Image widening during mixing (inkl. samples), please help

[abyssofdreams]

Prolly this is a total bullshit post, since I don't really know wtf I was doing

First of all don't bother about the shitty guitar sound but it's an old sorta "testriff" I had on my harddisk and I didn't re-record it, however it should work for this situation.

So, reading some stuff about image widening (pluginwise) and as all my mixes sound kinda "narrow", I was trying that delay/verb/imager trick.

This is what I've come up with:

For reference, here's the dry track (only some verb on snare and toms):
http://www.keinezeit.de/mp3s/image/testriff-dry.mp3

Here I've sent a tiny bit of every track to a group bus with Waves Supertab on it with the Analog Delay preset and BPM set at 240, although the songs tempo is 120:
http://www.keinezeit.de/mp3s/image/testriff-bit-delay.mp3

Same as above but with cranked sends/delay bus:
http://www.keinezeit.de/mp3s/image/testriff-lotsa-delay.mp3

And finally same as above but instead of a delay I've send everything to a room reverb (preset was "10 meters room"):
http://www.keinezeit.de/mp3s/image/testriff-roomverb.mp3

The group bus' chain was:
Delay/Reverb plug, HP@150hz + LP@8000khz, Waves S1 imager (width @100%)

Any tips on where to go with that?
Is there anything to improve soundwise without fucking with the phase too much using just plugins?

I remember "battletits/methlab" was having good results with delays, I just don't know if I'm going the wrong route and my settings are prolly crap.

ANy thoughts?

 

[nwright]

What is the S1 imager doing?

To me the original track didn't sound bad in terms of stereo spread, but then the other 3 versions with the plugins did open it up a bit. I liked the 1st delayed version and the room reverb version.

 

[colonel kurtz]

i didn't bother listening to any of the links you posted, but i can tell you that a "narrow" mix is the result of either improperly panning things while mixing, or improper monitor placement. it can also be the result of improper technique while tracking, i.e. setting up the drum OH's in x-y instead of a spaced pair when you know you want the kit to sound really wide.

remember that when you hard-pan something L/R, that's as far out as it can go...there's no way it's going to go farther out than that. on top of that, i've noticed that anytime i use 1 of the image-enhancing plugs, it sounds really cool when i 1st slap it on there...but then when i come back to the mix later, it sounds really fake/shitty, and i end up just turning it off.

about the only thing i use those things for is pulling the low-end towards the middle...like if the floor tom is panned out to the side, i might suck the low end back towards the middle, but keep the rest panned for the attack/definition.

and yes, reverb/delay helps to open up mixes, but IMO they play more to the front-to-back imaging than they do the side-to-side stereo field.

 

[Ihsahn1981]

Check your stereo stuff with a phase meter

 

[MrLee]

A long time I recorded the same sound for all my takes on guitar, result was a kinda narrow stereo field. Then somebody here told me to alter the sound a little bit for each take. then the phasing is even less an issue.. it helped a bit!

 

[abyssofdreams]

i didn't bother listening to any of the links you posted, but i can tell you that a "narrow" mix is the result of either improperly panning things while mixing, or improper monitor placement. it can also be the result of improper technique while tracking, i.e. setting up the drum OH's in x-y instead of a spaced pair when you know you want the kit to sound really wide.

remember that when you hard-pan something L/R, that's as far out as it can go...there's no way it's going to go farther out than that. on top of that, i've noticed that anytime i use 1 of the image-enhancing plugs, it sounds really cool when i 1st slap it on there...but then when i come back to the mix later, it sounds really fake/shitty, and i end up just turning it off.

about the only thing i use those things for is pulling the low-end towards the middle...like if the floor tom is panned out to the side, i might suck the low end back towards the middle, but keep the rest panned for the attack/definition.

and yes, reverb/delay helps to open up mixes, but IMO they play more to the front-to-back imaging than they do the side-to-side stereo field.

so basically your advice is not to use any image widening plugin for the sides then?

 

[abyssofdreams]

What is the S1 imager doing?

To me the original track didn't sound bad in terms of stereo spread, but then the other 3 versions with the plugins did open it up a bit. I liked the 1st delayed version and the room reverb version.

It widens the stereo field of the sides psychoacoustically, making it sound wider but messes alot with the phase I guess.

 

[abyssofdreams]

Check your stereo stuff with a phase meter

Yeah, I'm playing around with Waves PAZ a bit, however it's hard for me to interpret the values correctly, need some more experience with it...

