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What Kind of Music Do You Make And....
How important is Panning to You?
- Do You Use Panning In Your Music?31 votes
- Yes I Use Panning When I Make Music.77.42%
- No I Don't Use Panning When I Make Music.22.58%
Comments
Don't everyone use panning? I don't remember ever listening to a song that was originally released in "big mono" (identical L & R). Panning is ubiquitous.
Everyone else pans my music. I don't need to.
Well, excluding really really old stuff, of which I usually listen to remastered versions.
It is important in my mixer/DAW. I don't need it much before that. I have it in all mixers/DAWs I use so haven't been thinking about it overly much, apart from when reading about new apps in this forum after @kobamoto, who will ask about it.
Lol! Everyone will be punning this thing of panning things.
Actually, I don't really use panning. I tend to mix everything in the centre, my only concession to stereo is using stereo effects, especially delays, and to hard pan double-tracked guitars or backing vocals, but otherwise my approach is mostly mono.
I personally don't see the need to place hi-hats off centre etc.. For me it doesn't add anything to the sound. I think stereo is useful for creating thick, wide soundscapes, but instrument placement within the stereo field is overrated IMO.
I prefer M/S over panning usually. More often I would use automated panning for sound design rather than mixing. Other than that if I pan I don't go over 75% on either side as a general rule/like of mine, as long as I don't double/triple/etc track the same part to get it wider
I use panning to place things in the stereo field at mix stage. That's it. When I'm adapting presets that have all sorts of crazy modulated panning for effect I usually turn it off. Reminds me of a mosquito buzzing around my head.
I've made a fair few techno, house and IDM records and, as many club systems are mono, have unfortunately found a lot of my use of panning has become lost in translation. I love to mix for the headphone listening experience (harking back to all those Jarre records of my childhood & the Warp stuff of the early 90s), which is a problem when just making club tracks.
Now, I concentrate on IDM-type music only, but I still tend to track in mono & then carefully use delays, chorus & subtle panning at the mix stage.
As mentioned above, synth presets with modulated panning are a big no-no. Dave Smith synths are full of that and it just sounds messy to me.
I pan tracks some, if you mean permanent placement in the stereo field. It can widen and separate things.
I would use panning a lot more if it were available in more apps. Currently I mix all my audio in AUM because it has panning, but it would be nice if other mixers - here's looking at you ModStep, had panning too for those occasions where you cannot pan the sound within the source AU/IAA. As ModStep now supports AU then if there were an AU Panning Effect life would be easier
Panning is an essential tool when getting sounds to sit right in the mix, especially when you have sounds in similar frequency ranges.
I am not a fan of lots of real-time panning, too much movement tends to confuse the ears (unless that is what you want of course), but on the odd occasion extreme movement can work, during transitions for example, one sound exit stage left while another enter stage right type of thing.
I guess the other exception would be ping pong delay's but you don't need panning for that.
I should say I use spatialisation effects more than I do simple left / right panning in my ambient material. I've developed / stumbled across some techniques which I use for these spatialisations.
I am autopan's bitch
Panning and Placing of Elements in the Depth of the Audio (Tiefenstaffelung) is very important when making electronic music that feature alot of elements. Thus Panning is omnipresent when creating a new track.
Usually a mix also has to be checked against mono compatibility. For Club Music where the PA usually really is Mono there is a breaking point in the Frequency Spectrum from which downward you usually pull away all side content from the signal and making it mono via m/s mixing.
I couldnt do a single track without proper Panning, Reverb and Mixing. Obviously I really have a hard time listening to un-panned mixes even if the track is harmonically and creatively interesting.
It's all a matter of taste, but I am a panned guy.
Ah i forgot the reply of the first part of the question. I am an old fashioned trancer.
You can check out some of my work here:
https://pro.beatport.com/artist/oliver-imseng/97147/tracks
https://pro.beatport.com/artist/dj-snowman/112096/tracks
Should also find these things on Apple Music and Itunes.
Have fun
Best answer EVER!
I have everything running through Logic, thus that is where I make my pannings, am playing with the binaural setups in Logic at the time, which is greatly fulfilling my needs. Anybody here tried that?
I make rock and roll music, and to me, panning is essential. So effective when Jon Lord was in the left speaker and Ritchie Blackmore in the right, or when Tony Iommi panned two separate rhythm guitar tracks hard left and right on "Hole in the Sky."
An interesting follow up question, for folks who pan their drums, do you pan a drum kit from audience perspective (hats on the right assuming a right handed player) or from drummer perspective (hats on the left assuming same)?
Oh, yes. And also, as well as binaural, the early experiments in my quasonama four channel immersive VR scheme were done (and then later accidentally lost) in the Logic 5.1 panner. I was at the time disappointed that youtube didn’t know what to do with a 5.1 sound track, and apparently, you had to put two sound tracks (I used Apple Compressor), one a stereo down mix, the other your 5.1, and set the stereo mix as the first one. Never did get it to work properly though. Not withstanding, there’s a bewildering array of channel assignment standards for 5.1, which really doesn’t help.
I think that’s correct, that’s from my own notes as a result of my research at the time.
@u0421793 yeah, interesting thing, your quasonama. Until a few years ago I played quadrophonic setups (not as pointed to one single spot in the room as 5.1 etc.), but since most venues just have stereo, I started with the binaural stuff. Very happy with it, so far.
