# Wide and Lush..How to get that sound?



## DocMidi657 (Apr 3, 2012)

Hi,

Was listening to 8Dio's demo..the very first track's mix has such beautiful width, depth and sheen to it. 

Anyone have any tips or suggestions to get that sound with their mixes?

Here's the link to the demo http://8dio.com/?btp_product=adagio-violins-vol-1 and the song is called "Adagio Sorrow.

I have a lot of quality sample libraries but my mixing skills never seem to get that type sound?


Thanks,
Dave


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## germancomponist (Apr 3, 2012)

It is the reverb and its settings, what you like so very much...... .


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## DocMidi657 (Apr 3, 2012)

Thanks Gunther! Got it.....Do you have any guesses how to get started dialing in that sound. 

In other words is it one reverb on the master bus? Or is it separate reverbs? Any guess what kind of reverb and settings they are using to get that sound? 

Thanks again for the reverb pointer.

Dave


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## xenno (Apr 4, 2012)

Mid side mixing can help get that sparkling wide sound too.

Try putting: http://www.voxengo.com/product/msed/
on your tracks. Essentially a phase summing/subtracting tool.

Basically, route your final mix to two busses or just duplicate the tracks.
Then put one of these on each bus, but mute the side on one and mute the mid on the other.

This allows you to control the middle and side of your mix separately.
You'll notice how much more control you have; a mastering secret if you will.


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## Folmann (Apr 4, 2012)

Hi Doc,

I created the demo you are referring to. The demo sounds wide and lush because of the samples. I didn't do any processing at all, except adding a little reverb. The reason it sounds wide and lush is primarily due to the samples. It is about as out-of-the-box as it comes.


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## jlb (Apr 4, 2012)

Folmann @ Wed Apr 04 said:


> Hi Doc,
> 
> I created the demo you are referring to. The demo sounds wide and lush because of the samples. I didn't do any processing at all, except adding a little reverb. The reason it sounds wide and lush is primarily due to the samples. It is about as out-of-the-box as it comes.



That sorrow piece is wonderful, but lets say if you don't happen to have Adagio strings, does anyone have any general tips for a wide and lush sound?

Jlb


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## Jeffrey Peterson (Apr 4, 2012)

Folmann @ Wed Apr 04 said:


> Hi Doc,
> 
> I created the demo you are referring to. The demo sounds wide and lush because of the samples. I didn't do any processing at all, except adding a little reverb. The reason it sounds wide and lush is primarily due to the samples. It is about as out-of-the-box as it comes.



Ptsh, Next your going to say those realist staccatos are out of the box too.


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## DocMidi657 (Apr 4, 2012)

Thanks Everyone and Troels you created a wonderful piece of music! 
Dave


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## Jeffrey Peterson (Apr 4, 2012)

No, I was just being silly. Your staccatos sound amazing Troels.


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## Dom (Apr 5, 2012)

Great piece. I really like the string arrangement.

In terms of the stereo width: Longer sections are more out-of-phase than in-phase which makes it nice and wide, but it's good to be careful when delivering material of this width to a broadcaster. Over here they could reject it, or if it's for film or TV the dubbing mixer (re-recording mixer) may narrow the stereo image to make it 'legal'. Which defeats he whole purpose of make the mix wide in the first place.

Though I don't know if it's the reverb, the strings or any mix processing in the demo that are a bit too wide phase-wise.

Dom


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## KEnK (Apr 5, 2012)

xenno @ Wed Apr 04 said:


> Mid side mixing can help get that sparkling wide sound too.
> 
> Try putting: http://www.voxengo.com/product/msed/
> on your tracks. Essentially a phase summing/subtracting tool.
> ...


I'd love to hear more about this technique.
I just started exploring the mid-side world,
and I'm wondering what you might do w/ these 2 buses.
I can see the value of separate eq, reverb, compression/limiting, 
any specific hints?

Also-
Are the Voxengo plugs really good quality?
(Are they at the same level as Waves or something like that?)
Never bothered w/ them cause the interface makes them look low rent.

Thanks,
Ken


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## germancomponist (Apr 5, 2012)

KEnK @ Thu Apr 05 said:


> I'd love to hear more about this technique.
> I just started exploring the mid-side world,
> and I'm wondering what you might do w/ these 2 buses.
> I can see the value of separate eq, reverb, compression/limiting,
> ...



