Logic Pro X Quick Tips Stereo Pan

Learn all about Logic’s new Stereo Pan feature to truly give your mixes the width it deserves!

Welcome to masteringinlogic.com’s quick tips.  No nonsense random tips that I think you might find useful? Maybe.

In this quick tips I’m going to look at something brand new from Logic and that’s the new Stereo Pan, I’m going to share with you some ideas you might find helpful in using the Stereo Pan creatively.

Here’s the transcript from the video:

First off though let’s briefly go through why Logic have added this new feature to the channel strip and how to use it.

With the previous Pan dial it wasn’t a true stereo pan it was more of a level control balancing the stereo signal from one side to the other, to accurately pan a source in stereo from left to right you needed to load Logic’s Direction Mixer.

This was fine but I found even though I new I needed to use it I’d rarely go for the plugin, panning is something you want to do quickly and then move on.

Well now you can because everything you need to truly and accurately pan is right there above the channel fader.

So now we can access the different panning options from a channel strip by either right clicking or ctrl clicking on the pan pot you want to work with.

Options are Balance, which is perfect for mono sources and stereo if you want to simply leave the part untouched or balance like you would before.

Stereo Pan is similar to having two pan pots the way a stereo channel strip is in Pro Tools, this allows you to now place the position of the stereo signal across the stereo field rather than just rebalancing it; you can even adjust the width or the stereo signal making it wider or thinner.

The third option which I’m not going to discuss is Binaural, which is best experienced on headphones.

So the way you manipulate Stereo Pan, which I found a little bit fiddly to start with, is to click the centre of the dial and drag down or up to pan left and right.

To change the width of the Stereo signal click inside the green bar and drag up or down to adjust the width.  You can even grab the little white handles to move them independently.

That’s it that’s how you manipulate the Stereo Pan dial but what applications does this dial have?

Well of course in terms of panning it’s endless but I’m going to show you a few ideas that might spark your imagination and help you to come up with some creative ways of using Stereo Pan.

Using The Stereo Pan Dial

Ok so let’s get underway.  The first thing I want to show you is how Stereo Pan can help clear out the centre of a mix but at the same time giving you the ability to create some unique pad sounds.

We’ve all been there working away and wanting to find some kind of stereo pad, if you’re like me I’ll sometimes be dead lazy and go through presets find something that works and then move on.  Trouble is everyone else has access to Patch 101 from whichever VI your using so here’s a good way of creating an almost unique pad sound that is clear of the centre and panned correctly across the stereo field.

So I’ve loaded 3 pads (see video) that I’ve picked pretty much at random and selected Stereo Pan to do three things. Pad 1 is off to the left pad 2 is off to the right and pad 3 has the width reduced so it’s closer to a mono signal and is then automated across the stereo image as the music plays.

As you can hear from the video I’ve created a new pad sound that is just about unique and has the advantage of being out to the sides gently bleeding back to the centre.

The more mono sound on pad three automating across the image helps to keep the pads moving.  The great thing here is this, I’m not only creating a new sound but by doing it this way I’m leaving room in the middle of the mix for mono sounds, kick, basses, vocals … you know the sort of stuff.

This can on occasion be a better approach than finding one big synth patch that spreads across the entire stereo field and ends up masking mono sources.

Flipping the Stereo Signal

For the purpose of demonstration there’s one other quick thing I want to show, it’s a cool feature that allows you to flip the stereo signal.  Say you have a sound the has different audio parts on either side.  One sound left, one right by holding command and clicking in the centre of the pan knob you can quickly flip the signal.  This is a great timesaving feature if you want to hear what the stereo signal sounds like reversed.

Get More Creative with Stereo Pan

Alright just for kicks let’s take this pad one step further I’m going to send my pads to two different busses loaded with different Delay Designer settings.  I’m going to Stereo Pan one to the left the other to the right; the left delay is a 16th note filtered delay and the right an 8th note filtered delay.  I’ve not gone overboard because this is a demo and you’ll come up with far more creative ideas than me.

Pad one is sent to the left delay bus, two to the right and pad 3 is sent to both so the delays are triggered as it pans back and forth across the stereo image.

I’m doing this for two reasons feeding the pads to different delays allows for greater interest and movement and panning the busses allows me to leave the centre of the mix relatively clear.

This is a great way to get creative with stereo imaging as well as ensuring your mix stays solid and punchy in the centre.  The possibilities are endless.

Stereo Pan Goes Mono

The last thing I want to show you is something that will help your mixes become more focussed.

One thing that can often cause a mix to become cluttered is bass sounds from VI’s that are too heavy across the stereo field.  I’m referring here to sounds that you would only want to hear in mono.

Sometimes even mono sounding bass presets have subtle stereo delay or reverbs that aren’t really heard but can cause the mix to lack focus.

So the way I used to solve this was to load the Gain Plugin and click the Mono button placing the sound centre stage.

Now though I don’t need to do that I can simply switch the pan pot to Stereo Pan and then reduce the width of the signal to mono. This is a simple trick that I’ll be using a lot on sounds from VIs that I want in mono.  It’s a subtle feature but it will improve the sound of your mixes making them more focused.

Thanks and happy mixing and mastering.

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