I make quite dense tech/progressive house. A tip i picked up to pan before i eq or do any other processing so now if the mix isn't sitting right i do a balance edit to see if i can create space before i touch an eq or fader and it's been really effective.
Good point about the mono side though, i usually listen in mono check for phase issues before sending the track off for mastering. Not too sure how my tracks translate on club systems though but not heard of any issues from DJs so far.
Oh yeah on the last track i used SPL Vitalizer to add some sterep width and it really widened things so the snare fills sounded like they were further out to the right etc, i know a lot of people use mid/side processing for pyshoacoustic effects which i'm planning to get into as it opens the door to a lot of creative processing.
I make mainly techno/acid type of thing.
There are not many clubs/venues that require stereo- however if you have made your tracks for more domestic listening pleasure- then stereo can well enhance it. It will easily convert back to mono.
I thought I was on my own in not bothering about stereo/ panning. I don't think is a deal breaker. Stereo will not be the deciding factor in whether or not it's a banging good tune. No amount of tweaking the panning will make a duff track good.
I make the opposite of the kind of music that people associate with sexual intercourse, and I only pan my hats/snares when I'm on my desktop, on iOS I can't be bothered (plus Samplr doesn't pan so I always have a pan-less-ness in the central heart-spot of my typical song-stuff, so why bother, etc.).
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^^^
This, and I'd add any two guitar band's tracks (Stones, AC/DC, etc.) to the @eustressor examples above. I've always enjoyed listening for the panned instruments in rock and roll, particularly two different rhythm guitar parts.
I make something along the lines of dark ethereal electronic rock and occasionally more down-tempo instrumental tracks, but typically very complex arrangements in either case. I used to ignore panning entirely but also felt like my mixes always felt muddy, flat and thin. It has taken me a long time to get to the point where I finally feel minimally competent with mixing and mastering, but I think panning along with frequency filtering is pretty key in trying to give each sound its own space and has made a big improvement in the quality of my own material. I'm no expert, though...it's mostly an art, it seems.
I pay specific attention to panning. Since one of the genres I create is classical/orchestral, and the placement of instruments is expected to be in specific places in the stereo field for certain orchestra arrangements by the listener - in stereo of course - then I aim at that particularly in the creation of tracks. But, as others have said, at the DAW stage (or if in Notion, then in Notion).
I also take care to work with stereo field width for specific instruments as well. Many acoustic instruments (and their sampled cousins) are essentially mono. Therefore it's relevant to restrict their stereo field width. Of course, one must take into account room acoustics (real or simulated, delays, early reflections, etc.) as well.
However, I also pay attention to panning with any genre I create.
Again, as others have said, it is equally important to understand that a mix may well, still, in this day and age, be heard in mono in various ways, so the EQ, phase and track balance are crucial as well. Checking the mix in mono (frequently - I to and fro between stereo and mono during the mixing process) is also important. Some I know prefer to mix mainly in mono and concentrate on EQ.
I take the view that for many, the stereo field is important enough (i.e. they will strive to listen in stereo), that panning and instrument width in stereo is a focal point in my mixes, and for effect as well (i.e. panning across the stereo field, whether in terms of, e.g., ping-pong delays, stereo field sweeps, stereo delays, etc.). That being said, the mix, even when employing such techniques still needs to sound acceptable (read "good") in mono
And, yes, I do this on iOS as much as on the desktop.
Currently working on an orchestrally song but in an ambient style, panning sounds great for placing bunch of orcestral sounds at different places to L/R
I have a few originals to my credit, but I like to make covers of tunes I enjoy (this comes from creating MIDI files of popular tunes to test out my then-new Roland XP-50 Music Wofkststion). I have had snippets of melodies & such in my head for years and have attempted to flesh them out with all this iOS capabIty, I also like to go all 'Weird Al' and do parody tunes aimed at some local radio personalities orntheir callers - even got one tune of mine played on the radio one evening.
Mostly, I like to amuse myself more than anything!
I use panning for traditional placement, whether the music is traditional or not. Music that just stacks all the instrumentation one atop another is less pleasing to my ear unless that's specifically what I'm going for but even then that's still adhering to the concept of 'placement'..... Especially these days when so much music is produced on headphones all of these groove boxes with no panning is as mystifying to me as synths with no filters would be, or mixers with no eq. What's the point in controlling the vertical if you can't control the horizontal too. I do allot of layering and allot of resampling and the lack of panning in iOS is killing me. I use the impc pro allot which does have panning thank god but Samplr is the reason I even use iOS and the lack of panning is painful each and every time. I pray for the day the launchpad app gets panning, it will turn it into such a good production app, the novation circuit as well will be mine once it has panning... all of that per step capability and the editor they released for it looks great but without panning I just can't sit there with a pair of headphones and get into it. My only recourse right now with Samplr is to mute each track and export/record out individual tracks to be placed in another app which is a real workflow bummer. My recipe for making it sound like there's a demon and an angel on your shoulders whispering in your ears while you debate with both of them is to pan the demon vocal far left all of the way, keep your vocal in the center, and pan the angel vocal to the right but not all the way leave it at 2-3 o'clock which will give it the feel of being not just to the right but upward and heavenly, while the demon will seem to be not just far left but coming from underneath. Anyways I think pink floyd would have just been floyd without panning.