Creating a wide stereo field

[James Stichbury]

Hi guys,
I'm realizing the joys of stereo panning and want to make a synth sound really wide. I have discovered a stereo spreader plugin in logic, but since i am using a synth anyway, is there a way to create a wide stereo field in the first place?

I have tried using a couple of oscillators, making them subtly different and panning them left & right, which works, but it doesn't seem to result in an amazingly wide sound.. any tricks?

[Medway]

James,

I'm not a big fan of the stereo spreader in Logic, I've tried many times but it always sounds phasy and weird to me.

The oscillator trick should generally work but it depends on how different they are from each other.

Do you have an mp3 example of a track with the specific effect you're looking for?

Maybe try using some stereo enhancing effects like chorus/delay. A good one is to pan the synth left and the mono delay return right.

(Worse case example you could just spread your speakers out further ;-)

[James Stichbury]

I don't have a specific track, but just generally noticed my music sounding rather flat compared to others. On second look at my synth sounds though, i think i am getting it as wide as other tracks.

Thanks for the tips. I tried that trick and it sounded pretty cool.

While reviewing some other tracks however, i did notice that some jump out of the speakers a lot more than others. Any tricks on this?

I'll attach an example..

[Medway]

James,

Is this a clip of your track or one you are trying to emulate?

As far as jumping out of the speakers, some well placed loudly mixed elements that are panned to the sides of the speakers can really work. Hihats especially are good with this, short and sharp and pulled to the edges of the stereo field. That will give the impression of depth as compared to the rest of the track thats a bit more in the 'distance'.

[James Stichbury]

oh, thats just a track i found that seems to have that hollow drum type sound jump out of my speakers..
Thanks, i'll try panning my hihats.

One think i don't quite get though - if i pan my hihats, say fully left, won't half the dancefloor hear very little hihat?
If i pan another copy fully right, they will sum to mono, so i have pan a completely different hihat fully right?
...this comes back to my question on how to make something really stereo?

hmm maybe i'll just move my speakers...

[Medway]

James,

That hollow drum sound is an 808 conga. They've just mixed it fairly loud, coupled with the fact the mix/drums are tightly compressed which is making it jump out.

The mix itself pretty much has no stereo information other than the reverb. If you take that clip and mono it (Wavelab has a button on the output to do this) you'll hear the mix almost stays pretty much the same, except for the wide reverb is almost completely subdued.

You are right about panning two copies of the same hat left and right, its simply mono then. For something to be stereo, the infomation on the left channel has to be different than the right.

So either pan a different sound to the right, or you can of course alternate hits from a single sound left and right.