Exporting Multiple-mono to stereo interleaved: SUCKS

mixsit said:
I haven't really thought this through, but could it be the difference is do to pan laws ?
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I mentioned pan law above. It shouldn't really change the relative levels left-center-right. What it would do is change the overall level of the stereo output, because it's turning up each side by whatever the pan law is set to. This alone makes the A/B test invalid unless it's been compensated.

I also haven't heard how this A/B is achieved. If that stereo file is being pushed through the same master bus with all that processing still on it...

OP - Post some samples that we can play with!
 
I thought about pan law, but it shouldn't do anything but alter the overall levels, and then only if it's wrongly implemented as a boost to the sides rather than correctly implemented as a cut at center.
 
I'm still wondering what effect his particular application of stereo plugs to dual mono files is doing....?
If I understand him....he is applying multiple stereo plugs to dual mono tracks/files, then exporting that out as a stereo file....and he says something happens during that process.

How would stereo plugs affect dual mono tracks/files, when they are then summed by the individual stereo plugs and again at the time of export to a stereo file...?
Also, how he is actually doing all that...what stereo plugs is he using....what is his step 1 then step 2, etc..? It's not really coming across in his explanation.
I bet if we could watch what he is doing...and also hear it.....the answer would reveal itself.
I'm also wondering what if any conversions he is doing during this process from the start to the final export, and if there's anything he is specifically doing that might be altering things..?

Kinda' hard to say what is going just based on his generic explinations and without any audio clips to hear.

I don't know of anyone else that is doing that in that manner....and not just here, but I've never come across that even on other audio forums....so I've never seen any discussions/issue/solution about it it before.
 
bouldersoundguy said:
I thought about pan law, but it shouldn't do anything but alter the overall levels, and then only if it's wrongly implemented as a boost to the sides rather than correctly implemented as a cut at center.
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I don't know if it's in his path there, but those pan law differences (the different versions of 'up or down, center or sides') can sound pretty close to the same effect as playing with mid/side levels- i.e 'wider 'narrower..
 
mixsit said:
I don't know if it's in his path there, but those pan law differences (the different versions of 'up or down, center or sides') can sound pretty close to the same effect as playing with mid/side levels- i.e 'wider 'narrower..
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Ummm...if you've got the whole mix like this in two files panned L/R, all the pan law can possibly do is (bsg says maybe) change the overall level of the whole mix. The phenomenon you describe will happen if you have a stereo mix composed of individually tracks panned across the field and change pan law, but shouldn't really affect the width of the mix in the OP's case.

miroslav said:
I don't know of anyone else that is doing that in that manner....and not just here, but I've never come across that even on other audio forums....so I've never seen any discussions/issue/solution about it it before.
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I recall reading a while back (like, around the turn of the century) that Trent Reznor liked to render his mixes one side at a time for some reason. I may have done something similar in the past in my noise experiments, but the closest I've come for anything resembling music was an attempt to "fool" a reverb into doing stereo things that it didn't want to do.
 
ashcat_lt said:
I recall reading a while back (like, around the turn of the century) that Trent Reznor liked to render his mixes one side at a time for some reason. I may have done something similar in the past in my noise experiments, but the closest I've come for anything resembling music was an attempt to "fool" a reverb into doing stereo things that it didn't want to do.
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Yeah...maybe for some odd/specific reason....for some effect.....but for pure mixdowns, I just never heard of anyone doing it like the OP is describing, or that anyone complained about the stereo image quality, when not working with dual mono, like the OP.
I just wonder if sometimes people pursue some weird path, create their own mess...then assume there's something wrong with a process that works for everyone else exactly as it should. :D
 
Here is an audio sample, i hope no one would have trouble downloading it:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/40388394/sample.zip

Readin your thoughts on the issue, and researching some more on what you guys suggested, im starting to think maybe i have a general idea of whats going on. but i wont share it- i dont want you to be biased :)

so check it out, let me know what you think..
 
It's definitely not nulling perfectly, so there is some difference between the audio in the multi mono files and the stereo file, at least with this sample. I didn't find anything indicating a shift in the stereo field, but I did find some 60Hz and harmonics coming through, plus a few short glitchy sounds.

So, there's no processing on your master bus, is there? An imported bounce would be going through it a second time and sound different.
 
Iv'e mis-threaded my audio sample for you to check, so here it is again:

Here is an audio sample, i hope no one would have trouble downloading it:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/40388394/sample.zip

Readin your thoughts on the issue, and researching some more on what you guys suggested, im starting to think maybe i have a general idea of whats going on. but i wont share it- i dont want you to be biased :)

so check it out, let me know what you think..

btw, boulder- for your question- no.
there is no process on the output bus. also, all the reference tracks you see there are just me trying stuff out, you can ignore that.
all i did was get the original mix, in multimono, to go through all the plugins on the process channel, and then just bounce it out twice. one as stereo, and one as multimono, and thats exactly the files you have here to download.
 
