-1 Pan On All Audio Imports is Driving Me To Drink!

Not that this Celt needs any more reasons...

Why is it that all my clips, music, and other audio media import with the pan set at -1?

I surely didn't set FCP up to do this, and I've been through User's Preferences, System Settings, Audio/Video Settings, and everything else I can think of, but can't find a way to change it.

Any remedies?

Because they are stereo paired. Just select them and press CONTROL-. (fullstop) in the timeline to pan them center.


www.derekmok.com

Isn't that an FAQ Derek? Should we add it? Seems to me that comes up quite often and it does throw beginners. Maybe explain the concept and the cure?

Michael Horton
-------------------

Michael Horton Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Maybe explain the concept and the cure?

YES!!

If they are stereo pairs then -1 is correct. That is centered. Control-period sets the clips to 0, which for stereo pairs is not correct. It moves the sound to mid spread. 1 on a stereo pair is full spread. 0 is what you want for mono tracks to get them centered.

> If they are stereo pairs then -1 is correct. That is centered.

Yes, but that's assuming the sound source was supposed to be spread like that. I've had many instances where two different tracks on a tape were captured as stereo paired, in which case you'd have to re-center them or characters would be talking out of extreme left or right speakers. Actually, I ask for that when an assistant captures, because it's a lot easier to break a stereo pair if you don't want it, than to make dual mono stereo paired if you do want stereo pairing.


www.derekmok.com

If they're on separate tracks they should be captured as mono a1/a2. If they are captured as a stereo pair when they're actually mono then you need to convert them to mono and center them with Control-period.

It's the same step to convert stereo to mono as mono to stereo. Select and Opt-L.

> If they're on separate tracks they should be captured as mono a1/a2. If they are captured as
> a stereo pair when they're actually mono then you need to convert them to mono and center
> them with Control-period.
> It's the same step to convert stereo to mono as mono to stereo. Select and Opt-L.

I'll have to disagree with you, Tom.

If I captured two mono dialogue tracks as Stereo Pair, then the advantages are:

1. To pan them back dead center, I can select 1000 audio clips and press CONTROL-. Boom, done.
2. To adjust levels globally, I can just move the overlay to one of the two.
3. To apply filters, I just apply it to one.
4. If I'm at the stage where I have to mix each side separately, I can also disconnect the Stereo Pairing on an entire timeline by selecting all 1000 audio clips and then pressing OPTION-L.

If I captured those same tracks as Dual Mono, the disadvantages are:

1. Any filter you apply will be doubled...and parameters have to be adjusted separately before you've even hit upon the settings you want.
2. To link a Dual Mono pair as Stereo Paired, you have to select only the pair of clips you want linked. Which means if I had 500 pairs, I'd have to perform 1000 operations (lasso, OPTION-L; lasso, OPTION-L...), two operations on each individual pair. You can't just select all of them and press OPTION-L; FCP will assume you're trying to link all 500 into one entity and refuse to do it.
3. Frankly, I've never been able to see much benefit to capturing as Dual Mono linked. If I needed them separate for detailed mixing, then why would I want them linked in the first place?

Of course, it's a whole other beast when you're talking about, say, video formats and clips with eight audio tracks coming with. Not much choice there. But given a choice, I always opt for having them stereo-linked to speed up the scratch mix. Once the positions are done, then I can worry about separating them out.


www.derekmok.com

1. If they are stereo pairs and you select them and press Control-period, boom, you're not done. Look at the pan settings in the viewer. They're not centered. They're in mid spread.

2. If you have separating recordings on two separate tracks why would you want to adjust the levels for both globally? Are both channels recorded identically? Did both speakers speak at exactly the same levels?

3. If you have recordings of two separate sources do you really want to apply the same filters and settings to both?

4. Or vice versa. If you really want to globally adjust the levels for the monos tracks, turn them into stereo pairs. However, if you're adjusted the tracks separately, and then change them to stereo the separate settings will be lost.

______________

1. If you really can apply exactly the same filters and settings to both tracks you can select the tracks and drag copy the filters to them, or copy and paste attributes.

2. You use the track select tool. Select one track. Command click to select the second track. Press Opt-L. Or if the program is short enough you marquee drag through all the clips and press Opt-L. They don't have to be individually selected and converted.

> If you have recordings of two separate sources do you really want to apply the same filters
> and settings to both?

Final mix, no. Rough mix, yes. I'm an offline editor. I also think that if we're doing very detailed mixing, we usually wouldn't be doing it in Final Cut.

> If you have separating recordings on two separate tracks why would you want to adjust the
> levels for both globally? Are both channels recorded identically? Did both speakers speak at
> exactly the same levels?

Because recordings from one location often need the same ballpark adjustment. Certainly if you have background noise. At any rate, if they do need minute adjustments separately, it takes just two operations to make everything independent again.

> You use the track select tool. Select one track. Command click to select the second track.
> Press Opt-L. Or if the program is short enough you marquee drag through all the clips and
> press Opt-L.

I see what it is...it works if the clips are already Mono linked, but not if they're unlinked. I did miss that small distinction -- previous tests were done on clips that had been unlinked. You can't do multiple clips then.

There's also one major habit in my workflow that makes Mono linking a nuisance. I always unlink video from audio through the entire timeline. And with Dual Mono linking, unlinking the video would also mean the audio becomes unlinked. In Stereo Paired, unlinking video does not undo the link between the audio pair, speeding up rough dialogue editing.

> However, if you're adjusted the tracks separately, and then change them to stereo the
> separate settings will be lost.

Yes. That's why I advocate starting out with Stereo Paired and undoing it when/if it ceases to be advantageous, rather than the other way around.

