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Trance Forum ť ť Forum Production & Music Making - Haas effect frustration

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Haas effect frustration

golem
IsraTrance Full Member

Started Topics : 109
Posts : 70
Posted : May 9, 2014 04:27:01

I read of a mixing technique called haas effect from a mixing engineering manual and for the last 6 months I have used it in almost all of my tunes.

Only lately I have started to listen to my tunes in mono and realized that it almost always ruins mono channel. Especially transients seem to vanish totally.

Now I am mixing all of them again and removing the haas effect, a lot of work

So has anybody here used it successfully and if yes, then in for what kind of sounds or situations?

http://www.soundcloud.com/dreaml4nd

http://www.mixcloud.com/aegonox-peter-pan

aseem
IsraTrance Junior Member

Started Topics : 41
Posts : 341
Posted : May 9, 2014 04:39

Have Paz analyser on your master channel.. make sure your signals don't go across Anti phase border..

https://soundcloud.com/aseem-2

golem
IsraTrance Full Member

Started Topics : 109
Posts : 70
Posted : May 9, 2014 12:37

Well that I didn't try yet, but I adjusted the delay and listened in mono and with almost all values there was phasing that ruined mono compability.

I am certain that there is a place for haas effect (otherwise it would not have been in a mixing manual) but it must be more suited for certain kind of sounds or situations.

http://www.soundcloud.com/dreaml4nd

http://www.mixcloud.com/aegonox-peter-pan

frisbeehead
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics : 10
Posts : 1352
Posted : May 9, 2014 14:32

wouldn't go as far as not to allow any sound into the anti-phase border. if you want something to play just on the right speaker, a noise of some kind, it will be marked as anti-phase, correlation lost and all of that, but no problem doing it...

as for the haas effect, it's a very cool effect but there's things to consider: it spreads all across your stereo image, so it takes a lot of room in the mix. so you shouldn't do it often and certainly not to a lot of sounds, let alone a lot of sounds at once. phasing is a natural thing when you pick to equal or very similar (like two mic recordings of the same thing) and one of them is slightly off. haas effect, is similar to what a flanger is but with a very short delay and no feedback. so there's phasing and yeah, transients can no longer be as sharp because you have two versions of them, some ms apart from each other.

as far as mixing goes, keeping things focused under 250Hz (or similar value) is a good idea. but haas effect is intentional phasing, it's an effect, like a phaser could also ruin your mix if you'd place it on KB bus, but it's got it's uses as well. hope it helps.

i like the haas effect for some stuff: some times on vocal samples, some times on pads and atmospheres. usually when going for thick, going all over the place super large sounds it can do the trick.

Colin OOOD
Moderator

Started Topics : 95
Posts : 5380
Posted : May 9, 2014 22:49

Quote:

On 2014-05-09 14:32, frisbeehead wrote:
wouldn't go as far as not to allow any sound into the anti-phase border. if you want something to play just on the right speaker, a noise of some kind, it will be marked as anti-phase, correlation lost and all of that, but no problem doing it...

With respect... a sound that is only on one stereo channel will be shown on a correlation meter as '0' - smack bang in the middle, since the sound is not in anti-phase (ie. identical but phase-reversed signals on each channel) or totally correlated (ie. mono), but has zero correlation between left and right.

Anti-phase signals are metered on the left of a correlation meter, uncorrelated signals in the middle, and mono signals on the right. Single-channel stereo audio is metered in the middle, as uncorrelated.

As you were

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Colin OOOD
Moderator

Started Topics : 95
Posts : 5380
Posted : May 10, 2014 02:13

I tend not to use Haas panning on important percussion sounds as it stops things from sounding so tight, as you've found. It can be very useful for leads or pads or samples though; it gives a sense of space and position but in a very different way to normal panning or reverb. Best used sparingly IMO.

frisbeehead
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics : 10
Posts : 1352
Posted : May 10, 2014 15:03

a sound in a mono (or stereo with equal L/R) channel will be smack in the middle, but not if there's differences between the two (L/R) channels, in which case the analyzer will pick those differences. guess I didn't explain myself properly: what I meant was that if you place the analysis on the master output channel, then a sound panned to the extremes will show up in anti-phase - and there's no problem doing that, so what I was going about was that it's normal for that to happen and it doesn't present a problem by itself, not everything has to fit inside the "nice correlation" territory.

