how to record: 2x mono or 2 stereotracks?
 

Hello,

I was wondering how I should record my boom and laverlier mikes on a 4 channel digital recorder (edirol r44). Its more of a post production question, were I dont have so much experience with. should I record the mikes as 2 stereochannels and then do a Right Fill or left Fill (premiere pro) in post or should I record them als 2 seperate monotracks (like I have bin doing) but how do I put them in stereo later in post???

thanks

Two mono tracks for flexibility and options. Why in the world would you want them as stereo later in post???

Two days ago I recorded a singer/guitar player with a lavaliere on the guitar and a shotgun on the singer.
When I import the tracks from my recorder (Fostex) into the computer they appear as a stereo track.
I am using them as a stereo pair but it is easy enough to split them if I want to and use them as mono tracks.
I edit in Liquid. You can do what you want with the tracks once they are imported eg pan them, change the volume etc.
I'd be surprised if Premiere isn't the same.
So the answer to your question is that I doubt if it matters.

Mono is mono. One lav and one shotgun, unless setup in a stereo placement are just two mono sources. Recording them to 2 tracks won't make them stereo in the true sence of the word. It's just a waste of drive space and reduced recording time with no gain. Prem pro has mono tracks you can pan. No need for the channel fill. If they import as stereo just do a break out to mono command on the to get the 2 mono clips

tanks for the replies guys

But surely once you have mixed and recorded them to one track in mono you cannot pan them or equalise them or adjust the volume etc separately?

I think the point Steve is raising here is recording 1 mono track to stereo (2 channels) is a waste.

Recording 2 mono tracks as one stereo PAIR (still only two tracks but earmarked for left and right speakers) isn't using any more space but causes one track to appear on one speaker and the other track to appear in the other speaker, which makes no sense UNLESS you are deliberately trying to record TRUE stereo (which is more problematic than just tossing up two mics).

Thanks Shaun
It may not be true stereo but it sounds better to me if I record a singer/guitarist or a fiddler/guitarist (in two takes I hasten to add - he hasn't got four arms) and treat them as separate tracks in a stereo pair. Both are examples that I have recorded in the last week for the soundtrack of a film I am making.
That does allow you to pan them so that there is some separation and to adjust them individually.
That's what I was trying to say. I misunderstood what Steve was saying. I suppose the key phrase was 'unless set up in a stereo placement'. Thanks for clearing that up.
I've got to admit that I don't know what 'true stereo' is. You've both used that term.

A lot of people think "stereo" just means you have two channels each playing from it's own speaker. Not quite. You only have stereo if your two channels have been recorded so the sound you hear at the listening position duplicates the relative levels and phase information that you would have heard had you been sitting where the mics were placed so you hear a faithful reproduction of the original soundstage. You don't get that with two mics placed randomly with respect to each other. "True Stereo" requires careful attention to matching the mics and placing them so that proper phase, arrival time, and intensity information is preserved.

Here's a link to an interesting PDF that illustrates several commonly used true stereo micing arrangments ... http://www.schoeps.de/PDFs/stereo-re...chniques-e.pdf

TRUE stereo, for lack of a better way to describe it, is the spatialization of two signals , each originating from a discrete "emitter" (speaker, headphone speaker) so as to mimic the binaural way that we humans hear through two ears, spaced a certain difference away from each other.

What that means is:
-in the field there are different ways to record a sound event (a guitar player, an orchestra, an exploding pumpkin...) to mimic this such as coincident pairs, M/S pairs, binaural mics...
-These are then "decoded" into left and right channels for speakers
-We can also "force" stereo by recording with completely mono recordings such as micing two persons speaking with lav mics and in post, we can pan speaker #1 a little to the left (as he appears onscreen) and speaker #2 a bit to the right (as she appears onscreen) to create the illusion we are in the space with them aurally.
-Likewise we can do this with a band: the bass player is screen left (as is his amplifier) so we place him a little further into the left matrix. The guitar player who also sings is on the far right hand side of our frame so we pan her slightly right. We can do the same with each individual drum and or cymbal to create an artificially large space.

I hope this rambling post helps.

Apparently Steve and I were typing at the same time. I think Steve's response is a little more accurate, while I win the award for "Wow, that's a lot of words. What do they actually mean?"

<double posted>

Thanks guys. As always I continue to learn new things on DV Info.
By the way, if not 'true' is there a name for the kind of stereo that I have been fabricating. Presumably not 'false'.
'Hybrid' or 'bastardised' perhaps ;-)