acoustic guitar stereo image

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aerospace1

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Hi Guys! Here's something I was wondering:
We just got done laying down 2 acoustic guitar tracks which are just exact copies played on two different guitars. Each guitar was recorded with XY miking.

So usually I would place the X mike on the left, Y mike on right side.

Now I have 2 different guitars, both with X Y. How should I image these? Put both X and Y of guitar 1 on left, XY Guitar 2 on right? Or put both X's on one side, both Y's on the other?

Any thoughts guys?

Thanks!
 
Can you clarify? You have 2 recordings of guitar. Each of them are stereo/X-Y recordings?

Pan them to where it sounds best. Typically, I would record each one in mono and pan them left and right, I've never tried using 2 stereo XY recordings, I imagine that can get messy.

You could try this:

Guitar 1 (X): 100% left
Guitar 2 (X): 100% right
Guitar 1 (Y): 50% left
Guitar 2 (Y): 50% right

Or really any combination. Just whatever sounds best. That's just something I came up with off the top of my head.

Also, listen in mono while you pan stuff to make sure it doesn't turn to crap. Then when switching to stereo you should have a nice, wide stereo image that is mono compatible, and hence, will sound good on systems with poor stereo imaging like small boom boxes or some laptop speakers.
 
No one can say without hearing it.

What sounds best to you?

Usually doubled parts are panned fairly wide. XY configurations are mono compatible, so you should have no problem summing the mic pair from gtr A to one side, and the mic pair from gtr B to the other if that gives the sound you want. It may be, though, that the best sound for the mix will be with just one mic on each gtr.
 
There are many different ways you can go. It depends on what effect you want to wind up with...a question you should have asked yourself *before* you set up the mics and started recording ;).

A lot depends upon the overall arrangement of the song. What is the purpose of the guitars?
Are they just background rhythm or teh main focus of the song? Are they call and response to the vocals or solid rhythm all the way through, etc.

If they ae just guitars playing pretty much by themselves, a more natural sound option would be to pan one guitar a bit left and one a bit right to actually give you a more realistic and intimate sound (the specific % numbers are not chisled in stone):

Git1L - 70% L
Git1R - 30% L

Git2L - 30% R
Git2R - 70% R

G.
 
So, you recorded these to 4 mono tracks, or two stereo tracks? In either case, then net result you probably want to achieve is as if you were sitting with two guitarists sitting in front of you forming a triangle between you and them. Maintain the stereo spread of each guitar, but pan those spreads partially left and right with some natural overlap.
 
Perhaps the OP will revisit the thread and describe what kind of mix he's using the tracks in.
 
good ideas

Hi guys,

Thanks for the replies. I forgot the fact that their are no rules in this game...

Seperating them as Danny/SS mentioned sounds natural and seperated.

A very neat subtle delay effect was achieved by cross-mixing them (Guitar 1 and 2 X on one side, Guitar 1 and 2 Y on the other).

For this song the acoustics perform a picked eighth note arpeggio, so the appearance of a single delayed guitar is probably what I will go with.

We are recording a pop rock album, so the backbone to all these tracks is the acoustic rhythym guitar.

In general, we have been recording all the acoustic parts in double. I don't know what we will end up using in the mix since I'm definitely afraid of over-using that technique.
 
I agree with the keep it simple part. I'd also offer that perhaps even more key is not to just consider how the gits sound in isolation, but rather lay out a holistic plan for the mix. What may sound "neat" when soloing the two gits may not work right within the context of the entire mix with the rest of the instruments.

Keep the entire mix balanced in three dmensions: pan, spectrum, and depth, and leave enough room in the mix for each instrument to breathe, and you should be quite happy with the results. Let the instruments compliment each other rather than fight each other for space.

Additionally, if you are doing a whole album, I'd recommend planning the mix for each song indiviually. What works best on your power anthem may not be the right recipe for your smoother ballad, for example.

You found a couple of different ways of doing them so far. There are many more. I'd recommend not settling on one method to use throughout, but rather keep each method as a card in your hand to be played when the time iis right for that card.

G.
 