I'm not sure I understand your problem. It appears that you did a stereo mix, but then you are exporting the two channels separately. Is that right? Why not just master the mix? Am I missing something? Why would you do your mastering that way in the first place?

Maor said:
hey guys,
im using pro tools 10 for mixing and mastering.
im exporting the final mix as multiple-mono file (2 mono files, for L and R, if you dont know..), and importing that into my mastering session.
there is goes from 2 mono tracks, to a stereo master bus, on which i do all the processing. to keep the stereo image looking good, i only use multiple mono inserts, for all of my EQ's compressors, limiters and what not..
everything sounds GREAT!

but in the end, i dont have an option to keep the file a dual mono. the world is working with stereo files- so im bouncing down to stereo interleaved. and it SOUNDS DIFFERENT.
when i import this file to the session, and A/B test with my multiple-mono process, i hear there is a change, for bad, in the stereo image.
it seems like the middle is brought up (unpleaseantly) on the expense of the side information..
everything just comes together to create a mono-ier output.

HOW CAN I SOLVE THIS?
i tried to insert one "stereo" (instead of multi-mono) plugin in the end of the chain, but it doesnt seem to have the same effect.
let me know if there is any way around that...

THANKS
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Rod Norman said:
I'm not sure I understand your problem. It appears that you did a stereo mix, but then you are exporting the two channels separately. Is that right? Why not just master the mix? Am I missing something? Why would you do your mastering that way in the first place?
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:laughings:


(Not laughing at you Rod)
 
I didn't jack the playback level way up on the null test but all I heard were a few brief beeps'.
I thought a few times the interleaved ver might have been a bit different ..but really my ears are way to tired ..for a vocal (or anything :) in the '1k range. I'm out, no help :)
 
I got the same results as the first time, some 60Hz, 120Hz, 180Hz at or below -80dBFS, an even lower tone at about 14.66kHz and the few brief glitches or "beeps". There was nothing relating to stereo image or panning.
 
Most of what doesn't null out is noise. I'm guessing dither? The "beeps " are interesting, though, as they are recognizeable as part of the mix. These are spots where the two mixes are noticeably different. They seemed to come at points where the overall mix is pretty hot, so I'm guessing it's something different about the way those peaks are limited/clipped/distorted. It might even be that the randomness of the noise causes these things to clip differently enough for those boils to come through? I haven't zoomed into the waves to visually inspect for differences at those points.

I have to say that I'm not hearing any noticeable difference between the two mixes, but I didn't spend a lot of time with it. Sounds good either way, though, so apparently your unconvential way of doing things is working for you. Not sure it's worth all the effort and frustration, but...
 
Rod Norman said:
I'm not sure I understand your problem. It appears that you did a stereo mix, but then you are exporting the two channels separately. Is that right? Why not just master the mix? Am I missing something? Why would you do your mastering that way in the first place?
Click to expand...

My mixes are heavy with CPU. so are my Mastering processes. so i always export a mix and open another session to master it. also its so much easier to faithfully A/B stuff this way.
no disrespect, but honestly every proffesional mixing engineer iv'e met works this way. not just in the analog world, but in the digital as well.
 
Thanks for the time and effort guys, i appreciate you testing this out with me, even though you didn't give me the answer i was "looking for".

Just one more thing that came up around here: is my workflow really that weird for you guys? i mean, most of the professional engineers i know and worked with have the same or similar method for mix+master (i don't know too many of them..), and also lots of guys who studied with me use something similar, even if its not on pro tools.
I mean, maybe the multi-mono thing is just me being superstitious, but a new session to master a song? even your own mix? seems trivial to me..
I hate to say it but inserting an L2 at the mix main output, and pulling down 6-7db isn't Mastering. not in my books..
 
The multi mono thing is weird to me, but I may take my audio through two sessions after the mix phase. I'll do one for finalizing the audio and to convert the sample rate and a second to lay out a CD. Sometimes that's two different programs.
 
Maor said:
Thanks for the time and effort guys, i appreciate you testing this out with me, even though you didn't give me the answer i was "looking for".

Just one more thing that came up around here: is my workflow really that weird for you guys? i mean, most of the professional engineers i know and worked with have the same or similar method for mix+master (i don't know too many of them..), and also lots of guys who studied with me use something similar, even if its not on pro tools.
I mean, maybe the multi-mono thing is just me being superstitious, but a new session to master a song? even your own mix? seems trivial to me..
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Without going back and rereading everything, I thought the only thing in question was having to use dual-mono to maintain the sound from an original mix on export to the master proj?
Are you thinking now you aren't hearing differences?
 
It doesn't matter one bit that you "do the same exact thing to both L and R channels" because the L & R channels contain DIFFERENT information.
These differences will trigger your compressors in a different way and generate a blurred stereo image.
 
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