Mono source to M/S Signal

There won't be any side signal in a mono source. The side signal is the difference between the two stereo sides of a signal. Obviously on a mono source there is none.

Hi Soundblend,
Like Karl said, a mono signal panned center is, definitionally, a mid signal in M/S decoding. The only way to get it to the "sides" is to "stereoize" it in some way. You could use a doubler to get it out to the sides or you could copy your mono track, pan the two tracks L and R and process one differently than the other

Good luck
Dean

For M/S to work correctly you need to begin with stereo information and I mean true stereo information. Converting a mono signal to a stereo track won't achieve anything either. With only one signal present there will be no S signal to work with.

In this case you are better off forgetting any form of M/S processing and just get back to the concept of working with your mono signal and use other more traditional approaches to giving it space etc.... delays, reverbs, early reflections etc. 

Once you have got your mono signal now into some form of stereo field you could convert that to M/S and alter the M S relationships and then convert back but that would not achieve a lot either as you can also do that by simply adjusting the Wet/Dry balances of the various effects that you are using on the mono signal anyway to do the same thing.

You can use the process of converting a final stereo mix to M/S and then alter the M S relationships and convert back too but this tends to be used in situations where a mastering engineer only has access to the stereo mix only and may want to change some aspect of it. But as you are mixing too you can also do all that during the mix.

So to sum up M/S processing is not really the way to go here, just more normal techniques of placing that mono signal into some space etc..

What you could do though is to record the vocal etc using M/S recording to track the signal from the start so you are making a two channel recording right up front. And if the room sounds nice you will have the option later of altering the balance between the direct signal and the amount of room you want to hear later on when you are mixing. In that situation it could be quite useful. That is where M/S recording really excels. 

I think Mike's suggestions are interesting but if you feed that mono signal (even if it is converted to two channels of identical information) into a matrix then some encoders will still only give you a zero output on the sides signal so you wont have any signal to process at all. But what Mike is talking about may only be possible if you can get inside the matrix and that matrix allows you to insert effects etc into the S components. You need to check that you can actually do this with the matrix involved.

If it does then this is a very good way to go for sure because you can effect the M part of the sound differently to the part of the sound that is on the extremes of the stereo image and that opens itself up to some interesting effects.

If you do go down this route I would still suggest checking for mono compatibility on a single point source mono speaker with your L and R outputs summed to mono just to make sure. You might also be horrified when you do this.

Of course you are right Jeff. I had a brain plough.

You do not need to send the 2 mono tracks to a matrix... I will edit that in the post above.



You only have to conceive of the two examples of the mono track as Mid and Side and then treat them as if they are. 

Then when you are done with the effects you send them thru a M/S "decode" process and turn them into Left and Right.

Voxengo MSED lets you encode and decode easily... In SONAR you can put MSED on a bus and pan the 2 track sends to the "mid" and "side" of the bus respectively.


best regards,
mike  

Agreed.  I have acknowledged my tech blunder. :-)

best,
mike

How about this?:

http://www.kvraudio.com/p...oximity-by-vladg-sound

I haven't tried it... it seems like an amalgamated one stop place to do things I'd probably just use do with EQ, ambiance and delay.

Your recent post sent me back to the OP and I saw that the actual goal was to be able to push the vocal further back in the "image".

This plug purports to be able to do that sort of stuff all in one place.



best regards,
mike