panning guitar duett

[waltergrund]

Hi,does anyone have experiences in mixing a duo? In this case I have two guitars. One plays the solos the melody stuff the othe plays accompaniment.First I have worked with different pre-delays of the reverb and the distance-control to have the 2nd gtr. further in the back.I guess it'll be bad to pan them slightly. I'd have no instrument dead center then. On the other side, in real world you don't play behind each other but sit next to each other...Any thoughts/experiences? I like the idea of having them slightly panned (from 0 to 100 I used 15R and 15L)Walter

[mazz]

There's no rules, really, but I suggest you think about what you're trying to accomplish. It seems to me that an acoustic guitar duet would be panned from an audience perspective. In other words, if the two guitars were playing in your living room and you were sitting in front of them, what would that sound like?There would be some directionality to the sound: the guitarists would probably be sitting next to each other, as you said, but even then, the sounds would blend in the room. If they were good players, the accompanist would play a bit softer than the melody player so even if they were in the same general sonic space, one would be louder than the other (they'd be mixing themselves live in real time).You could make the melody guitar just a tiny bit brighter with EQ to set it apart as well or darken the rhythm player a little. Just a tiny bit, though, try to do the most you can just with volume.I think if they were panned too widely, it would sound unnatural but some panning would help. Just go wide and then bring it back in until it sounds right to your ears.Let the music and your aesthetic vision guide you.Mazz

[flood]

Mazz is right on. Pan them so that they sound natural, but the eq can help separate them in the spatial arena as well. If one is naturally deeper or more resonant, you can enhance that with EQ, adding further separation in doing so.I generally don't pan things further than 70% or so, unless they are unison electric guitars. Probably just a personal preference, but I find it distracting to listen to a mix where acoustic instruments are hard panned.You may also want to listen to some of your favorite duets to see how they did the mix. Sometimes I will rip CD tracks and approximate their version to see if it would work for mine.Good luck with it!

[stoney]

Just to add to the above comments.Your guiding vision with any mix big or small should be balance. You can afford to pan the guitars a touch probably 13:00 and 11:00 o'clock (maybe a tad more) would be enough to separate them. Apart the obvious distance issuesover panning could also cause pan law problems (assuming your summed to mono?) which would again unbalance and of course ruin the mix.A good convolution reverb will be resonsible for creating your spatial effect. I personally wouldn't treat the guitars with different reverb effects or pre-delays as there is a chance localization of sound could become confusing if too obvious. The listener might perceive an imbalance? I would add a touch of subtle compression and EQ too highlight and define your instruments. Best of luckDarren

[matthoggard]

Great comments.Unless your instrument signals are clipping I personally wouldnt compress. I firmly believe that panned guitars can be treated effectively with eq only. But each situation is different. You might have one that is "overplayed" in spots. Ive heard some gutair work with eq and verb treatments that were beautiful. A little 200k here a little 1.5 k there a little plate here etc. etc. If you love it then its probably good.

[waltergrund]

Thanks all 4 of you!I appreciate your input. I already worked with EQ so that shows me I'm on the right track...Walter

[mojobone]

It'll help with the separation if you carefully cast and audition the guitars; maybe it goes without saying, but you are using two different guitars, yes?

[stoney]

Sept 14, 2008, 6:11am, matthoggard wrote:Great comments.Unless your instrument signals are clipping I personally wouldnt compress. I firmly believe that panned guitars can be treated effectively with eq only. But each situation is different. You might have one that is "overplayed" in spots. Ive heard some gutair work with eq and verb treatments that were beautiful. A little 200k here a little 1.5 k there a little plate here etc. etc. If you love it then its probably good.I think this is sound advice but Matt I assume you don't mean clipping as in digital clipping or going into the red? Compression would only highlight and thus actually degrade the quality of your sound.EQ and reverb are definitely the key to making this work but unlike full on dist electric guitars were compression is often not needed acoustics can be dynamic buggers which means compression might be a must?Without hearing the guitars it's hard to say whether they would need this kind of treatment? Depends on the playing? Amateur would probably tend to be over dynamic where as a pro wouldn't?Like the main man Mazz says 'Let the music and your aesthetic vision guide you.' Nice!!

[mojobone]

To compress acoustic guitars or not would depend on the desired result; possibly also on whether close-mic(s), distant mic(s) or a combination of the two are used. One can get knee deep in options rather quickly. Given a great sounding pair of guitars and a great sounding room, a spaced pair of omnis at head height no more than 5 ft away might sound most natural when uncompressed, but depending on the amount of clean gain available at the preamp and the amount of unwanted ambient noise in the recording space, some mild compression and gating might be beneficial. The best option might be Mid-Side and figure out the panning later, if two guitars are to be played simultaneously in the room.

[stoney]

Top tricks here mojo which led me to thinking about something that I would work well with your comment. Parallel Compression is a good option if a compressor is needed. It would allow you to create a bigger sound without losing the dynamics.