Width + depth
Getting extra dimensions in your mixes can really give them a pro feel. Here’s how…
01
Pitch and formant shifting is handy for quickly widening mono synth, vocal and guitar tracks. Create two copies of a track, pan them hard left and right, then apply slightly different pitch shift or formant shift values to each copy. Duplicate additional tracks with alternative pitch and formant settings for an even wider effect. 02
To widen a stereo track, flip the reverb or delay so that the effect from the right channel is played in the left and vice versa. Set up a 100% wet reverb or delay effect on a buss and then flip the L/R channels using a utility plugin. 03
Try rotary plugins and autopanning effects on mid-/high-frequency percussion-like hi-hats, shakers and bongos, giving the tops width while the kick and snare stay dead centre. 04
The human ear can make out only a few different panning positions at the same time. Use this knowledge to keep the panning of individual tracks nice and simple. Using just five panning positions will keep your mix clean and increase separation between instruments. The positions hard left, mid left, centre, mid right and hard right can be used exclusively, so don’t be too scared of doing hard panning. 05
Collapse the majority of a track’s elements to mono to enable the stereo and panned instruments to really stand out. Alternatively, use a multiband imaging plugin to switch all the frequencies below a certain range into mono. This will allow the midrange and high frequency instruments to become more prominent. 06
To create a wider-sounding guitar riff, take a mono guitar sample and duplicate it onto three separate tracks. Pan one left, one right and one centre, then apply guitar cabinet plugins to the three tracks using different settings on each. Keeping a ‘clean’-sounding centre channel with two different distorted cab emulations panned left and right sounds especially good. 07
To make the chorus parts of a song really stand out, widen the stereo field during that part and narrow it again for the verses. Use a mid/side plugin with an adjustable width setting on wide-sounding instruments. Then automate this width setting to reign in the stereo effect during the verses and widen during chorus sections. 08
Careful EQing is one of the simplest ways to create an impression of depth in a mix. For sounds you want to place ‘close’ to the listener, set the EQ curve to brighten them, exaggerating their dominant frequencies. For ‘farther away’ sounds, roll off the top-end around 2kHz and slightly boost the low frequencies below 200Hz. 09
It’s easy to create a basic perception of depth with just one reverb instance to save on CPU and keep your mixer routing simple. Firstly, set up a buss with reverb set to 100% wet. You can then vary the send’s level depending on how far away you want each track to sound.