Hello creative friends,
 
I am using Sonar Platinum.
 
Here's my novice situation:
I have three string tracks recorded - One panned full Left, one panned center, and one panned full right. 
I want to send these to a stereo bus (or do I?) so i can add a touch of reverb to all three at one time and maybe one other effect.
Here's my work through -
 
 1) I create a stereo bus and set the output (what was to master) to the STRINGS bus. It sums to center. Effects are all turned off. My first thinking was effects was the issue. Out come is all three strings are in the center. I toggle the output back to Master and the strings take their panning as set.
 
I think I am misunderstanding the proper use of a  Stereo Bus. Should I be using an aux send instead?
 
Next I tried using the send section
1) sending the signal to the stereo bus via the sends while setting the send pans to the appropriate side - same out come.
 
The master bus is set to stereo not mono.
 
Perhaps, again, I am misunderstanding the signal flow or the proper use of things.  
 
Any help or suggestion is greatly appreciated
 
 
 
 

You need 3 busses:
 

1. Strings
2. Reverb
3. Master

 
Set the OUTPUTS of your tracks to the Strings buss
Insert a SEND from your tracks to the Reverb buss
Set the OUTPUTS of the STRINGS buss and REVERB to buss to the MASTER buss
 
Insert your reverb of choice in the Fx bin of the REVERB buss. make it 100% WET or if that option doesn't exist, kill the DRY part.
 
Adjust your track SENDS to taste
 
All these busses are stereo.

Duplicate

To check if an effect is forcing mono summing, it's not enough to bypass the effect. You have to actually remove it from the fx bin. 
 
Most reverbs do sum to mono, but some are "true stereo", meaning separate left/right reverb engines. Contrary to popular belief, though, these do not necessarily create more natural-sounding reverb. That's because real acoustical reverberation doesn't work that way - in a real space, delayed versions of each instrument are going to be all jumbled together and hitting your ear from all angles. Only the original direct signal is going to have a well-defined point of origin.
 
Here's what you want to do...
 
1. Create a bus called STRINGS and route each of the three string tracks to it. Don't put any effects on this bus for now, although you might want to add an EQ or compressor later on. But no reverb. This bus is just for setting the level of your strings as a group. Route this bus directly to the master.
 
2. Create a bus called REVERB and insert your reverb plugin there. Set it to 100% Wet. Also route this bus to the master.
 
3. Create AUX SENDS on each of the string tracks and route each of them to the REVERB bus. 
 
That's it. Your string sections should preserve their pan positions. The reverb bus, however, will be blurred panoramically, as it should be. Use the REVERB bus' volume to set the overall reverb amount.

Sorry, Jonesey, we were typing at the same time. Great minds, as they say...
 

Pardon me for cluttering this up.  I'm a curious sort.
 
What are the pros/cons to using a send from the STRINGS bus to the REVERB bus instead of individual sends from the each of the string tracks?

A send per track lets you apply different levels of reverb to each track.

A send from the bus means every track feeding that bus gets the same level of reverb.

The advantage of the first it that sometimes applying the same amount reverb to bunch of tracks doesn't work well, but you want them all to have the same reverb "space". An example might be a string section with violins, cellos and a bass. If the violins benefit from a certain reverb level there's a good chance it would be too much if applied to the bass and the sound would get muddy and confused. Apply the reverb that works for the bass to the fiddles and they may not have enough reverb. So a send from each track makes sense. It also makes it easier to "push" some of the tracks into the background.

The advantage of the second is that if you have say three guitar tracks and they all need to be in the same "room" you can control the whole lot together rather than having to keep adjusting sends on the tracks when you change the volume of the track.

The third approach is to insert a reverb directly into a track, useful when you want, say, a particular reverb configuration on that track only for effects purposes.

I typically send different levels for each string section. Violins get the most reverb, violas slightly less, cellos much less and basses almost none. This isn't done in order to enhance realism, though, which it obviously doesn't. It is done to enhance clarity. 

i am unanimous in this

If there were just a small number of instruments and nothing else eg a string trio there is also some merit in sending the buss mix into a reverb also.  You can end up with a more balanced reverb over all three instead.
 
I patch in an EQ before the reverb and it is here that you can actually control what goes into the reverb a lot more.  The bassy instruments can have a HPF in action and that will limit the low end that goes in there and gets muddy.  All three instruments in a way should be in the reverb and if they are, the reverb will sound more interesting and complex instead of just being on one higher pitched lead instrument.
 
Having the violin only say getting the reverb and bass none might make things sound a little strange.  The upper harmonics of the bass can still get in there using the pre EQ but muddiness can still be kept low.  If there is a powerhouse rhythm section going on at the same time though then using individual sends could also sound better.  Depends on what you are trying to achieve.   A nice string trio in a nice small sounding room?