When rough-mixing, I might apply a Compressor filter with parameters from my effects presets bin. With Stereo Pairs, it's just one filter. I can adjust the parameters so that the general sound is closer. Or, say the pair has background noise so I'd have to find an EQ setting to alleviate the noise. Once I'm close, then I can break them apart and tweak each one individually if I needed to. But if they were Dual Mono, every parameter change would have to be done twice, or you'd have to keep using copying/pasting or Paste Attributes to replicate the settings to each track, even when you're only exploring. I've always found that a huge waste of time when I'm not even sure if X is the right filter yet.

And then you have scenes that aren't shot with separate tracks -- just one source going into both tracks. Capturing those as Dual Mono is a waste of time (double the filtering and levels work, etc.). Unless you did want to change the Mono/Stereo capture settings for every scene that differs, it's faster to break them apart later.

I'll be the first to say I'm not an audio expert, but I think we'll have to agree to disagree on that one.


www.derekmok.com

"I always unlink video from audio through the entire timeline."

Wow! Never in my wildest imagination would I dream of doing that. Or of switching off linked selection. But if you really like working like that then maybe just switching off linked selection would work for you and do what you want.

"And then you have scenes that aren't shot with separate tracks -- just one source going into both tracks."

Absolutely, then the clips should be captured as stereo pairs. Most material shot with a camera mic I'd capture like that. Material that was shot with an external mic often only has one track of audio anyway, with a blank track, in which case it's easier to capture mono and delete the empty track and use center the audio.

Anyway, the point of this was that -1 is correct and centered for a stereo pair. No idea why that nomenclature is used. 0 isn't centered for a stereo pair. 0 pan centers mono tracks.

> Never in my wildest imagination would I dream of doing that. Or of switching off linked selection.

I I just lasso and use the All Tracks Forward tool a lot. It might be a mindset thing -- it's a little old-school, like film and sound tracks. Plus it always drove me crazy that when I applied a dissolve to a linked clip's video cut point, it used to assume I wanted a sound Cross Fade at the exact same cut point on the audio, which is never the case. It's a problem when the software tries too hard to "help" you...and then you have to go back and undo the "helpful" step.

At any rate, way off topic now!


www.derekmok.com

Geez, I didn't mean to start such a debate, but it IS good to see such passion for one's craft!

Hey, while we're at it: Toilet paper - over or under?

Dude! Over!

"Plus it always drove me crazy that when I applied a dissolve to a linked clip's video cut point, it used to assume I wanted a sound Cross Fade at the exact same cut point on the audio"

This only happens if you use the shortcut menu in the timeline or the overwrite/insert with transition. If you use Cmd-T or the menu you just get the video transition only.

I've actually found that I always leave linking on when cutting TV, or anything corporate, but always leave it off when cutting drama. There's so much more slippage required.

Just to get even more off topic, I also found to my surprise that I use the timeline trim mode an awful lot in drama, and almost never for anything non-fiction. (Thanks here to Bill Russo who liiterally forced me to learn timeline trimming!)

> I've actually found that I always leave linking on when cutting TV, or anything corporate, but
> always leave it off when cutting drama. There's so much more slippage required.

Good point. Plus many of those corporate and promo pieces don't rely much on sync sound. Narratives always need so much more of a soundscape.

As for timeline trimming, it was exactly the opposite for me: I didn't start using the Roll tool, number pad, OPTION <> and other timeline trimming tools until I started cutting multi-camera music video. I cut years of narrative before that without needing those tools.


www.derekmok.com

I do it both ways (oo er) linked and unlinked with the linking option or by removing links on clips - actually I find it depends on the nature of the edit point (overlapping sound and/or vision) rather than the genre of the edit.

I also use a mixture of the the roll tool and the trim windows - it will often depend if I 'know' (feel the power of the cut point like a divining rod to water) where the extremities of the clip should be. Or in the case of the trim tool - I don't...

...and I gotta agree with Tom... definitely 'Over'

'Under' is for softball and girlie men



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

>Control-period sets the clips to 0, which for stereo pairs is not correct. It moves the sound
>to mid spread. 1 on a stereo pair is full spread. 0 is what you want for mono tracks to get
>them centered.

Sorry, need to double check on this, as I remember them very differently... -1 on a stereo pair is the default setting for FCP on stereo pairs which basically is full stereo (first channel goes to left output, second channel goes to right output), 0 on a stereo pair centers the audio (equivalent of pan pots set to center on an analog console), -1 on a stereo pair INVERSES the stereo spread (first channel goes to right speaker, 2nd channel goes to left speaker).

It's a little misleading, as Apple chose to adopt this nonmenclature for audio.



www.strypesinpost.com

Linking on or off... It's a mix of both, almost always off on corporate as there's almost no sync sound involved, for stuff with sync sound it's usually on during the assemble, and off during fine cuts and adjustments (i prefer the all tracks forward tool).

Over or under? I just grab 'em..



www.strypesinpost.com

You're quite right strypes. I was confusing the behavior with something else. -1 is full spread.

Cool. Alright, not at a machine, but into the FAQ it goes.



www.strypesinpost.com

Good luck on anyone trying to write this up for the FAQ

Lets let Tom do it.

BTW Tom are you still in CA, or in Panama with the big insects and spiders?

Michael Horton
-------------------

I'm at Stanford now and next week, then the DMA Caribbean cruise, then Panama, then back to Stanford in August.

> Lets let Tom do it.

Oops. Sent it up on the FAQ yesterday already... Feel free to change it.



www.strypesinpost.com

Where is it Gerard? I can copy/paste to Wiki

Michael Horton
-------------------

Here it is... in the audio section. Where else?

[www.lafcpug.org]



www.strypesinpost.com