Watch this video, presenting a very cool plugin what exactly can do what you are asking for:



There are other vids on their website and on the net too, and the ms thing is good explained:

http://www.brainworx-music.com/en


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## RyBen (Apr 5, 2012)

It's kind of a bootleg method, but I like to just pan the instruments according to a standard orchestral layout, but leaving the bass more centered.


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## xenno (Apr 5, 2012)

I like Voxengo. Their stuff is pretty good.
I just mention them, since they have free plugins to test out the workflow.
Once I heard about this process, I took some songs popular songs that were already mastered and processed them through this workflow and noticed how much more simpler it was to have control over punching up the already mastered track.
Of course you can go way overboard, but it is an interesting process.

I usually only use it for mastering, but you can use it to punch up individual stems or busses too.
I've also been using it in relation to mixing with stems in movies, since you can pull the mono down over tricky effects parts, but keep the wide part of the mix stable.
Another interesting thing is to add reverb to just the wide part of the mix, which is great because I am usually adding a low cut to my wide anyway and I don't like the low end sneaking into the reverb over dense mixes.

Of course the best way to arrange, is to always treat each eq band you're trying to fill, like one complete piece that congeals together and treating the whole mix like it is one complete piece; thinking of dialog and effects like instruments in your composition. But sometimes the scene needs a lot going on and it can be difficult to get your ideas to stand out if they are needed too.


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## KEnK (Apr 6, 2012)

Thanks Gunther and Xenno-

I'll check that vid and fool w/ some of these ideas.

_"Another interesting thing is to add reverb to just the wide part of the mix, which is great because I am usually adding a low cut to my wide anyway and I don't like the low end sneaking into the reverb over dense mixes."_

Yes- That's actually the only thing I've done w/ the m/s technique (so far).
But it works so well it's made me want to look at what else can be done w/ it.

Thanks again,

k


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## wst3 (Apr 6, 2012)

cool thread, and mid-side processing is certainly a great technique, and not just for sound field placement, try compressing just the mid or just the side and then run that in parallel with an unprocessed copy - very cool sound.

but I digress (as usual)...

There are lots of factors that help our brain localize sounds, timing is predominant (as far as we can tell) but both level and spectral content also play a role, and can be used in this context to 'fool' the ear/brain.

Here's an exercise I use to work these things out:

Start with a harmonically rich sound - sampled or synthesized doesn't matter. Sit in the sweet spot and pan the signal left to right. Now try filtering out the highs or lows, what do you perceive?

Now add a very simple sound (e.g. flute or sine wave) and place both signals at the center.

Adjust the level of one or the other, listen to the effect.

Filter one or the other, highs or low and again listen to the effect.

Now delay one or the other and listen again.

Now put them both through the same reverb (preferably a simple reverb, no early reflections) and do all the same exercises.

If all goes well, and your monitoring environment is up to the task you should already have a considerable array of tools to place things in the sound field.

The thing about most reverbs is that they affect the spectral content, and they usually have some inherent delay, so when you start using them in real projects you may discover that pan, EQ, and delay can actually muddy things a bit.

But for starters it is difficult to beat the exercises above, so some variation on them.


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## KEnK (Apr 6, 2012)

Hi Bill-

Sounds like you're talking about the Haas effect here,
or some variation of it.

k


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## wst3 (Apr 6, 2012)

KEnK @ Fri Apr 06 said:


> Hi Bill-
> 
> Sounds like you're talking about the Haas effect here,
> or some variation of it.
> ...



That is certainly part of it, and you can use it to great effect, but there are a lot more tools available to us!!! Timing (delay & reverb), Timbre (instrument selection and filters), Pan, level, matrixing, etc are all helpful.


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## germancomponist (Apr 6, 2012)

wst3 @ Fri Apr 06 said:


> That is certainly part of it, and you can use it to great effect, but there are a lot more tools available to us!!! Timing (delay & reverb), Timbre (instrument selection and filters), Pan, level, matrixing, etc are all helpful.



Experiment with detuning the reverb, for example tune it a little bit deeper or modulate it with a pitch lfo...., you get cool results! o-[][]-o


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## xenno (Apr 6, 2012)

> The thing about most reverbs is that they affect the spectral content, and they usually have some inherent delay, so when you start using them in real projects you may discover that pan, EQ, and delay can actually muddy things a bit.





> Experiment with detuning the reverb, for example tune it a little bit deeper or modulate it with a pitch lfo...., you get cool results! beer




Wishing there was a "Like" button at the moment.


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