Electronic drums

[JohnPaul]

OK, should samples drums be kept in stereo or mono...

...i normally layer and process a bunch of stereo samples (eg 3 or 4 kick drums) then record them as one single stereo file....

...should i record them as a single mono wav file instead...?

...most of my other non-drum/percussion sounds are all in mono....

...just wondering what others who are making electronic music think...

??

 

[Gidge]

the individual hit samples should be mono......

 

[Stealthtech]

Depends on what samples your using. For example, a good deal of my samples that I use in the EXS24 with Logic are stereo samples with toms, rides and crashes set to left or right stereo field for a kit that sounds as though it has been miced with 2 mics for a true stereo sound.

 

[Gidge]

the true stereo sound (or all close as it gets with samples) will come from taking all of the individual mono hits (kick,snare,hihat,ride,each individual tom,crash and rides, and panning them around the stereo spectrum in its appropriate place.....

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Many "stereo" samples are simply mono sources with phase/EQ/ambient effects applied directly....

Mix several such "stereo" samples together and you get a wonderfully unpretty, washy mess of phase and comb-filtering artifacts.....

Keep the tracks simple -- use stereo only when it makes absolute sense (for example, a natural room sound as part of a track's sound)...

Leave the faux stereo patches in the demo modes where they belong.... convert them to mono and strip off any of the crappy effects they may have as part of the patch settings before using them.... apply the effects that are appropriate for YOUR application afterwards...

Sure, it's convenient and easy to simply use the presets, but 99% of the time, the preset settings (including DSP, tone and effects) won't apply to what you want to use it for!