a little widening.
I've got pretty much all of the plugin's that do that but the DA11 seems to mess with things less so right now I'm running completely plugin free!