Panning a stereo track

[Myriad_Rocker]

When you pan to one side...let's say the left...do you lose the right side of the stereo track or does the ENTIRE track get pushed to the left?

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

If it's a stereo track, then it's intended to act as a hard-panned left/right signal.... so yes, if you pan left, then you lose the right channel information.

 

[Myriad_Rocker]

Well.....crap.....

Can I convert stereo into mono so I can pan the ENTIRE track instead of just one stereo side?

Otherwise I guess I'll have to do a crap load of re-tracking and that won't make me very happy....

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

You should be able to convert a stereo signal into a mono one -- Cubase & Sound Forge certainly has that functionality, so I imagine Cakewalk does too.

But if you're going to convert it to a mono track anyways, then it seems you don't really care abou the "stereo-ness" of the track anyways, so pan it however you like!

(converting it to mono will result in some loss of detail/depth)

 

[Myriad_Rocker]

It's not that I don't care. See, I'm recording a digital stereo signal from a Line 6 Vetta II. I'm using two different amps in stereo and I like the sound I get from both at the same time. But if I pan the track, I lose an amp. See what I'm saying? But I have more guitar parts to track.

Hope that was clear...

Most guitars in recording studios are tracked in mono, right? If there are multiple guitar parts anyway...

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Ah - I see... what I would do if I were you then, is to separate out each channel of the interleaved stereo track into 2 mono tracks and re-import them back into your project.

And yes - I find the only time I record anything as a stereo track specifically is when I need it to be a true stereo track (as opposed to 2 mono source being interleaved in one audio file)....... much more flexible that way, and more typical of the tape multitrack recording paradigm.

 

[Myriad_Rocker]

Ah - I see... what I would do if I were you then, is to separate out each channel of the interleaved stereo track into 2 mono tracks and re-import them back into your project.

Any suggestions on how I can accomplish this?

Thanks a bunch, by the way.

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Again, I don't have CW, so I can't tell you specifically for that s/w but for Sound Forge, you open the file, convert it to mono using the Channel Converter plug, choosing only 100% of say the right channel, save that to a new mono file.

Re-open the stereo file (or undo the last changes) and use the same plug, this time using 100% of the left channel and save that to a new mono file.

The import those new files into CW as individual mono tracks.

 

[guttadaj]

Not in front of my SONAR at the moment, but I believe that you can do a Bounce to Track(s) and select something like "Separate Stereo to Left and Right". That would give you 2 mono tracks one with the left channel and one with the right channel from the stereo track. So, if your stereo track was made up of the 2 amp signals hard-panned (one amp signal 100% L and the other 100% R), then each track will be for a single amp's signal. Then you can pan and blend to taste.

 

[dachay2tnr]

There is also a toggle button for each track which toggles the playback mode (stereo versus mono). It is located next to the Phase icon. I'm not totally sure, however, where the pan slider is in the signal path in relation to this toggle. In other words, if the toggle to mono occurs after the track has been panned already, it won't help much. You might have to try it to see what it produces.