LCR Panning

Some software synth patches are essentially incompatible with LCR, as may be the case with any stereo source. The concept of panning means nothing with a stereo source, which is already comprised of left and right components.

Sometimes, the solution is to convert to mono and then pan them normally. However, some stereo patches don't fold to mono well, especially those that have used time delays to fake stereo-ness from a mono sample, a common technique on hardware romplers.

What I do is first audition a synth patch in mono to see if I can just take the left channel. Things like bass and drum samples usually do OK for this. If not, I go ahead and record it in stereo and use the Channel Tools plugin to shift the stereo image 50% left or right just to get it somewhat out of the middle.

That sure explains things Bit. 

I'm quite often perplexed at how messed up things can be even after all kinds of efforts to pan here there & everywhere.

Good advice!

+1 Bit.  Giving the middle breathing room catches my attention ... it seems to allow vocs more clarity (which I seem to prefer oft).

Perhaps often my imagination/speculation:  But I oft pan things nearer or further from center ... in order to clean/dirty things a bit or (un)separate dissonant harmonics or dissonant counter points.

I have a sort of perversion of running all my L & R verbs down the middle as well ... to act as sort of an ambiance element (if that makes sense).  The ambiance, of course, acts like a 'glue' oft-times.

Generally, its bad when I verb Haas fx's too much (anywhere) ... but sometimes OK when the verb is enveloped in needful sections.

Sometimes, I fancy panning as critical to a mix as ... balancing a good portrait painting ... with various foreground-objects and backround 'stuff' 'balancing' against one another throughout the canvas ... while still drawing attention to the head of the portrait ... or main hook in a song.

Sorry if I drifted a little off topic ... as LCR is valid technique for many mixes.

I don't see the LCR concept about collapsing stereo signals to mono and panning them either to L C or R.

You're absolutely right, assuming the stereo file is really stereophonic. 


But if the synth patch is actually monophonic within a ROMpler's ROM, and a chorus effect has been used to imbue it with a faked stereo-ish sound, then the L/R differences are only the result of comb filtering and most of the signal below 500Hz remains smack down the center. This gives you a lot of mud in the middle that'll step on your vocal.


OTOH, if the patch is really stereo, e.g. a mixed orchestral patch with instruments panned across the classical stage, then you've got different instruments on the left than the right, not just separated by frequency. You'd lose something for sure if you collapsed them to mono. The effect would be as if the orchestra had all moved to one side of the stage.


Another example is a Leslie. Much of the Leslie's effect is a moving acoustical phenomenon. A Leslie miked mono has a very different sound than one miked in stereo. However, if you situate a stereo recording of it in the center, it sounds as though the speaker is in the center of the stage. Low frequencies remain in the middle. A real band on a real stage would have the Leslie to one side of the stage. So you have two choices: fold to mono and pan, or use something like Channel Tools to pan one of the stereo channels to the side. Either way you shift the low frequencies out of the center and away from the vocal.

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