Hey dear Atmos buffs,
while setting up a 7.1.4 Atmos Studio with production suite I discovered a mixdown oddity which apparently can’t be affected with neither setting of the “trim and downmix controls”.
Here we go:
A signal panned to (+/-)60,60, 60, 100 = (TopFront R or L) is mixed down vastly different depending on being “object” or “7.1.2 bed”.
In essence, when I toggle this exact panning between Object/Bus in Protools and the monitoring in the Renderer is in “Stereo downmix”, the object mode results in about double volume than Bus mode!
This happens only with the top fronts. All other speakers mix down as expected.
When I dig deeper into it I see the first difference appearing in the 7.1.4/7.1.2 to 7.1 downmix/monitoring where Objects in this position are fed partially into R,C,Ls,Rs whereas Bed content in this position is exclusively downmixed to Rs. The Object pattern goes down to the 5.1 and then adding up in overly loud reproduction in the Stereo.
It gets even weirder! When I do the same experiment with a 7.1 Bed (instead of 7.1.4 Bed) the contrary happens. The object is mixed down lower than the bed! Less difference but still considerable. What the heck?
As I said, no setting in the downmix controls affects this being so.
To compare I set up my own straight downmix matrix for quick reference with the awesome RME total mix matrix and these DIY downmixes behave exactly as I would expect. No overblown objects in the stereo.
What's going on here?
Top Front Objects mix down into Stereo a lot louder than 7.1.2 beds?
Top Front Objects mix down into Stereo lower than 7.1 beds?
So different that it isn’t the same mix at all.
I´m sorry for this complicated matter but can anyone confirm this?
Do I have my wires crossed or is this what the Renderer does?
Thanks so much for help
Nick