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  #1  
Old 11-08-2010, 08:43 AM
montreal montreal is offline
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Default How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

How do you pan your Channels in a dance song for example??
I ve been told i have to center all my drums tracks, to make them mono whereas my drums tracks are stereo tracks... So should i create new mono tracks or can i just use my old stereo tracks and put them all on zero ?
And more generally how do you pan your tracks ? ...
Thanx for your help
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  #2  
Old 11-08-2010, 09:53 AM
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Default Re: How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

First thing is, you don't HAVE to do anything anyone says(including what I say). My 2 cents(please take it that way), some things always stay in the center, including bass drum, snare, bass and lead vocal. I tend to spread things around to create the "image" or a band on stage. That puts a guitar toward the left, guitar 2 toward the right, drums spread out a bit...you get the idea( IOW, close your eyes and imagine players in front of you). This means that stereo instruments like DB-33 or MiniGrand, don't get hard panned(for my taste, that's not realistic as a piano isn't 40' wide on a 40' wide stage). Of course, you may feel that reality has nothing to do with your "ideal" mix. Have I confused you yet?
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Old 11-08-2010, 06:34 PM
montreal montreal is offline
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Default Re: How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

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Originally Posted by albee1952 View Post
First thing is, you don't HAVE to do anything anyone says(including what I say). My 2 cents(please take it that way), some things always stay in the center, including bass drum, snare, bass and lead vocal. I tend to spread things around to create the "image" or a band on stage. That puts a guitar toward the left, guitar 2 toward the right, drums spread out a bit...you get the idea( IOW, close your eyes and imagine players in front of you). This means that stereo instruments like DB-33 or MiniGrand, don't get hard panned(for my taste, that's not realistic as a piano isn't 40' wide on a 40' wide stage). Of course, you may feel that reality has nothing to do with your "ideal" mix. Have I confused you yet?
no you 're very clear . one question though, when you say for example you put the bass at the center , does it mean you use a mono track with pan set on zero or can you do it to a stereo track putting the pan at zero both side ?...
coz i'm very surprised because a mastering engineer told me to put my bass, kick etc at the center... so i did it ( my bass and my kick were on stereo track) but he told me that when i'll center those tracks they will appear much more louder but it's not the case at all, they appear very low.. dunno if im very clear...
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Old 11-08-2010, 08:54 PM
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Default Re: How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

I'm not following your comment here, unless the ME is referring to the PAN law and how some mixers(analog or digital) will treat the signal a bit different when panned to the center. In any case, since bass is usually a mono instrument, there is no reason to record it to a stereo track(a stereo track with the same sound on both sides is actually dual-mono). If things panned to the center seem to get softer, you may have a polarity problem with your speakers(or headphones). A simple test is to call up a mono AUX track, pan it center, insert the Signal Generator plugin(start with the fader down) and bring up the volume to a comfy level(the default is a 1KHz tone which is fine for this). Pan the tone left-right-center. If it gets softer in the center by a little bit, try the new options of PAN law in PT9(its not adjustable in 8 and older). If it seems okay there, drag the frequency slider on the plugin down to 100 Hz and repeat(it could just be a woofer). In any case, if the tone gets really soft in the center, that may mean your speakers are out of phase so you would need to check your wiring.
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Old 11-09-2010, 04:56 AM
montreal montreal is offline
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Default Re: How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

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Originally Posted by albee1952 View Post
I'm not following your comment here, unless the ME is referring to the PAN law and how some mixers(analog or digital) will treat the signal a bit different when panned to the center. In any case, since bass is usually a mono instrument, there is no reason to record it to a stereo track(a stereo track with the same sound on both sides is actually dual-mono). If things panned to the center seem to get softer, you may have a polarity problem with your speakers(or headphones). A simple test is to call up a mono AUX track, pan it center, insert the Signal Generator plugin(start with the fader down) and bring up the volume to a comfy level(the default is a 1KHz tone which is fine for this). Pan the tone left-right-center. If it gets softer in the center by a little bit, try the new options of PAN law in PT9(its not adjustable in 8 and older). If it seems okay there, drag the frequency slider on the plugin down to 100 Hz and repeat(it could just be a woofer). In any case, if the tone gets really soft in the center, that may mean your speakers are out of phase so you would need to check your wiring.
1/ dont understand you either. when i do your test, i have to pan "left-right-center" ?.... what do you mean ? i have to test that signal generator once with pan left ? then once with pan right ? and then in the center ?.... ? ( coz of course when i pan it to the left for example my signal is softer at the center coz i put it entireley on the right side !!! ??? )

2/ one other question, in my song i realised all my tracks were mostly in stereo, even my bass and kick etc... moreover i did not touch the pan at all so when i create stereo tracks it is automatically calibrated with left channel at -100 and right channel at +100 ... i let that settings like that on all my stereo tracks.... so does it mean my mix is totally spread on each side like my mastering enginneer said ?.. (and not centered of course ? ..)

3 / and IS HE RIGHT to tell me it is absolutely not conventionnal to mix like that and not efficient at all... ? ( especially for the kick,bass.. which have to be on mono tracks ?....)

4/ is there a difference in term of panning and volume between a mono track centered at zero and a stereo track centered each side at zero ?


ty all and sorry for my noobiness...
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Old 11-09-2010, 06:27 AM
danander11 danander11 is offline
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Default Re: How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

First things first.. Drums do not need to be stereo.. actually, a lot of things don't, but I would think that a taste issue.

