a perception of extreme WIDTH in a mix (stereo tracks=mono)

[dsw]

The thing I hear missing in most ITB mixes and think is the hardest thing to get is not width, but depth (front to back). A lot of mixing sounds so flat these days. It takes a good stereo with proper speaker placement to hear depth anyway, so I wonder if that's part of it for people. I see a lot of pictures of peoples set ups with the speakers close together and right up against the wall.

[Z-Plane]

I totally hear you on depth. My theory is that converter algorithms tar everything with the same brush, with the first casualty being perceived depth. I say this because I used to work in a mastering house during the mid to late 90s, exactly the time the first ITB mixes were appearing. Some mixes we sent back, only to find they were done on crappy soundblasters, with the main artifact we noticed being complete lack of depth.

Alternatively, providing a positive example - I keep a lot of outboard fx on sends from my DAW, 3 reverbs and some modulation units e.t.c. and find that the depth magically reappears whenever I process spatial fx outside the box, and its so pleasing to hear a reverb tail when I press stop!

[The Scum]

How about stereo sends to stereo reverb - otherwise your reverb'd tracks start where you panned them, then they recenter and bloom from there, sucking things back to the middle.

This is interesting. Would you match your aux pan with your channel pan?

Seems like matching them would be most realistic, while panning the send to the other side might actually increase perceived width.

I think maybe the tacit thesis of the idea above was that in order to add or maintain width, you need to remain aware of some of the things that work towards maintaining a stereo image, and preserve them.

A mono send to a stereo reverb (or a mono-in, stereo-out reverb) implicitly returns things to the center of the stereo field, destroying width.

To preserve a realistic image, that triggers the clues our ears & brain use to identify & place live sources, you'd want to pan the send to match the channel.

Not that people always wor like that. There seem to be an awful lot of desks with only mono auxes, a similar number of mono-in, stereo-out reverbs (or similarly bad, ones with stereo inputs that sum to mono before hitting the reverb). There are also a lot of examples where this sort of realistic image wasn't attempted...the guitar on Funhouse comes to mind.

[kingtoad]

I totally hear you on depth. My theory is that converter algorithms tar everything with the same brush, with the first casualty being perceived depth. I say this because I used to work in a mastering house during the mid to late 90s, exactly the time the first ITB mixes were appearing. Some mixes we sent back, only to find they were done on crappy soundblasters, with the main artifact we noticed being complete lack of depth.

Alternatively, providing a positive example - I keep a lot of outboard fx on sends from my DAW, 3 reverbs and some modulation units e.t.c. and find that the depth magically reappears whenever I process spatial fx outside the box, and its so pleasing to hear a reverb tail when I press stop!

Surely if converter algorithms were to blame then only projects recorded on tape would be exempt from any perceived lack of depth? If you are mixing a DAW recorded project OTB then there is actually more conversion going on as the audio has to be sent out to the console and (usually) back in again.

Are you referring to summing algorithms instead?

[Z-Plane]

A theory, and perhaps poorly developed. It could be that summing and processor algorithms, or even factors yet to be discovered play the greater part. All I can say for sure is that my subjective response to any kind of spatial processing always favours OTB. The idea for my theory was that while multiple conversions are not the enemy, there is more contrast and perceived depth provided by elements which have neither been generated nor converted by the box, outboard reverb tails being a good example. Obviously these are often subjected to a final mix A/D conversion, but I find I still prefer this method to 100% ITB.

[firesine]

The quality of converters would be an important distinction here. Soundblasters are certainly gonna muss things up compared to newer, more high quality converters. Especially in the multiple conversion scenarios. It seems like ITB would be the way to go if you have crappy converters.

[The Scum]

Z-plane,

An interesting theory, but I'm skeptical.

You mention that outboard reverb does better for you than ITB.

Unless it's an analog reverb (plate or spring, most likely), then it's running it's own AD/DA converters. Therefore, if converters, in general, ruin the spatial perception of reverb, any digital reverb is being ruined intrinsically...it's effectively in it's own box.

I'd venture a guess that it might have more to do with the quality of the algorithms in reverb plugins, versus OTB algorithms. I haven't yet met a plug that was a 480L...though they finally captured the H3000 a while back.

