Stereo Positioning of AD2 In Sonar - Mystery Understood [and I've been corrected]

I've had a realization that changed an age old issue I have when running AD/AD2 in Sonar.

Adjusting pan locations kept seeming right/wrong at times and positioning pieces was very "unrewarding"...

NowI found the issue!

The Room bus within it has reversed positioning! I guess I could see the issue of naming them as you face each view ( looking forward or looking back from the drummer's (stage) view seems what the have chosen... That view is fine for the kit,, but then they've labeled the room as viewed from the audience, so trying to pan a piece to either side always results in the piece also appearing in the room on the opposite side!

At last!

Now panning a piece left or right actually moves in that direction!

I've already updated my assorted templates that use AD/AD2... I hope I found them all as I don't actually have too many! ;-)

I just thought I'd mention it for the community here... I hope not terribly OT .........

If I'm incorrect in this somehow, please forgive me, but it certainly seemed very audibly obvious during my last session...

Keni

Thanks Keni!
 

Yeah... When I used my own room the issue went away and when I used the AD-built-in room, I had "difficulty". I just didn't think to look here...

Funny as I was commenting the other day how I was disappointed to only have demos of AD drums in mix with all their plaback processing... I wanted to hear the raw samples as I believe I know my ability to adjust typical drum sounds to my liking... And preferring to use my own processing of what I already considered "good" samples...

Now I'm readjusting my approach and using more of the AD'S internal processing as it seems the best (?) way to get the sound of their kit as advertised... It's a little different for me... If I'm not satisfied with an element of a particular piece's settings, I'm then reverting to use my own choice of devices outside of AD as I haven't had a lot of luck doing much with their comp/EQ/room...

I've not been much of a fan of having all my processing buried within another app as it is a tad more out of the way and more tedious to get at... Let alone adjust...

I've really become a big fan of our Quad-EQ with the analyzer-flyout... As well as the PC76 and CA2a comps... I feel so at home with them in so many scenarios! ;-)

Keni

Okay. So the real issue is that the panning of the Room signal doesn't follow the track pan. I can see how that would make it sound like the Room signal is panning the opposite way as it becomes more distinct when the direct signal level is reduced on that side. The same thing will happen when mixing inside AD and using its Master out because there's no option to have the pans for the sends to the Room bus follow the channel strip pans.
 
So when you say you updated your templates, do you mean you stopped using AD's Room output and started adding you own ambience in SONAR?
 
 

Thank you for bringing this up Keni. I will keep an eye on the pan settings. If I am understanding this correctly (I've only scanned the thread) the Room mic bus is using an opposite pan config than the close mics and perhapd even the overheads.
 
That is annoying and really doesn't make a lot of sense but there are few things XLN have done recently that don't make a lot of sense.
 
I gotta wander though... this could be a preset specific thing. As in perhaps you have stumbled across some presets that have reversed the perspectives to create a certain effect.
 
As far as the raw samples and/or using AD2's internal processing... yeah, the raw samples are useable but it's not like with BFD or expansions by Platinum Samples where what you are getting is more like the raw recordings you'd get from a quality mic job in a good room on a nice kit. AD has always seemed to rely more on it's processing than the actual samples. The samples may have been created with this in mind and their presets are very nice.
 
I look at AD as a "drop it in and forget it" (and maybe some light tweaks either in AD2 or the DAW) type of sampler where BFD is more what you get from actual tracking (more work but a skilled producer can treat it like they would a live session). BFD still has some decent presets and I'm only on Eco so I'm sure the full version(s) have much more going on.
 
Cheers.

Hi Beepster...

Please understand my own mistakes... The panning is fine if you use audience perspective... So it was simply my not paying enough attention when using their room from stage perspective...

I agree with you about the samples though. AD seems to rely very heavily on playback processing for their sound than the samples themselves... I don't often use mangled kits and I'm used to (mostly) getting the sound I want for my drum kit during recording when I record live drums...

I can't comment about the BFD drums as I don't own it though I wish I did... I can't afford to buy it. I'm M not thrilled with many of the methods AD uses...

I found the AD samples requiring a lot of processing to get "good" sounds hence my attempt to use their own processing this time... I've got a feeling I'll be continuing to use SD3 most of the time as before...

So in short... It is/was me, not AD that is the crux once again! ;-)

Keni

brundlefly

Keni
But I decided to use the internals for one song and the situation was upon me... So I changed my templates where I now have the room reversed... Still using all AD comp/EQ...
[snip]
In either case I don't use the plugin's stereo out preferring to keep discrete sonar tracks for each piece... I prefer mixing this way...

 
Something is not adding up here:
 
A. I still don't understand how reversing the stereo image on the Room bus solves anything (or that there's an inherent problem).
and
B. If you "don't use the plugin's stereo out", you won't even be getting a stereo Room signal that could have panning that doesn't match the track panning of mono channel outputs. ???

A) when I pan a drum piece left, the room has the drum on the left after I reversed l/r... If I leave it with the left/right that it defaults to, panning a piece left turns up on the right side of the room... Remembering that panning IN SONAR doesn't affect the AD internal room send which continues to believe the drum is panned right for the AD Master... Which I don't use...

B) AD setup here is using the discrete outs to individual Sonar tracks... The room comes up on two sonar tracks so each gets panned to one side for the stereo room...

Keni