Panning Gems

sadmanbarty

Well-known member
Tracks that offer something different when balanced completely to the left or right.


Do it through speakers though, doing it through headphones makes you feel jetlagged.
 

luka

Well-known member
Panning is the distribution of a sound signal (either monaural or stereophonic pairs) into a new stereo or multi-channel sound field determined by a pan control setting. A typical physical recording console has a pan control for each incoming source channel. A pan control or pan pot (short for "panning potentiometer") is an analog control with a position indicator which can range continuously from the 7 o'clock when fully left to the 5 o'clock position fully right. Audio mixing software replaces pan pots with on-screen virtual knobs or sliders which function like their physical counterparts.

A pan pot has an internal architecture which determines how much of a source signal is sent to the left and right buses. "Pan pots split audio signals into left and right channels, each equipped with its own discrete gain (volume) control."[1] This signal distribution is often called a taper or law.

When centered (at 12 o'clock), the law can be designed to send −3, −4.5 or −6 decibels (dB) equally to each bus. "Signal passes through both the channels at an equal volume while the pan pot points directly north."[1] If the two output buses are later recombined into a monaural signal, then a pan law of -6 dB is desirable. If the two output buses are to remain stereo then a law of -3 dB is desirable. A law of −4.5 dB at center is a compromise between the two. A pan control fully rotated to one side results in the source being sent at full strength (0 dB) to one bus (either the left or right channel) and zero strength (−∞ dB) to the other. Regardless of the pan setting, the overall sound power level remains (or appears to remain) constant.[2] Because of the phantom center phenomenon, sound panned to the center position is perceived as coming from between the left and right speakers, but not in the center unless listened to with headphones, because of head-related transfer function HRTF.[citation needed]

Panning in audio borrows its name from panning action in moving image technology. An audio pan pot can be used in a mix to create the impression that a source is moving from one side of the soundstage to the other, although ideally there would be timing (including phase and Doppler effects), filtering and reverberation differences present for a more complete picture of apparent movement within a defined space. Simple analog pan controls only change relative level; they don't add reverb to replace direct signal, phase changes, modify the spectrum, or change delay timing. "Tracks thus seem to move in the direction that [one] point the pan pots on a mixer, even though [one] actually attenuate those tracks on the opposite side of the horizontal plane."[3]

Panning can also be used in an audio mixer to reduce or reverse the stereo width of a stereo signal. For instance, the left and right channels of a stereo source can be panned straight up, that is sent equally to both the left output and the right output of the mixer, creating a dual mono signal.
 

mvuent

Void Dweller

the wild use of panning on jimi's guitar here might easily be written off as dated or gimmicky. but it's actually great. it encourages you to imagine the sound not as something produced by a performer holding an intrument (the movement you're hearing would be impossible if that were the case) but as an independent entity with a life of its own. audio animation. a comet careening through space (morphing in timbre and pitch as it does).
 

pattycakes_

Can turn naughty
TdIuDYU_d.webp


You already wow reacted!

Too late, kid
 
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mvuent

Void Dweller
You already wow reacted!

Too late, kid
only at your shocking breach of forum etiquette! i wasn't wowed in the slightest by this middling "Velvet Underground" band you posted, who, quite frankly, sound like a third rate imitation of The Strokes.
 
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