Center Channel and LFE questions

[talco]

Hi,
I'm doing a surround mix for a music only project for either SAcd or DVD-A and had two questions :
1) How many of you folks who do this a lot are printing an LFE track or are you just letting bass management handle the .1 trk
2) And how necessary is the center channel? Is it ok to deliver just L/R and Ls/Rs tracks with a phantom center?
Also this project will be professionally mastered for release.

Thanks for any help!

[jimlongo]

From the music mixes i've listened to the use of the C channel varies quite a bit in music mixes. Everything from hardly at all to having naked vocals in the center channel.
As for the LFE channel there is nearly always some of the bottom end present in that channel in addition to the bass managed output from the 5 channels.

There are a lot less "rules" to music mixing in 5.1 than there are to film mixes. There's a Grammy Surround Mixing recommendations paper in PDF format at this URI

http://www.grammy.com/pe_wing/5_1_Rec.pdf

[filmixer]

As Jim says, there aren't really any rules per say. However, by not using certain channels, you're giving up the power available to them. The center and sub can be used for their effect on the soundstage. Panning the vocal (or whatever) to the center speaker will give it precise localization there and adds the power of that channel. Using the traditional phantom center will make the vocal "float" out over the soundstage which has a nice effect. Adding Kick and Bass into the LFE will add power without taking up headroom on the main channels. On one of the first modern surround releases, Alan Parson's "On Air", he had the Kick and bass coming from all four corner speakers, utilizing the total power of these channels. You shouldn't assume your mix will be played just on systems with small satellites crossed over to a sub. Nathanel Kunkel, a well known mixer that has done a number of 5.1 mixes, has the philosophy of mixing to the highest standard, five full range speakers and a subwoofer, and I think this is the correct attitude. The key is experimentation and listening to some new 5.1 releases (like Elton John's "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road") to get a feel for what other people are doing and what's possible. The key, I think, to a great surround release is to arrange the song for surround by having enough elements to fill the soundscape in interesting ways. My 2¢.

[Andy Hay]

Make sure to check your work through a bass-managed system.. preferably as your mixing. I usually add some kick and bass into the sub. You may run into some summing anomalies though - you're summing content sent discreetly to the sub with content derived from the bass-manager. It's usually more noticeable with the bass. Experiment with phase and also try filtering both signals.

You're going to have a lot of fun

check out Beck's 'Sea Change' in 5.1. Nigel Godrich & Elliot Scheiner - wow.

-andy

[talco]

Thanks for the good tips guys! And thanks for the link to the Grammy recs paper Jim. I skimmed it briefly and it looks very helpful.
Cheers,
Talley

[h1ntOn]

Andy,

I want to hear that beck can you bring it by sometime...

oh and when is apple going to release an ipod with 5.1 out!!!!!