Glen,
Thanks for the input. As far as planning out the balance, I have always done this after tracking. We record everything including vocals, and then I figure out where to place each instrument (pan, eq, depth). Do you plan out all three of these before beginning to record a track? I imagine that is a much better approach since that would motivate certain mic placements for example. My approach this session has been to get a pretty generic (yet good) mic placement and then track all the acoustic parts for all songs (just 5 song disc). Keeping things dry, simple, and consistent. I am hesitant to try anything too different because I don't want to end up with something I don't like later on.

Hey nice site by the way. I didn't check out all of it but the interactive freq spectrum is very well done and informative!
 
We record everything including vocals, and then I figure out where to place each instrument (pan, eq, depth). Do you plan out all three of these before beginning to record a track?
If I'm mixing someone else's tracking, which is more often the case than not, unfortunately such a luxury does not exist.

But if it's a project that I am involved with and share the production tasks on from the get-go, or if I'm recommending a process to a musician or band making their own production, I highly recommend planning as much as can be done from the outset. This allows one to plan the tracking to help fit the planned mix and cuts down on the amount of force-fitting that has to be done in the mixing.
continued... said:
I imagine that is a much better approach since that would motivate certain mic placements for example. My approach this session has been to get a pretty generic (yet good) mic placement and then track all the acoustic parts for all songs (just 5 song disc). Keeping things dry, simple, and consistent. I am hesitant to try anything too different because I don't want to end up with something I don't like later on.
You sound quite reasonable to me, and there's nothing wrong with that approach at all, IMHO.

And this is how most of the stuff I have gotten to mix from ithers has some to me recently, where I have not been involved in the tracking at all, but rather have a bunch of raw tracks thrown at me on a disc with the instruction, "mix what you will of it.". My own personal approach at that point is to just throw the faders up, here what I have to work with vs. what the song wants, and what I have to do to make those two meet.
continued... said:
Hey nice site by the way. I didn't check out all of it but the interactive freq spectrum is very well done and informative!
Thanks :). Very kind of you to mention. It's still in an embryonic stage, though; there's a whole lot more coming.

G.
 
Next time, record one of them with a *vertical* XY and just pan both of them full to the sides.

Thinking ahead -- The VERTICAL set will sound bigger and more broad (for obvious reasons) than the horizontal set (which is why I still wonder why people use horizontal XY's on acoustic guitars in the first place). So, keep that in mind when deciding which one will be tracked which way. If one is doing a lot of "soloing" or other "lead" work and you want it planted more in the center, give that one the horizontal set.

(EDIT) As I re-read the original post, that would be the perfect candidate for simply tracking one vertically and the other horizontally and panning them all out. Or BOTH vertically and panning them opposite each other.
 
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Next time, record one of them with a *vertical* XY and just pan both of them full to the sides.

Thinking ahead -- The VERTICAL set will sound bigger and more broad (for obvious reasons) than the horizontal set (which is why I still wonder why people use horizontal XY's on acoustic guitars in the first place). So, keep that in mind when deciding which one will be tracked which way. If one is doing a lot of "soloing" or other "lead" work and you want it planted more in the center, give that one the horizontal set.

(EDIT) As I re-read the original post, that would be the perfect candidate for simply tracking one vertically and the other horizontally and panning them all out. Or BOTH vertically and panning them opposite each other.

Massive,
That's exactly what I began doing in the rough mix. I also did some spaced pair configurations and now I have a great variety of sounds.

Thanks for the input. I will post when the mixes are up and I'd love for you guys to check them out.
 
Both mics of one guitar panned hard left, both mics of the other guitar panned hard right.

I'll catch shit for that, but it's the best way.
 
With situations like that I usually pan the mics that are picking up more of the low end to the middle and the mics that are picking up more of the neck to the outside. It gives you a nice full sound and good stereo separation.
 
Tex-
That's an interesing idea. I have entered full time mixing mode, so I will be sure and try that out.

Harvey-
There are drums, bass, electric in most places other than intro's. I will probably use just 1 mic for those parts of the mix as suggested above.

eZ - i might try that for one of the intro's : )
 
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