stereo to mono question

[bonzerboy]

I am using a lot of VI and for what ever reason have a lot of stereo tracks where i feel i should have mono. I like the way everything sounds. If I bounce to a MONO WAV will it matter if I center the left and right pan or keep them 100% L & R? My question is will there be a difference? going MONO from Stereo but center the stereo track in the pan or leave it wide panned then go to MONO if that makes sense?

[Stephen Bond]

Originally Posted by bonzerboy

I am using a lot of VI and for what ever reason have a lot of stereo tracks where i feel i should have mono. I like the way everything sounds. If I bounce to a MONO WAV will it matter if I center the left and right pan or keep them 100% L & R? My question is will there be a difference? going MONO from Stereo but center the stereo track in the pan or leave it wide panned then go to MONO if that makes sense?

If the audio is actually mono on a stereo track then using just one side of it is fine. You can pan centre and bounce but the net result should be the same when level matched.

If it is a stereo signal on a stereo track and you like the way it sounds then leave it stereo! If you use just one side obviously it will sound different.

Personally I like some of my VIs to be mono when applicable. Minigrand and the Vacuum synth for example. There are others which are stereo only which seems a bit overkill when the output is actually mono.

Stephen

[bonzerboy]

Thanks for your input

[elicious]

Of course, listening is always your best friend.
If the track is truly mono; as pointed out above you won’t hear any tone difference;
(although your mono gain can be affected by how you have your pan law set.)
But if the patch contains some sort of stereo chorusing or other effect,
when mono-summed there could be a slight warbling in sound, similar to a tremolo.

I’m surprised at how few plug-ins, not to mention how few DAW channel strips,
don’t have the mono button as a standard feature.
There’s a couple of freebies out there, for example 4U meter from HOFA,
or Panipulator from Boz, which I always keep handy to check mono compatibility.

There’s another free plug, from Flux; StereoTool, which has a stereo field indicator,
which you can then quickly view to see if there is any stereo information…

(Sidenote; I use those tools a lot when in mixing;
receiving files from outside artists,
quite often in Logic and other DAWs,
when they export their mono files they show up as dual mono files,
which wastes a lot of system resources.)

[daeron80]

If the sound is fully correlated (no difference between L & R), you could set the instrument track output to a mono bus and then:

• record to a mono audio track.
• right-click the mono bus and bounce it with Import checked, then drag the new file to a track.

[K Roche]

Originally Posted by bonzerboy

I am using a lot of VI and for what ever reason have a lot of stereo tracks where i feel i should have mono. I like the way everything sounds. If I bounce to a MONO WAV will it matter if I center the left and right pan or keep them 100% L & R? My question is will there be a difference? going MONO from Stereo but center the stereo track in the pan or leave it wide panned then go to MONO if that makes sense?

Not quite completely clear what you are saying as you end goal ?? it seems you are talking about two different subjects in one post
#1 collapsing stereo tracks to mono within a stereo session so as to have the stereo VI tracks sound like mono
OR
# 2 bouncing a stereo session to mono format for some specific mono playback system ?

If it's #1 then the simplest thing is adjust the duel pan knobs to the same number L or R in the stereo field I often do this if after the fact I decide I want a stereo VI instrument to playback more in mono.
For example I might put both pan knobs for say a VI piano at 45 L or more often then not something like 40 L and 50 L
(one or the great things about the way PT handles stereo track panning) is you have the option to adjust each one totally independently from the other.