Positioning picked acoustic guitar in my mix

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sgia

sgia

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Hello,
I have 2 guitar tracks and one vocal track. The recordings are clean and I can get the sound I need with the software I am using .

My question is, how can I "position" the sounds in the stereo spectrum?

Some details:

1 guitar is rhythm, chords and the other is finger picking. Singer songwriter stuff.
My question is particularly about the picked guitar. I would like to get the high, glassy sounds off to the extreme right and left with the mids a bit closer in but still far enough away from the vocals (center) to have some "air" in the mix.

I have tried making a copy of the (picked guitar) track, panning one left and the other right and then adjusting EQ so they inversely compliment each other, but this only has had limited success as the sounds ends up for the most part in the middle again.

I have also tried stereo effects but these are generally for mastering and I think not the right "tool".

I'm not after a specific plugin or VST but rather a general technique for doing this kind of thing.
Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,
SG
 
Best way would be to record stereo. Stereo,does pretty much exactly what you're describing.

If you recorded two parts mono I'd say just pan them until it sounds good, experiment.
 
Aaron is right. Sounds like you're trying to emulate stereo, so just record in stereo or double track.
 
i find the mid/side technique gives a great deal of versatitlty when doing singer songwriter stuff with few track and when you need that spread out sound in the spectrum.
 
Why does it always sound so easy after bashing my head against my rack for 2 days? Thanks guys, I got a whole new perspective to give a go with. I guess the fear behind panning is that you'll leave a hole where you pan away from. That is my concern, but stereo recording (I'll record 2 mono channels, 2 mics) then panning those out, that's cool and I'll give it a go.

Q: Can a delay be used on an, i.e. hard right panned signal to send a 30-50ms delayed copy of itself to the other channel? That's be enough to make the listener's ears think it's the same sound is coming from left and right but not center. ?? just a thought...
 
you cant beat the real thing when it comes to stereo recording.
the technique you just described is never going to satisfy you. imho
 
sgia said:
Why does it always sound so easy after bashing my head against my rack for 2 days? Thanks guys, I got a whole new perspective to give a go with. I guess the fear behind panning is that you'll leave a hole where you pan away from. That is my concern, but stereo recording (I'll record 2 mono channels, 2 mics) then panning those out, that's cool and I'll give it a go.

Q: Can a delay be used on an, i.e. hard right panned signal to send a 30-50ms delayed copy of itself to the other channel? That's be enough to make the listener's ears think it's the same sound is coming from left and right but not center. ?? just a thought...
Click to expand...

Don't mess with the delay...it causes more problems and creates a lot of phase issues usually. Try and to prove to yourself you won't like it :)

If you record two stereo guitars, you can pan one guitar hard L and hard R (or 80%ish) and the other 40% to keep them separate.

Or you can do you rhythm guitar stereo and spread it pretty wide, and keep your lead more centered.

And, if you're adding vocals, that will fill in the gaps in the middle.

And, one more thing...using spaced pairs for stereo usually gets a pretty wide spread. If you want stereo but you don't want it so wide that there's a gapping hole in the middle, try an x-y set up.
 
Thanks for the great advice. I asked originally:

"I would like to get the high, glassy sounds off to the extreme right and left with the mids a bit closer in but still far enough away from the vocals (center) to have some "air" in the mix."

From what I am reading in the advice here, I would try:

1. make a stereo recording (2 very similar, however different tracks)
2. pan those channels hard R and hard L and set the EQ to bring out the highs
3. copy those channels, set the pan to, say, 50% L and R and set the EQ to enhance the mids

Something like that?

Thanks,
SG
 
Don't copy just record and pan. It doesn't have to be 100%.
 
Update:

Recorded stereo - 2x Rode Nt5s in an XY config, about 50cm (20 inches) away, pointing at the 12th fret.
Man, that's an eye opener. Thanks for all the good advice. Now that I have answered that question it presents 10 more, but I guess that is the way of things.

You guys are great, thanks again.

SG
 
Yeah! Good job. Learning one thing in recording always leads to 10 new questions.

I've used the NT5s for years and really liked them. They are a great stereo pair. I'd also recommend getting an omni cap for them. That's how I record most of my mono acoustic parts now. It's an amazing difference going from cardio to omni.
 
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