Thanks!

People are so afraid to pan these days.  While there are certain rules in contemporary recording, such as bass, kick and lead vocal dead center (unless we're recording something like bluegrass, but that's another conversation), if you want a guitar part wide out, pan it there.  If your recordings are simple arrangements with too few instruments to balance the overall sound, double tracking a single guitar part and putting each take left and right can add a nice expansive feeling too, whilst maintaining overall balance.
 
The only thing I would sometimes like to widen or narrow post recording is stereo overheads on the drums.  But there are things that can be done there too.  I have recently switched to using M/S for the overhead arrangement, so width is only a dial away, with no phasing issues when narrowing.
 
And if you haven't gone pan-happy in a while, give it a go - at least you won't need to spray contact cleaner in Sonar's pan pots :)
 
 

When compiling a albums worth and some tunes spacial elements widely differently to other tunes especially if from a number of different engineer's mixes as was the case of a fairly recent compilation I made from old tape mixes. Restoration was probably the best name for it.
Processing by MS can work better for spacial FX even reverbs in mastering.
 
 
 
 

Jeff Evans
 
Craig wouldn't another way to reduce vocals panned centre might be to convert a mix to M/S and maybe EQ the M component such that frequencies within a certain range (vocal range) only get lowered once the M/S signal is put back to stereo. I am sure there is a better way to do it rather than widening the image. Only just some ideas of course.

My understanding is that most wideners use a variation on M/S processing anyway, so if a widener can do the job with one control (and considerable amounts of luck), so much the better. I usually ask for three mixes if possible, one unaltered, one with vocal up, and one with vocal down, which of course solves the problem right there. I haven't gone to asking for stems yet but am seriously considering asking for a mix with no vocals and the vocals on a separate track. But then they have all these comped bits and pieces floating around so that becomes difficult...
 
When it comes to "salvage jobs," I don't think there are very many good solutions...only "less bad" ones. I'm sure you know what I mean

This thread is interesting. I have a tune where two guitars are panned left and right. They are two different guitars, playing the same thing, but sometimes they both ring out in the center much too loud. I keep forgetting about mid/side so I'll try it and reduce the center and see what happens. It all depends on how it sounds in mono.

Anderton
I haven't gone to asking for stems yet but am seriously considering asking for a mix with no vocals and the vocals on a separate track. But then they have all these comped bits and pieces floating around so that becomes difficult...
 

Tangent, but man, this kind of thing is becoming a bugbear of mine; what is so hard about "just export the mix as seperate mono tracks", which I need often for remix jobs.

In about a dozen remix jobs for signed artists with the material coming from at least the assistant engineer, I've had precisely one give me what I asked for. The worst thing you get is around 5 gb of god-knows-what, all in stereo files, all exported from different time positions, so you have to work out how to line it up yourself. Seriously.

As far as widening vst's go, I really like "Up Stereo" from http://quikquak.com/. It does some cool stuff under the hood to make the music appear to jump out in front of the speakers. It's a great effect if used properly (as soon as you put it on a track you normally need to unpress the "loud" button or you will think it sounds like crap). The 32 bit version down near the end of the page is 100% free and the 64 bit version at the top of the page is pretty cheap. Until the 64 bit version came along, it was my one hold out VST that kept me from using all 64bit effects.
I'll pop it onto a song, and do an a/b comparison. If the sound that I dial in is better than the original-unaltered file, then I'll use it.

I picked up the free widener plug called Sheppi Spacial Enhancer some time back. I believe Bitflipper posted that link many years back. http://dallashodgson.info/articles/OpenAmbienceProject/
 
However, the folks up top are correct. If you use a widener plug to "widen the mix" you WILL be sacrificing the quality of the mix. I have used the SSE plug in the master bus and yeah, it sounds cool in the studio, BUT..... set there while the music is in playback with SSE turned off. Everything is nicely defined.... plenty of kick and punch in the music, nice full sound. Click to turn on the SSE and much of that drive disappears in the process.
 
It is much better to use panning and doubling to get the width in the mix.  I often record my acoustic guitar 2x and simply pan the tracks 80% to 100% opposite each other. The slight differences between the 2 tracks gives a nice wide stereo field to the mix and everything else can pretty much stay really close to centered. Since the guitars are both playing nearly the same thing you don't end up with the weird 100% panned feeling. I also tend to pan my BGV wide as well, with this adding width to the vocal track harmony parts.....and they are at a low volume level so again you don't get that distinct feeling of extreme panning.
 
If you want the lead vocal (mono track) to have a fat, wide sound..... I record an identical vocal track for the lead 3 times. I pay attention to the singer's annunciation, timing, and groove and make sure the 3 tracks are as close to perfect with each other as is possible. Words, phrasing, etc...start and end together and in between as well..... One track goes up the middle at lead track volume and the other 2 are 80% or so panned opposite each other and way down in the mix somewhere around -16 to -20 db normally. ..... to the point that you can't really hear them clearly unless you solo the vocal bus.
 
If you have proper panning and good technique in the mix, the widener plugs are not needed.
 
Having said all that.... I do use the SSE from time to time for it's overall ambient sound.

I have had a lot of use and success with SSE as well. It is very good. Where I tend to use it is on mono tracks. And not on the whole mix. I have been mixing an artist who has been recording her acoustic guitar nicely but in mono only. This plugin is capable of adding some nice width to the mono track.