doubling tracks?

[tylerxxx]

You keep them separate and pan them. That is how you make stereo.

so if there are 2 different guitar parts, i end up with 4 total guitar tracks, and then what is common panning?

 

[Farview]

If you have 2 rhythm parts that will sound balanced if you pan them, you don't need to double everything. In fact, it will end up sounding smaller if you do it too much.

The idea is to make a bed with the rhythm parts. If you have one thick guitar part and one sparse guitar part, double the thick part, pan it, record the sparse part in mono and put it where ever it fits.

 

[tylerxxx]

http://www.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewProfile&friendID=3108350&Mytoken=20050613143144

what if the music sounds like that? would i still pan it like you said?

 

[tylerxxx]

bump......

 

[Dogman]

tyler, here is where I start. I assume you are talking doing a rythum guitar track, kind of like it is played by 2 seperate guitars. Play it twice, then you will not have the phase issues spoken about above. Then what I do, and you will just want to experiment with it, is put one guitar L, about 20-75%, and the other R-the same. Just play around with it a bit, and see how they work together. The further you pan them, the more they will sound like 2 guitars, and the closer, the louder theyget, and you hear both guitars from one speaker. You could hard pan them if you want that type of sound. Just depends on if you want thick, or maybe 2 seperate, but the same, guitars.

Just a place to start, and it will take some experimenting to get the sound you want.
Ed

 

[Farview]

http://www.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewProfile&friendID=3108350&Mytoken=20050613143144

what if the music sounds like that? would i still pan it like you said?

I'm still on dail-up for another week. I can't listen to it. There is no right or wrong, just balance things out.

 

[kceltic]

another cute little trick

Ok, I know that copying, pasting, panning etc can cause problems in mono and isn’t the best way to get a doubled effect. however, I sometimes can get interesting results when I split my final complete mix into 2 tracks, pan one all the way to the left and one all the way to the right, then add a few ms of delay between them. Anyone ever try this? It’s fun to do to produced music as well. I’ll copy a good stereo mixed tune from a favorite band of mine into my recording software and do this...it’s kind of like having a manually controlled stereo expander. Give it a shot.

 

[JohnnyB]

Double-tracking works well on vocals because random phase cancellation makes it sound thicker and more interesting (plus, you're usually mixing them together in the center). You're talking about double-tracking guitar parts left and right. I'm a freak for balance, so I like to have guitar parts in pairs, left and right. Double-tracking the same distorted electric guitar part actually has the practical outcome of making them sound smaller. As someone else pointed out, mono is achieved by the same signal coming out of both speakers equally. Unless there is something to differentiate the two signals from each other (e.g., timbre, time, modulation), it will often be necessary to crank the guitars well beyond an appropriate mix level to make them sound "big." (I can always tell when the guitar player supervised the mix.) If you're going to go the route of doing an actual second performance, why not try using a different guitar (heavily distorted Les Paul sound on one side, crunchy Strat sound on the other), a different amp, a different setting, different chord inversions, an effect, any combination thereof. When recording acoustic guitars, I usually use a part played in standard tuning on the left, and a part played with a capo or some other alternate tuning on the right. In general, I also tend to go for a bassier, fuller sound on the left, and the crisper, brighter sound on the right, since we tend to think low-to-high, left-to-right, like on a piano. A cheap, fast way to get L/R coverage that doesn't consume tracks is to use a little delay, panned hard right and hard left. I use anywhere from 25 to 45 ms. This is enough time to make them seem like two distinct signals without sounding obviously "delayed."

 

[famous beagle]

IMHO, doubling guitar parts and panning them usually ends up sounding like "big mono" to me, and I pretty much avoid it at all costs. My favorite recordings don't use this technique very much, and I don't as well. I much prefer the more lively "unbalanced" sound of having mono tracks and panning them to their own place in the stereo field. IF I ever do use doubling, it's usually to achieve a mono chorus-type effect, like the beatles would do with vox a lot and things like that.

Just my two cents.

 

[HangDawg]

My favorite recordings don't use this technique very much, and I don't as well.

What are your favorite recordings and how is it that you know what recording techniques were used on them?

 

[ecktronic]

with 16 tracks you can use 6 for drums (OHs, kik, snare, tom1+2, tom floor), 2 for bass guitar, 2-3 for vox and you still have 5 left for guitars. You can also bounce the drums once happy with the mix of them and the bass also.
Good panning for a guitar part recorded twice is around 9 and 3 o'clock.

The song sounds like two guitar parts that are similar in ways so they balance when panned. They are prob panned a little bit past 9 and 3 o'clock. They sound good.

 

[famous beagle]

What are your favorite recordings and how is it that you know what recording techniques were used on them?

Well, that's a good question .... You see I have these things called "ears" on my head, and with them, I can identify sounds that come out of the left and right speakers. When I hear a mono guitar come out of one speaker and not the other, I'm assuming that the guitar was recorded that way.

What kind of question is that?

I like The Black Crowes, The Beatles, Coldplay, Radiohead, Wilco, Counting Crowes, etc. Yes, of course there are probably plenty examples of doubled and panned guitar tracks on these recordings, but there are also plenty of examples of mono tracking as well. I tend to prefer the sound of one really nice guitar over the huge "wall-of-guitar" sound. It's just my personal preference, as I said.

 

[HangDawg]

Well, that's a good question .... You see I have these things called "ears" on my head, and with them, I can identify sounds that come out of the left and right speakers. When I hear a mono guitar come out of one speaker and not the other, I'm assuming that the guitar was recorded that way.

What kind of question is that?

I like The Black Crowes, The Beatles, Coldplay, Radiohead, Wilco, Counting Crowes, etc. Yes, of course there are probably plenty examples of doubled and panned guitar tracks on these recordings, but there are also plenty of examples of mono tracking as well. I tend to prefer the sound of one really nice guitar over the huge "wall-of-guitar" sound. It's just my personal preference, as I said.

It's the kind of question that suggests that alot of the time if it's done properly, you cannot tell if it's 1 track or 2 tracks with some amount of panning. That's kind of the idea isn't it?

Oh, and you should have included a smiley with your first remark. Now you just sound like an asshole.

 

[famous beagle]

It's the kind of question that suggests that alot of the time if it's done properly, you cannot tell if it's 1 track or 2 tracks with some amount of panning. That's kind of the idea isn't it?

Oh, and you should have included a smiley with your first remark. Now you just sound like an asshole.

I don't know how to do all the little faces. Didn't mean to sound like an asshole, sorry.

 

[tylerxxx]

does it matter if i pan it before i record it, or after?

stupid question, sorry.