 

[colonel kurtz]

so basically your advice is not to use any image widening plugin for the sides then?

my suggestion would be to try getting the width you're looking for without an imaging plugin...but if that's the only way, then go for it

you might want to try rendering a version of the mix with and w/o the widening, then have someone play them back for you with your eyes closed and select which sounds best

 

[everybody's x]

try using a widening plug on only certain elements of the mix instead of the whole mix.
Just the overheads for example.
If you are quad tracking and panning gtrs <100<75<>75>100> pull the inner gtrs lower in the mix than the gtrs on the outside. use a tone with more mids or cleaner sound on the inner gtrs.
take extra steps to get the elements EQ'd going in and if you have to eq them in the mix do it individually instead of in groups. When you eq things in groups it smears the stereo image.
listening in and out of mono will tell you if you have phase issues quicker and easier than a meter will.
If you do use a widener like S1 or whatever, then use it as a send rather than sitting on the two buss. Roll everything off at 300hz or so ,so the wide effect doesn't muddy things up.
I'm far from an expert on this but I have been trying to get it right for a long time and these things help me.

 

[csholtmeier]

I really like bx_digital control on guitars. Besides being a very usable widener, it has a mono knob that will (you guessed it), mono everything below a user definable frequency.

Great for bringing guitars in a little at the bottom and a widening 'em a little at the top.

 

[MrLee]

Roll everything off at 300hz or so ,so the wide effect doesn't muddy things up.
time and these things help me.

Could you please explain how to do this? Do you send all abov 300hz to the S1? hows that done and what about the dry signal above 300hz? sorry Im noob to sends and stereo widners..
Thank you!

 

[everybody's x]

make an FX bus
put the wide plug on it and then eq the bus with a low shelf.

then send whatever parts you want to effect to it.

make sense?

 

[MrLee]

yup! thanks! very cool tips by the way! gonna try tomorrow!

 

[006]

Out of curiosity yesterday I tried the Spatial Enhancer plug-in that is built into Cubase 4. I was surprised at what it did to the mix of the project. I noticed it does add some high-end to some things, but there is a "color" knob that can fix that if you just turn it down a little. I put the widening knob up to 128% and I reallllllyyy like what it did. I'll have to post a before and after clip, I really feel like it improved it. And it's not like the mix sounded too centered or anything before...I have a shit-ton of control over the stereo spread of the cymbals and toms because each cymbal was close-mic'ed individually, and they are panned really far to be as wide as possible. The toms are really far apart as well, but not too far, yanno? So somehow it just made it even wider than it already was. I like the effect, it seems like it is something that can easily be abused though, much like how people use a BBE all the time :yuck:.

~006

 

[mintcheerios]

I'm with 006 on this one. It is a good effect as long as it's used subtly. You can widen while monitoring for phase issues and find a happy medium.

 

[smy1]

A lot of people always said to me in the past: "you don't need widening plugins, you just need to know how to mix well!" - which admittedly didn't help me much ...

The two things that helped my mixes get wider than before were:

a) Don't pan hard L/R! ... that was the most astounding thing. I started panning the regular wide elements to 75/80/85 and started putting only one element (like shakers) to a hard L or R position. This gives the feeling of a wider mix when the hard panned element comes in, while the other elements at 80-85 still seem wide. I can't explain the psychoacoustics behind it, but I was amazed how well it works.

b) EQ instruments differently if they are doubled and panned somewhere L and R. This will increase their separation a number of times.

c) When using stereo synth sources, it really helps to but a mono plugin on them and send the mono source to a modulation delay, which is very short and hardly modulating and then pan it to the opposite side. This faux stereo seems to keep the center less cluttered to me ...

Hope this helps a bit.

 

[006]

I actually ended up taking the effect off after A/B'ing two clips, one with and one without the effect. I noticed it just thinned things out too much. I'm sure I could fix that issue in the mix itself, that way when it hits the 2-bus with the widening plug it won't affect it that way...but I shouldn't have to do that.

So basically, it sounded cool at first. But it really doesn't have a positive benefit...at least not for the master fader, IMO. I can see how it would be cool on maybe some vocals or OH's, in the case that they are sounding just too centered/mono. I'm planning on trying it out on a mix project I received a while back that had a single mono OH/hat track. I know, right? Hopefully this effect can spread that track out some because it's killing me.

~006

 

[smy1]

I actually ended up taking the effect off after A/B'ing two clips, one with and one without the effect. I noticed it just thinned things out too much. I'm sure I could fix that issue in the mix itself, that way when it hits the 2-bus with the widening plug it won't affect it that way...but I shouldn't have to do that.

~006

I have never used a widener on the mix bus, but if I'd do that, I'd probably put it on from the beginning of the mix - just like a compressor and/or limiter - and then mix through it. Never done it, but I think it could work.

 

[006]

Yeah, I thought about that as well. I always *at least* put a limiter, about -3dB threshold and -0.1dB output on the master bus before I do anything else. Most of the time also a compressor with ~3:1 ratio/~20ms attack/~160ms rel/~-7dB thresh before the limiter just so I can start getting that "glued" effect from the start.

Maybe I'll try it out on my next project...

~006