narrow stereo field

[gmeister]

Why is it when I play a commercial CD thru my monitors the stereo field is much wider and has more depth than my mixes I do on my Digi002.

Background: Treated room, Panasonic external convertors, Dynaudio bm6a's.

I'll pan the guitars hard right and left and the bass and vocals straight up the middle, but the stereo image is very narrow compared to a commercial Cd played thru the same monitors.

I tried using the waves S1 imager and it helps but doesn't sound the same.

Any suggestions? I'm forever trying to improve my mixes and this I just can't seem to fix.

[Lespaulaholic66]

I'm having the same problem!!!...I'll put a commercial cd on and the guitars will seem big and wide. But I can pan the heck out of mine and still they sound like they are towards the middle. I can tell that they are more prominent on one side but they still aren't as large and in charge as the commercial cd's. Same thing with my overheads......Its about to drive me mad. Hopefully someone will throw us a bone here....lol

[djui5]

Try using delays on the guitars....and make sure it's not 2 tracks of the same thing your panning hard left and right..if so you'll end up with what's called "big mono".

[gmeister]

Thank you djui,

Yes, the guitars sound like big mono. I tried playing slightly different guitar parts and added delays to the guitars and panned the delays opposite of the dry guitar. Definite improvement. Is there any specific place you pan the delay or is it just a matter of taste? I tried at 9:00 Oclock and seems to be fine. Another question, if you double track the same guitar part using different mics. Say for example a sm57 and a royer 121 on the same cabinet, I take it you pan the tracks in the same position to avoid the big mono effect.

Thanks again for your help.

[dpd]

I have a really cool old article that talks about using delays to augment stage width.

Remember, distance = time. You can play around with picking a distance difference between L and R and calculate the associated delay.

delay Time (sec) = distance difference (ft) / 1130 (ft/sec)

Quantum Disclaimer: The equation is correct, I just don't know if applying science will really help!

[djui5]

I'd say pan the delays hard right for a guitar that's hard left.
Use small delays..25ms and such. Work's wonders :)

[gmeister]

Thank you all. Some good responses. I'll be doing some experimenting tonight.

Thanks'again

[MrKeysAOO]

The most common way that engineers get a wide, huge guitar sound (assuming the guitar sounds good to begin with) is double tracking. Simply play the part twice (into two seperate tracks) then pan them to the extremes. The two channels will be similar enough that they'll sound like one part but different enough that the brain will interperate them as coming from the outsides instead of the middle. You have to remember that, in a stereo environment, you have only two speakers so ALL of the sound comes from hard left, hard right, or both (you also have only two ears)...nothing comes from anywhere in the middle or outside the width of the speakers. Your brain extrapolates position using time/phase, relative loudness, and tonality information. You can manipulate this in a mariad of ways ie: if you put a guitar in the left channel and put it's delay (around 10ms) in the right channel, the guitar will sound farther left than the left speaker! Also, a stereo EQ can do marvelous things to a stereo image.
Go to Google and look-up "psychoaccoustics" and read everything you can find----it's fascinating.

[dpd]

Originally posted by djui5
I'd say pan the delays hard right for a guitar that's hard left.
Use small delays..25ms and such. Work's wonders :)

Dang, Randy! 25 mS??? That's over 25 FEET difference! I would have guessed less than half that.

:NoExperience:

[MrKeysAOO]

delay times higher than about 10ms start to sound like, well, a delay :)

[djui5]

Just play with it...if 25ms is too much..then back off...you'll know what you want when you hear it.
BTW..I don't use calculations when doing this..just listen.

[gmeister]

Very good advice. I've been using waves supertap delay on an aux bus and just using 1/8 th note delays timed to the tempo of the song. I'll try using my ears this time. Apparently I'm using way too much delay in trying to get the effect I want.

It works real nice on vocals but too much for just widening the rhytmn guitars.

[dpd]

Originally posted by djui5
Just play with it...if 25ms is too much..then back off...you'll know what you want when you hear it.
BTW..I don't use calculations when doing this..just listen.

Ever the engineer, I calculate as a sanity check. Hasn't helped yet

[gmeister]

I tried it yesterday. I used a short delay of about 10ms. It was immediately noticable. It seemed to just lift the guitars from the speakers. I can't thank you enough.

I was wondering if I should experiment with some EQ on the delay. Is it common practice to eq the delay with high or low pass filters?

Thanks again

[MrKeysAOO]

Directionality is most appearent in high frequencies so high pass filtering/boosting may be an interesting choice

[gcjammin1]

Listen to AC/DC "You Shook Me All Night Long" to the guitar part during the 1st verse. You'll hear the panning of the guitars along with the tonal difference of each one. While listening to it, play with the pan so you can hear each guitar separatly and then how it sounds together. They're each playing the same riff, only at different timbers and it really fills out the sound. There are quite a few songs that use this technique. You can do the same thing by playing a song with one set of chords and then capo up and play the same key with a different set of chords and pan them hard left and right.

Gcjammin1

[snatchman]

Originally posted by djui5
Try using delays on the guitars....and make sure it's not 2 tracks of the same thing your panning hard left and right..if so you'll end up with what's called "big mono". Yeah, I tried explaining this to a friend of mine that records backing vocals! Copying a mono track and panning them hard left/hard right is not stereo! Just two dual mono tracks panned hard left/ hard right! If he wants true stereo, he has to use two (2)mics or a stereo mic with two capsules.:(

[gcjammin1]

You can also take a guitar part, copy it to another track and offset that track a little and pan them hard left and right and you'll get a stereo effect.

Gcjammin1

[MrKeysAOO]

Originally posted by gcjammin1
You can also take a guitar part, copy it to another track and offset that track a little and pan them hard left and right and you'll get a stereo effect.

Gcjammin1

This is definately an option but it doesn't give as much stereo spread or clarity and causes weird phazing problems especially when monoed

[snatchman]

Originally posted by MrKeysAOO
This is definately an option but it doesn't give as much stereo spread or clarity and causes weird phazing problems especially when monoed Yep..!:cool:

[gmeister]

I'm a big ACDC fan and I know what your talking about. On alot of their songs they don't play the exact same chord. On one side they usaully play a straight major chord and the other side they will play a variant of the chord. I've been doing this alot, but I still wasn't getting the effect I wanted. The delay trick is just what I was looking for. I tried using delay before but was way off track. I was making the delay too long.

[djui5]

Glad I could help out :)


I like the highpass filter idea...I've never done that before. It might be cool with some layering.
Original guitar on the left, delay on the right, but split the delay signal into 3 eq's. One is strictly highs, next is mid's, next is lows. Blend these together and vary the mix of them during the guitar part with a little automation. Could be interesting.

Also add a touch of verb to both sides moves things back and out a little too.

[MrKeysAOO]

hahahah you're sick....I like it