Solo fingerstyle - to pan or not to pan?

[SprintBob]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

I think this is a source of some confusion. Some people are talking about "panning inward" - making a stereo pair sound narrower. Every DAW's different, but usually you can do that when you record to two mono tracks. You have a choice of how much of mic 1 appears in the left vs right and the same with mic #2. So you could even set both pan controls to the center (equal in each channel) and get mono.Or you could pan one mic slightly left and the other slightly right, and get a narrow stereo sound. Or hard left and right to get the widest sound.

On DAWs I'm familiar with, when you record to a stereo track, the "pan" control simply adjusts the volume of one side or the other, it doesn't make the stereo image narrower or wider, it just shifts it left or right.

So I think people are talking about two different things.

For recording to stereo tracks, I try to balance the mic levels from the beginning, but if I need to adjust them slightly during mix down, the pan/balance control is one way to do it.

Copy that on all of the above. Thanks Doug!

[SprintBob]

Originally Posted by rick-slo

BOTH SIDES NOW 2 TR MONO MIX HPF PAN 100% L - R sounds the best. There will an especially noticeable difference when mic'ing
in a spaced pair configuration versus some coincident mic'ing setup.

Thanks Derek, good to hear you confirm what I thought my ears hear.

[SprintBob]

Thanks everyone who responded to this thread. I learned a lot and it was very helpful.

[Wrighty]

Originally Posted by SprintBob

KevWind,

I think you just cleared me up on a basic setup issue. I’ve been bringing both mics into a single Track with the Input shown as Stereo (i.e. the Track Input shows Input 1 and Input 2 together). I should have been using Mono for each mic for the recording so mic 1 is Track 1 is Mono Input 1 and Mic 2 is Track 2 is Mono Input 2. Than after getting the recording, I pan one mic L and one mic R and set the Master Mix Output to Stereo (correct?).

These are rookie mistakes, thanks for your time.

You can do it either way Bob - one stereo track, which Reaper will then pan for you or two mon tracks that you can then pan (usually hard left and hard right)

One stereo is simpler and only requires and FX etc to be applied once.

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by SprintBob

I'm not sure I understand the difference when I have two mics recorded on two mono tracks of panning "inward" or "outward". My pan control knob for each track lets me pan left or right 0% (centered) to 100%. How do I know I am panning inward or outward relative to one or both tracks?

My DAW (Reaper) does the same as what Doug mentions in panning a stereo track with two mics recorded on it.

As far as "inward" and "outward" with two mono tracks , it is dependent on where you are starting the panning from (i.e either from 100% hard left or right ,,,,or,,, starting from (0 % center ) . BTW there is no advantage to having them panned to center for recording.

That basically means "Inward" starting from 100% left on the left hand track , is any position less (numerically percentage wise ) than "Hard" 100% left , and moving the panner knob towards to center (straight up position) for example 45% L, is inward of 100% L .......... On the Right hand track it is the opposite, anything less than 100% right is "inward"
Conversely (and why it may seem confusing at first) Starting from 0% centered, (on the left hand track) "outward" would be any position increasing in percentage towards the left

Make sense?

I would suggest a couple of workflow and labeling ideas for consistency. First decide which Left and Right perspective is going to be your reference point , meaning either from the player's perspective, or from the listener perspective.

Me I use "players perspective" (i.e. being a right handed player ,,,,, in a spaced pair configuration, the Left mic is the mic aimed at the fret board, and the Right mic is the one aimed at the body...... And I label my two mono tracks as such. See the screen shot below

Originally Posted by Doug Young

I think this is a source of some confusion. Some people are talking about "panning inward" - making a stereo pair sound narrower. Every DAW's different, but usually you can do that when you record to two mono tracks. You have a choice of how much of mic 1 appears in the left vs right and the same with mic #2. So you could even set both pan controls to the center (equal in each channel) and get mono.Or you could pan one mic slightly left and the other slightly right, and get a narrow stereo sound. Or hard left and right to get the widest sound.

Yes that's my understanding of the terms inward and outward and I agree in many DAWs also seems to apply only to two mono tracks.

On DAWs I'm familiar with, when you record to a stereo track, the "pan" control simply adjusts the volume of one side or the other, it doesn't make the stereo image narrower or wider, it just shifts it left or right.

Yes and why with that type of DAW like Reaper , I prefer recording to two mono tracks.
But for example in Pro Tools a stereo track has two panning knobs that function exactly the same as on a mono track they shift the image left or right and do not change the relative level. Which I prefer ... And they can be set to act independently , relatively, or conversely...

Here is a session I just recorded Note the stereo tracks have two pan knobs

I have an Acoustic Rhythm guitar,,,, an Acoustic Lead guitar,, and a vocal in this session ...

And the "track labeling" ( towards the bottom of each channel strip) and positioning reflects the Left and Right mics (players perspective). In my workflow I have the Folder tracks (or Aux return or sub bus tracks ) on the left of each set,,,, then the audio tracks that feed that sub bus, next etc. ........And for my inputs the odd numbers are always Left and the even numbers are Right.

So Bob,,,, from the left the " A Ry Gtr" ( is the acoustic rhythm sub-bus track ) then the "A Ry L" is Acoustic Rhythm left mic, audio track,,,,, and the "A Ry R" is the Acoustic Rhythm right mic, audio track .....etc. labeling this way always keeps me organized on exactly what is what .

NOW note that the first set of tracks from the left The "A Ry Gtr " tracks are panned 100% L & R ,,,,,, where the "A Ld" tracks are panned "inward" to 40 %

[Bob Womack]

Of course, advanced DAWs offer multiple panner/balancer options for stereo tracks. One example of this is the Cubase Pro/Nuendo "Stereo Combined Panner." It presents a horizontal bar across the panner display on the DAW's mixer. You can click and grab the left or right end of the bar and pull each across as far as you wish. There are numeric quantitative displays that allow you to see how far you've panned inward or lick on the number and enter it manually from the keyboard. This allows you to use stereo insert plugs on the channel to keep the processing balanced. Sexy technology, no?

Bob