Stereo Widening

[sadboy]

what a plugin would be worthy to have it in the mastering chain for Stereo Widening...

Personally i use the Waves S1-Imager

[ms70]

i like the bx_digital mastering M/S-EQ

[Steab]

Sonalksis Ltd.

[aivoryuk]

i don't really do much stereo widening but do on occasion narrow the image. But nobody ever talks about that.

[dcollins]

Originally Posted by aivoryuk

i don't really do much stereo widening but do on occasion narrow the image. But nobody ever talks about that.

Post reported.


DC

[Virtalahde]

Originally Posted by aivoryuk

i don't really do much stereo widening but do on occasion narrow the image. But nobody ever talks about that.

But I wanted more of everything!

[mikeg09]

Sonalksis is a good companythumbsup

[miro]

EQ in M/S mode. In rare cases this:

MeldaProduction MStereoExpander, free VST effect

(which doesn't screw up the mono information, IME)

[CJ Mastering]

Originally Posted by sadboy

what a plugin would be worthy to have it in the mastering chain for Stereo Widening...

Personally i use the Waves S1-Imager

Personally, you should not have to use a stereo widener in the mastering stage. But in some occasions its called for, but not all the time.

When its called for, The Rupert Neve Portico 5014 stereo field editor is a great tool when it comes to altering the stereo image in the mastering stage.
Cj

[sadboy]

Originally Posted by CJ Mastering

Personally, you should not have to use a stereo widener in the mastering stage. But in some occasions its called for, but not all the time.

When its called for, The Rupert Neve Portico 5014 stereo field editor is a great tool when it comes to altering the stereo image in the mastering stage.
Cj

yea man i heard of it but the thing is that am looking for a vst, i dont think am gonna add an extra hardware into my rack just for stereo widening

[macc]

EQ.

[jackthebear]

Widening is best achieved in the mix.......

I can't tell you how much I actually enjoy mono.......

[macc]

Oh go on.

[jackthebear]

Originally Posted by macc

Oh go on.

how much time do you have??

Originally Posted by sadboy

what a plugin would be worthy to have it in the mastering chain for Stereo Widening...

Personally i use the Waves S1-Imager

Multiband stereo widening/contraction in Izotope Ozone.
I wouldn't do it single-band.

[CoreyL]

Originally Posted by jackthebear

I can't tell you how much I actually enjoy mono.......

+1

[Steab]

Here we go again, the super duper amazing internet-hardcore mastering engineers who never limit more than 1db and disgust heavy limited modern music, love monophony, never use multiband compression and don't even understand its use, never have to stereo widen mixes, and use only ..expensive sounding analog gear! Well, at gearslutz at least..

So much fun! dfegad

[huejahfink]

Originally Posted by Steab

Here we go again, the super duper amazing internet-hardcore mastering engineers who never limit more than 1db and disgust heavy limited modern music, love monophony, never use multiband compression and don't even understand its use, never have to stereo widen mixes, and use only ..expensive sounding analog gear! Well, at gearslutz at least..

So much fun! dfegad

Haha, and don't forget, if you have to turn ANY dial more than 1db, it's back to the mixing engineer.

PS. Just so this is not completely OT, I'm with MACC - and I use a little judicious EQ if a mix could use a little more width.

[staudio]

One of my little tricks to add width without ruining the center is to add a little reverb to the Side/Dif signal, Ozone's reverb section works well for this, although I do have fantasies of doing it in analog with a real plate verb. It adds spaciousness without throwing the Sum/Dif balance off too much because you are creating new out of phase information from the reverb, this doesn't mush the middle as much as simply adjusting the S/D balance.

[Idsz]

Originally Posted by soulstudios

Multiband stereo widening/contraction in Izotope Ozone.
I wouldn't do it single-band.

+1 for Ozone really something worth trying.

[lu432]

+2 For Ozone 4. Very good at what it does, however I still stay away from the limiter. Still not up to my standards.

[sadboy]

Originally Posted by lu432

+2 For Ozone 4. Very good at what it does, however I still stay away from the limiter. Still not up to my standards.

absolutely agree with you about the limiter, even though with ozone4 the limiter was amazingly developed but still there's something not there about the punch that the limiter of ozone gives....


thanks all for passing by though....
SaDbOy

[masteringhouse]

I think that we should differentiate a wide mix from a mix with a good stereo field.

A good stereo field comes from proper placement using panning, delays, reverb, mic technique, etc. on the individual tracks in the mix more so than taking an existing mix and telling it to "open wide". You can't easily make adjustments to the individual elements of a mix through stereo widening, you just make it wider (often by removing a portion of the center image). It's similar to trying to add depth to a mix by adding reverb over the entire mix. Both M/S and EQ help to better isolate the elements of a mix, but it's still a compromise.

[sadboy]

Originally Posted by masteringhouse

I think that we should differentiate a wide mix from a mix with a good stereo field.

A good stereo field comes from proper placement using panning, delays, reverb, mic technique, etc. on the individual tracks in the mix more so than taking an existing mix and telling it to "open wide". You can't easily make adjustments to the individual elements of a mix through stereo widening, you just make it wider (often by removing a portion of the center image). It's similar to trying to add depth to a mix by adding reverb over the entire mix. Both M/S and EQ help to better isolate the elements of a mix, but it's still a compromise.

so far this is the most confessing post in this thread thanks a lot mate

Originally Posted by masteringhouse

I think that we should differentiate a wide mix from a mix with a good stereo field.

A good stereo field comes from proper placement using panning, delays, reverb, mic technique, etc. on the individual tracks in the mix more so than taking an existing mix and telling it to "open wide". You can't easily make adjustments to the individual elements of a mix through stereo widening, you just make it wider (often by removing a portion of the center image). It's similar to trying to add depth to a mix by adding reverb over the entire mix. Both M/S and EQ help to better isolate the elements of a mix, but it's still a compromise.

Well, yes and no- I agree with some of this, that a mix stereo field is important, but that's not to say that stereo widening/contraction at the end stereo track point is the same thing - or worse. Different things.

Originally Posted by sadboy

absolutely agree with you about the limiter, even though with ozone4 the limiter was amazingly developed but still there's something not there about the punch that the limiter of ozone gives....


thanks all for passing by though....
SaDbOy

I think it's designed so you've got to achieve the 'punch' in the multiband dynamics (which includes limiting), rather than the 'loudness maximiser' stage.

[Ari-M.]

I have yet to use one single method (additive or subtractive) that didn't affect/effect mono fold down....

since width beyond the speakers (best way I could think to describe it) is always a byproduct of faulty (depending on your perspective) phase and or time delay of specific bands, I could never really bring myself to actually print those attributes to a clients product...

I am sure this puts me in a minority, and maybe I am just missing the boat all together, but I never liked the byproducts of any 2 track "widening"

I always felt the stereo spread was something for the mix

[jackthebear]

Originally Posted by Steab

love monophony,

is that like hating cacophony???