Or, conversely, on some of those soundblaster mixes you sent back, the converters may not have been the only quality bottleneck.

[Z-Plane]

Honestly, I can't advance the theory much more than my subjective feelings when listening, but lets try to get away from the soundblaster theme, that was an extreme example and they were indeed a pile of crap. Scum, I do have a spring reverb on a DAW send but there are also a couple of Lexicons and again, its not an issue with conversions per se, what I'm getting at is that I feel there is a contrast and definition to be gained with OTB reverb because it is not being painted with the same brush as the rest of the mix. As it happens, springs are very poorly modeled to date, but lets take a Lexicon, I was hinting that the very grain of the wet signal, and in particular its sense of depth, appears to stand apart from everything else coming from the box.

As in my previous post, there are many possible explanations, not just converters, and I have a reasonably modern DAW system that is configured for 16 channels of analogue summing, precisely to avoid any possible ITB summing issues. So again, converters are not the enemy, just that I'm convinced I hear a richer depth in mixes that get out of the box for reverbs and modulations.

[logancircle]

i actually kinda feel like ITB is TOO WIDE sometimes. like the hard panned stuff is kinda hanging out on its own way out on the edges, and doesn't always gel with the rest of the track the way i think it ought to.

Amen to that.

The right amount of reverb panned to the right spot in the field, even on <100 panned guitar or whathaveyou, can make all the difference. The close/far miking is great for this too, and you can put the far mic way the hell out there and crush it.

[highway51]

What About the Joe Meek stereo compressor that has a stereo width knob?I would venture to guess their using some sort of outboard gear that causes this effect. does anyone know how it works? After seeing that the joe meek vc2 stereo compressor comes with this effect I've been seriously looking into it.

[vvv]

I looked in to that outta curiosity.

They claim it is some kind of "mid-side" processing.

Other stuff (mostly plugs) I've seen play with phase relationships and/or limited frequency delays.

[Nick Sevilla]

I try not to pan stuff hard at all, and leave the extreme edges for effects only, on some songs.

When hard panning stuff, I do try to have ambience somewhere else in the field, to try to emulate a room, and the hard panned instrument bouncing off the walls in the "right way"

Of course, now that I re listened to Electric Ladyland, who knows what crazy thing I'll try next...

Cheers

[T-rex]

I like hard panning a guitar and hard panning it's reverb to the other side, especially when there are two guitars one hard left and one hard right with their verbs opposite. I would have thought that would sound like a cluster but it actually works really well for me. actually, I take that back I usually pan guitar hard and the reverb about 50% on the otehr side.

I am with Z-plane. I know people say the extra conversion is a killer, but I don't hear that. It seems the more outboard stuff I use the more the mixes open up; depth and width wise. It could be an audio placebo, but that is how I hear it. And I don't think the outboard stuff I am using is better than the ITB stuff.

[Marc Alan Goodman]

I certainly think that conversion can take depth and space out of a recording, but it doesn't necessarily. The biggest difference I've ever noticed with this was when we demoed the Antelope 10M atomic clock. Just listening to a 2 track mix coming out of the computer the depth was DRASTICALLY improved by switching the atomic clock on. So drastically that everyone in the room noticed it, including a few musicians and a friend who wasn't involved in making music at all. What that thing can do over an entire mix (both A/D and D/A multi track conversion) is astounding.

Personally I have a lot easier time creating a sense of depth and a natural feel working on a console than I ever did in the box. I have to side with the people who've said that ITB mixes sometimes sound TOO wide though. It's more about making it sound "good" (I feel like I need to use quotes with that word for some reason) and wide rather than just wide.

As far as outboard digital gear, such as reverbs, yes of course they're using their own conversion, and it's another stage. However if your reverb is set all the way to wet and you're blending it with the original dry signal it's only the verb, which is usually way quieter than the original signal. So I can't see why it would have a hugely dramatic effect on the width of the recording. If the outboard delay sounds wide it should add width. If it sounds flat it should flatten things out. I don't see why if it sounds wide coming out of the reverb it would make things sound more centered.

Finally, yes, mono drums help a lot. Just listen to OK Computer (which I did last night for the first time in years and I finally feel like I can see through the mixes, though they're still awesome).