Wildman
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Vocal placement
I was listening to Forever Autumn by Justin Hayward / Jeff Wayne and have always thought what a brilliant stereo track this is. I see that the guitars are panned wide but the vocal is just somewhere out there in the middle but like back in space somewhere. Is that just a brilliant reverb or other technique? Also the synth fills seem to become really big and wondered at the technique.
I find that I get muddy mixes and maybe it is too much modern effects that get stereoed too much whereas older recordings were using more hardware effects on the busses to get that wide effect on a small minority of instruments.
Any ideas?
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sharke
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/11/30 13:49:55
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There's quite a bit of reverb on the vocal. And it's not digital reverb, that's for sure!
Do you use a high pass filter to clean up the mud?
JamesWindows 10, Sonar SPlat (64-bit), Intel i7-4930K, 32GB RAM, RME Babyface, AKAI MPK Mini, Roland A-800 Pro, Focusrite VRM Box, Komplete 10 Ultimate, 2012 American Telecaster!
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robert_e_bone
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/11/30 14:34:19
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The keyboards may have been recorded using a technique similar to what Tony Banks did for some of the Genesis keyboard tracks.
He had one side of his stereo tracks run through a slight delay, and according to him it really widened the sound. I briefly spoke with him about that the one time I ever got to meet him, at a backstage party following a gig at the Greek Theater in CA. (I got to watch the show from up on the stage, off to one side - what a fantastic experience).
Anyways, that's what he told me he did to widen his keyboard sounds on some of the stuff. I don't remember anything else technically - it was a quick discussion long long ago and I don't remember anything else off hand.
Bob Bone
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Shambler
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/11/30 16:15:51
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sharke
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/11/30 16:18:18
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You can do this with Channel Tools, yes?
JamesWindows 10, Sonar SPlat (64-bit), Intel i7-4930K, 32GB RAM, RME Babyface, AKAI MPK Mini, Roland A-800 Pro, Focusrite VRM Box, Komplete 10 Ultimate, 2012 American Telecaster!
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Shambler
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/11/30 16:27:15
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sharke
You can do this with Channel Tools, yes?
Indeed the left and right delay times do exactly whats required.
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noynekker
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/11/30 21:16:42
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scook
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/11/30 21:22:35
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robert_e_bone
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/12/01 01:39:00
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I think if memory serves (and it no longer does), I believe he used a setting of 15 ms.
Bob Bone
Wisdom is a giant accumulation of "DOH!" Sonar: Platinum (x64), X3 (x64) Audio Interfaces: AudioBox 1818VSL, Steinberg UR-22 Computers: 1) i7-2600 k, 32 GB RAM, Windows 8.1 Pro x64 & 2) AMD A-10 7850 32 GB RAM Windows 10 Pro x64 Soft Synths: NI Komplete 8 Ultimate, Arturia V Collection, many others MIDI Controllers: M-Audio Axiom Pro 61, Keystation 88es Settings: 24-Bit, Sample Rate 48k, ASIO Buffer Size 128, Total Round Trip Latency 9.7 ms
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sharke
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/12/01 01:49:18
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I tried this on a stereo synth track that was playing long sustained chords, and I couldn't perceive any difference even with quite a large delay. Does this "widening" effect only work when you hear the note attacks?
JamesWindows 10, Sonar SPlat (64-bit), Intel i7-4930K, 32GB RAM, RME Babyface, AKAI MPK Mini, Roland A-800 Pro, Focusrite VRM Box, Komplete 10 Ultimate, 2012 American Telecaster!
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scook
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/12/01 01:52:16
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Try with a mono source panned hard one direction and the delay panned hard in the other direction.
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Wildman
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/12/01 03:58:01
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Thanks for all the tips and will try some of these on my recordings. Plus great mention of Tony Banks in there! I actually prefer the way older recordings capture stereo image and somehow sound special because the effect sits out there special in and around the other more simple instruments. On many modern recordings there is so much going on that the sounds all get mixed in together.
Back in the day... I'd listen to a track and then there'd be a sudden brilliant sound...be it a keyboard / guitar or vocal effect and it would floor me.
Cheers all.
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lawajava
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/12/01 16:11:05
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Bob Bones and Noynekker - thanks for suggesting the ms specs. Always good to have a solid point of reference to the techniques.
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jb101
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Re:Vocal placement
2012/12/01 16:36:49
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This is known as the Haas Trick, and was not invented by Helmut Haas, but just demonstrates the Haas Effect. Pan a signal to one extreme, and a ghost copy (delayed by 1-35ms) to the other. Changing the amount of delay gives different effects.
Roey Izhaki gives three examples of is use:
To fatten Sounds panned to extremes e.g. double tracked guitars
More realistic panning - our ears use amplitude, frequency and time differences to understand direction of a sound, pan pots only use amplitude. The Haas trick adds time, and frequency if we EQ one channel.
As a panning alternative.
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