You can set the L/R pan to zero on a stereo track, or you can just print them to a new mono track..

ie: create a new mono audio track and assign an input, say BUS 1. Set the output of your kick track to BUS 1 (and not BUS 1-2). If you are on 8.0.4 or older, drop the kick fader by 5-6 dB, (or to taste). record arm the new mono kick track and record.

You can do this for all of your stereo tracks that you want to convert to mono.. go through and set your routing and then just perform one record pass. Set all of the tracks you printed down to HIDE AND MAKE INACTIVE. They will always still be there, just hidden and not consuming resources.

Clear as mud yet? Good luck!
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Old 11-09-2010, 06:57 AM
montreal montreal is offline
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Default Re: How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

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Originally Posted by danander11 View Post
First things first.. Drums do not need to be stereo.. actually, a lot of things don't, but I would think that a taste issue.

You can set the L/R pan to zero on a stereo track, or you can just print them to a new mono track..

ie: create a new mono audio track and assign an input, say BUS 1. Set the output of your kick track to BUS 1 (and not BUS 1-2). If you are on 8.0.4 or older, drop the kick fader by 5-6 dB, (or to taste). record arm the new mono kick track and record.

You can do this for all of your stereo tracks that you want to convert to mono.. go through and set your routing and then just perform one record pass. Set all of the tracks you printed down to HIDE AND MAKE INACTIVE. They will always still be there, just hidden and not consuming resources.

Clear as mud yet? Good luck!
sorry but my english is a bit poor...
do i need to recreate new mono tracks or pan L/R on zero for stereo tracks has EXACTLY the same effect ??????? please i want to be sure of that ..
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Old 11-09-2010, 07:31 AM
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Default Re: How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

1/ dont understand you either. when i do your test, i have to pan "left-right-center" ?.... what do you mean ? i have to test that signal generator once with pan left ? then once with pan right ? and then in the center ?.... ? ( coz of course when i pan it to the left for example my signal is softer at the center coz i put it entireley on the right side !!! ??? ) You are misunderstanding here. The idea is to compare the volume when a signal(the tone generator in this case) when it is panned left, then right, then center, to see if the center sounds much softer(indicating a problem with your wiring that is causing cancellation).

2/ one other question, in my song i realised all my tracks were mostly in stereo, even my bass and kick etc... moreover i did not touch the pan at all so when i create stereo tracks it is automatically calibrated with left channel at -100 and right channel at +100 ... i let that settings like that on all my stereo tracks.... so does it mean my mix is totally spread on each side like my mastering enginneer said ?.. (and not centered of course ? ..)A stereo track that has identical sound on each side, is NOT a stereo signal. It is 2 mono signals that are sitting at opposite sides of the stereo field, essentially sounding like mono(but is a very inefficient way to use your system, other than being inefficient, its not a problem). Once again, sound sources that are mono should be recorded to a mono track. I'm guessing your bass is from a synth and not a bass guitar? Maybe there is some stereo chorus in it? That would make it a stereo sound(but a mono bass sound will have a bit more focus and power)

3 / and IS HE RIGHT to tell me it is absolutely not conventionnal to mix like that and not efficient at all... ? ( especially for the kick,bass.. which have to be on mono tracks ?....) Yes, but, nobody say you MUST be conventional. Rules are made to be broken In the end, if it sounds good, it IS good

4/ is there a difference in term of panning and volume between a mono track centered at zero and a stereo track centered each side at zero ? I'd say this is an experiment you can perform and decide for yourself. There's a lot to learn here, and diving in and trying things(just like this) will help you learn the how and why.

BTW, your English is fine and Montreal is one of the most beautiful cities in the world I hope this is making sense, or someone else can explain it better.
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  #9  
Old 11-09-2010, 08:24 AM
montreal montreal is offline
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Default Re: How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

Quote:
Originally Posted by albee1952 View Post
2/ one other question, in my song i realised all my tracks were mostly in stereo, even my bass and kick etc... moreover i did not touch the pan at all so when i create stereo tracks it is automatically calibrated with left channel at -100 and right channel at +100 ... i let that settings like that on all my stereo tracks.... so does it mean my mix is totally spread on each side like my mastering enginneer said ?.. (and not centered of course ? ..)A stereo track that has identical sound on each side, is NOT a stereo signal. It is 2 mono signals that are sitting at opposite sides of the stereo field, essentially sounding like mono(but is a very inefficient way to use your system, other than being inefficient, its not a problem).



.
FIRST THANX A LOT FOR YOUR HELP ALBEE !!!!

so you say that a stereo channel which has identical sound with left pan to -100 and right pan to +100 essantialy sounding like mono ?? a stereo channel set like that is for you centered like a mono then ..? coz my mastering engineer say that it is not true because a stereo track with a pan left to -100 and a pan right to +100 is not centered at all but just placed at the extreme both side and nothing at the center.... ???

oh and do you know a shortcut to make all pan of my stereo tracks on zero ??
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Old 11-09-2010, 08:55 AM
danander11 danander11 is offline
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Default Re: How do you pan your tracks in a song ?

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Originally Posted by montreal View Post
oh and do you know a shortcut to make all pan of my stereo tracks on zero ??
Easy,

Highlight all of the tracks you wish to change the values on, Then hold ALT-SHFT on PC, which I think is CMND - SHFT on Mac, then click on hte L pan knob, (having the ALT/CMND key down will set the knob to a default value), then do the same for the R pan.

All the tracks you had highlighted will be affected similarly.
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