Newbie Panning

  • Thread starter Thread starter mfine
  • Start date Start date
M

mfine

New member
i'm a newbie to mixing and wonder if there are general basic guidelines for panning? i have a few densely layered songs and i'm trying to make sure no individual tracks are lost in the mix.

i've been experimenting with panning to try to separate certain instruments a bit, e.g. panning guitar hard left and keys hard right. one thing i worry about is if the listener is not in the sweet spot between speakers, that the mix may sound off.

any info about common practices is appreciated!
 
Just be carefull with hard left and right. I was once listening to a tape of Keith Richards and the expensive wino's on my walkman, and the hard panning of the rythem guitars was extremely annoying. They were both playing kindof breakbeats, I don't know. Just annoying.

Stereo sources, or 2 tracks from the same source, with different mics may be or even should be hard panned, I guess. I wouldn't put a mono track hard right or left. Unless this is meant as some sort of special effect...

And offcourse, if you're mixing a live band, hard panning is bad. Only half of the audience would here the instrument.

You can also get some density out by having different tracks in a different freq spectrum. Cut some frequencies out of a track and make some space that way. That's what I heard... I don't have any experience doing that...
 
mfine,
Try to read up on the following topics by using the search.

Stereo imaging is done with a three dimension in mind.
up/down/left/right/close/far

Depth - reverb/delay/freq related
Left/Right -panning
Up/Down - use of Freq's

Seperation of freq spectrum as mentioned above is an important issue as well.

Combining all the above can bring you to move any sound any were.
You can even make a sound seem like it's comming from a room in a house with the door open to your left.

If after you have read and have any more questions then please ask.
 
thanks so much for the tips. i understand that vocals/drums/bass generally go in the center. it's the guitars and keys i'm still trying to work out. from searching this site, others seem to say that u generally want to keep only slight pans on main instrumental parts (e.g. main guitar slight left and main keys slight right) and use hard panning mainly for special effects that perhaps don't appear often. i use a a fair number of strange samples that come in briefly here and there so may want to restrict hard panning to those. i know there are no hard and fast rules for panning, but if anyone has any other general guides from their experience i'd appreciate it. thanks...
 
rough rule of thumb:
don't exceed 9:00 left pan or 3:00 right.
Roel is dead on.Listen to old beatles records for some weird panning choices.

Tom
 
I don't know, I like Beatles panning. I pan stuff hard right, hard left all the time. To not exceed 9:00 and 3:00 is a bit of a constraint, what a waste of open space.
 
If you pan hard and it becomes distracting then THAT is a problem. But if you compensate corectly there should not be any problem.
For example : 2 guitars panned hard is fine
A Stereo bass panned hard left and right is fine
Overheads panned hard left and right is fine.

A bad example would be: pan hard a percussion instrument to
one side but not compensate it.
 
Shailat's right...

...it's all about balancing sounds on the left and right side evenly. Not that you have the same instruments left/right, but for example, if you have a cabasa panned hard left, you want to have some other percussive element on the right to even it out so that the percussive elements don't stand out. You also have to watch panning for mono-compatibility.

Bruce
 
I come from a live sound background where if you pan hard, folks on that side of the room won't hear it!I hear people hard pan all the time so its not uncommon.I just feel cautious about a mix that sounds different depending on where you sit in the stereo sound-field.

Tom
 
track pan example in midi

these are my starting points for a mix:

drum set (56 to 72):
kick 64
snare 60
hats 56
toms 72-60 starting with the largest to the smallest
cymbals 56 and 72

instrumentation:
bass 64 or 68 if bass is just as deep as kick
keys 76
lead guitar (not duing solo) 52
horns/winds 40-48 and 80-88
stereo strings/pads 24-32 and 88-96
rhythm guitar 0 and 127

vocals:
lead vocal 64
doubled vocal 40 or 88
back vocals 16 and 112

of course, if you don't have a particular group represented during the course of the tune, you can move the outer groups inside to replace it, but i don't always do that.

with good mix placement, the right volume on the instruments and the proper compression (with look ahead peak limiting), i'm finding that my mixes are starting to sound more pro than semi-pro.
 
Pan so you think it sounds good. And if you think hard left panning sounds good and is cool. Do it. Annoying? Well, thats a Good Thing too sometimes!

I love Sgt Pepper. Especially in headphones!
 
I think general guidelines are having the kick, snare, bass guitar, lead guitar , lead vocals panned dead center...and balancing the rest like the other guys mentioned...i believe in hard panning on guitars (Roel, listening on headphones , in my opinion, overexaggerates the stereo field so wide panning will sound a little wierd)...

also, mfine, u mentioned that you had several dense mixes...try letting some of the tracks come in at certain parts and stopping others...they dont all have to play throughout...it will clean up the mix a little and, if done right, add some cool dynamics to the song...

and Shialats point about mixes being 3 dimensioned in best explained in The Art of Mixing, a pretty cool book that can definitely help you....I havent had a chance to check out John Sayers book, but it's next on my list, as its been recommended by several people whos opinions I hold in high regard....
 
Panning re: Beatles

The separation you hear on Beatles albums was not intended at the time of recording. All recordings were done for mono playback, even after stereo was available. Tracks were separated and remastered--if you like that terrible stereo CD remaster of Sgt. Pepper's (especially on the headphones) try flipping it on mono, or better yet get the original mono vinyl pressing (without the yellow stereo strip along the top of the cover) and listen to how amazing in your face Beatles can sound, as it was intended to. I don't know who did the separating, but I personally think a lot of it clumsy and overdone. I think Roel is absolutely right, and only point out the above because I don't think the Beatles are a particularly good example when talking about "panning." The White Album" may have been recorded in stereo, but Sgt. Pepper's I am pretty sure wasn't. Even the difference between vinyl stereo and CD remastered stereo is distracting to me...
My two bits...
 
"Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was officially released in both mono and stereo on June 1, 1967."

George Martin did the stereo mix.

My three bits. :)
 
panning

I guess my point is that George Martin always mixed for mono first (and all the Beatles' albums and/or unreleased materials) have mono mixes at some point, usually first. They were particularly adept at creating spatial qualities in sound _without_ stereo, and it often seems their gestures toward stereo were done tongue in cheek, and with a great deal of the famous Beatles humour (so maybe annoying is a good thing sometimes!), but I also think that George Martin was left to do those mixes, and left to experiment. I am no great Beatles purist, but I do love that mono sound and the brilliance with they manipulated it (especially, of course, Sir George). That being said, we all have stereo at our disposal and shouldn't neglect it but should remember the other dimensions and tones when mixing.
 
One of the coolest panning-effects I've ever heard is on Black Letter Day from the Emmerdale album by The Cardigans. Not that I know how they did it, but the effect is that the snare is hard stereo-miced, and he plays it with brushes. That sounds amazing. Especially in headphones. I'll provide a sample of it.

They've also got one song where all the drums are in the left speaker, except the toms, which goes from left to right in size-order. Very cool.
 

Attachments

You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top