Mixing Tips. Widening the stereo image with a free plug in.
| August 16th, 2010 | 23 Comments | « Previous | Episode 22 | Next » |
In this episode I show you a really simple (and free) trick to add a little extra stereo width to your mixes. I also sit down with Rick Clark the Author of the new book “Mixing, Recording, and Producing Techniques of the Pros: Insights on Recording Audio for Music, Video, Film, and Games”
Don’t Forget about the free mixer panel in Hollywood, that we are presenting, August 25 at 8pm!
Download a high quality WAV version of the audio samples
To watch on your iphone or Ipad download the M4v version.
Audio Samples in this episode from the upcoming album by Robert Lopata
Watch full 40 minute Rick Clark Interview. Rick talks about Jim Dickinson, Brian Ahern, David Briggs.
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August 19th, 2010 at 10:26 am
The difference is amazing! I have used freq widners prior, but no longer! Thanks Ronan!
August 19th, 2010 at 2:54 pm
Thanks again Ronan, for another great show!!
August 19th, 2010 at 3:11 pm
Great tip Ronan.. and the examples were drastic and inspiring.. I am going to give this a go on a few upcoming projects and I am sure it will be a great technique to add to my skill set.
Thanks again for the support and all the rest..
look for runwaystudios on twitter and facebook.
August 20th, 2010 at 6:29 am
lol i just tried it on my project and hey presto it worked on my keybaords.
i usually shave the low end of my guitars anyway from about 120hz
August 20th, 2010 at 3:30 pm
Great show Ronan!
This is my first time watching the show from my new home at the Cleveland Institute of Music, where I’m about to begin my degree in audio!
Watching the show always reminds me of why I got into recording in the first place – thanks so much for the inspiration!
August 21st, 2010 at 1:13 pm
Excellent show, as always, Ronan! Will definitely get a copy of the book, Roy Thomas Baker and Tony Visconti are two of my faves, looking forward to seeing what you’ve got to say in the book as well.
P.S. Really appreciate the M4v version, my internet connection at home isn’t very good so I download at work then watch ya over breakfast the next morning
Thanks again, Ronan!
August 22nd, 2010 at 8:07 pm
I loved it when Rick said he liked talking to the guys behind the console because they were in it not to be in a magazine, but because they get off on trying to make music sound like it matters. Brilliant! I’ll be picking up the book (and doing a head-to-head with the stereo widening EQ trick and my Brainworx control_bx plugin). Thanks, as always, for your time and insight!
August 25th, 2010 at 12:35 pm
Great idea and one I use on virtually of my recordings with acoustic guitars. My EQ curve looks exactly like yours.
Thanks for confirming what I suspected.
October 6th, 2010 at 10:19 am
Hi Ronan, Thanks for the shows – great tips. I sure learned a thing or two! I couldn’t help to noice the Event (20/20 bas?) monitors. I would love to hear your comments on those as well…
October 6th, 2010 at 2:24 pm
Jakob, I actually really love the 20/20bas monitors. They have been my main mixing monitors for over 10 years.
November 16th, 2010 at 12:27 pm
Hey Ronan,
Ernest here from GS and HC. What a great tip mate, thanks!
If you don`t mind, I put a link on my site to yours!
Peace and Keep rocking,
EB
December 28th, 2010 at 3:33 pm
Thanks for taking the time to do these videos. There are a few really great free music recording educational resources on the net (like the Tweakheadz pages) and from the two films I’ve seen so far, I’d say this is one of them.
February 11th, 2011 at 11:59 am
Great lesson! Tanks ! You do a great work ! tanks again!
February 27th, 2011 at 7:38 am
Excellent!
Can you list out the actual eq settings. I realize that I may have to tweak, but it would be nice to have a starting point. Thanks!
March 8th, 2011 at 8:57 pm
A good starting point is a high pass filter at about 250 Hz and then tweak to taste. Go as high as you can without killing the tone of the instruments.
March 8th, 2011 at 10:35 pm
Great tip Ronan.
I’m at the day job so can’t try your tip out for a few hours…
If you only have one guitar track (mono) rather than 2, like you had in your example, will copying the mono track and hard panning each L and R and then using the eq on each have a similiar effect ?
Thanks for any advice
Murray
March 8th, 2011 at 10:40 pm
No this would not work. If you simply copy a track and pan one hard left and the other hard right you will just get a mono guitar panned straight up the middle. The trick really only works to enhance things that are already stereo. But this would work if you took your copied track and put a short delay on it (100% wet) with 15ms or more, this would make that mono guitar stereo and then you could use this EQ trick to enhance the stereo feel of it.
March 8th, 2011 at 10:53 pm
Isn’t the interent great Ronan…I’m in Perth Western Australia and it is early afternoon.
Thanks for the quick reply.
In the “work around ” you suggested should the copied mono track be left as a separate mono track (with the delay as an insert) and if so is the hard panning of each track ok at that point ?
Or would I be better off creating a stereo track from the to mono tracks and making sure the insert delay is only applied to one side ?
cheers
March 8th, 2011 at 11:02 pm
Hard panning is the best way to make the effect dramatic. You can go either way to get there. The end result should be exactly the same. Have fun with it!
March 8th, 2011 at 11:05 pm
Thanks v much.
Finally, I suppose another option is to keep one mono track, don’t pan at all, then add insert stereo delay and add say 20ms to 30 ms of delay to right side and track will sound like panned left…??
cheers
March 8th, 2011 at 11:25 pm
Then again, upon reflection I don’t think my “finally” idea will work.
cheers
March 15th, 2011 at 9:24 am
Thanks for these vids. You do a fantastic job with your presentations, making it easy to digest the info.
March 16th, 2011 at 11:42 am
I THINK ITS IMPORTANT TO NOTE…..ALTHOUGH THE BASS isnt directional it really gathers in the MIDDLE if coming from 2 speakers.
So here is whats happening. The lows that are the SAME in the L & R tracks from the guitar are meeting in the middle turning them basically mono. So when you do a lowcut it removes them from the middle and makes it sound wide
Great video Bro