Colin OOOD
Moderator

Started Topics : 95
Posts : 5380
Posted : May 11, 2014 03:07

I agree that not everything has to live on the right-hand side of the correlation meter, but if the meter spends too much of its time between -1 and 0, chances are you have some phase issues in your mix.

You said "a sound panned to the extremes will show up in anti-phase", and I repeat - a sound panned to extreme left or right will show up dead centre of the meter, with zero correlation.

I'm not sure what you're doing to make your "extreme panning" register as antiphase, but whatever it is, it's not "panning"

frisbeehead
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics : 10
Posts : 1352
Posted : May 11, 2014 03:56

if I was to measure the panned channel I'd get a similar reading as in your screen shot. not doing anything fancy with my panning XD

you're measuring just one channel here, right? in a situation where you'd have the entire mix playing at once and the analyzer was placed on master channel, then correlation would be measured against other sounds in the mix, and this would be such an extreme event for a (kind of) symmetric or balanced mix that would presumably read as anti-phase or negative correlation, right?

Colin OOOD
Moderator

Started Topics : 95
Posts : 5380
Posted : May 11, 2014 06:42

Quote:

On 2014-05-11 03:56, frisbeehead wrote:
you're measuring just one channel here, right? in a situation where you'd have the entire mix playing at once and the analyzer was placed on master channel, then correlation would be measured against other sounds in the mix, and this would be such an extreme event for a (kind of) symmetric or balanced mix that would presumably read as anti-phase or negative correlation, right?

If I get your meaning, my take on it is: in the absence of a specifically antiphase signal, small short-lived antiphase components are generated as a natural consequence of the interaction between the various stereo and panned sources that presumably comprise the music in question - including hard-panned sounds. However in a track with levels at least approximately well-balanced, those components will not generally be large enough to swing the correlation meter into the negative area at all. In order to get significant negative readings with a whole mix playing you need to add specifically antiphase components (as opposed to just decorrelated) at a level that's unpossible ok ok really rare to get accidentally by the combining of stereo (ie. decorrelated) sounds. If mono compatibility is important to you then antiphase signals of this relative magnitude should obviously be avoided, as you'll lose significant chunks of your music to cancellation. Being a matter of taste and application, obviously different people have different preferences as to how much this matters to them.

By "not everything has to live on the right-hand side of the correlation meter" I mean "pretty much everything should live on the right-hand side of the correlation meter if mono compatibility is important to you".

frisbeehead
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics : 10
Posts : 1352
Posted : May 11, 2014 14:55

Quote:

On 2014-05-11 06:42, Colin OOOD wrote:

If I get your meaning, my take on it is: in the absence of a specifically antiphase signal, small short-lived antiphase components are generated as a natural consequence of the interaction between the various stereo and panned sources that presumably comprise the music in question - including hard-panned sounds. However in a track with levels at least approximately well-balanced, those components will not generally be large enough to swing the correlation meter into the negative area at all. In order to get significant negative readings with a whole mix playing you need to add specifically antiphase components (...)

Yep, that's what I meant!

So bare with me on this one. This events you speak of, could be the kind of thing you do with such stereo doubles panned to extremes, such as this "haas effect", right? From my experience, I'd say some stereo effects like reverb and delay (specially very short decay time stereo delay) can produce such events, more so when using them on auxiliary channels (return channels); 'cause it produces a very similar signal to the original, in which case the correlation of one would be measured against the other. For example: just 100% wet early reflections playing along with the original can produce anti-phase readings (measured with PAZ analyzer here btw), and it kind of makes sense to my mind since it's producing very similar doubles of the original and spreading them in the stereo field.

So, what are your thoughts on this?

Colin OOOD
Moderator

Started Topics : 95
Posts : 5380
Posted : May 11, 2014 21:52

Yes, Haas panning and spread-stereo doubling etc. can produce antiphase readings, as I said above. You won't find them pushing the correlation meter into the negative in the context of a track, however, because compared to the strong correlation of eg. kick and bass, or other more-simply panned sounds, they are relatively insignificant - for all that they indicate that you will, indeed, lose stuff when you fold down to mono.

BTW Paz meters are seriously shite. Both the level meters and the spectrum analyser lie through their teeth. Not sure about the PAZ correlation meter though, it might be ok.

frisbeehead
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics : 10
Posts : 1352
Posted : May 11, 2014 23:18

Quote:

On 2014-05-11 21:52, Colin OOOD wrote:

BTW Paz meters are seriously shite. Both the level meters and the spectrum analyser lie through their teeth. Not sure about the PAZ correlation meter though, it might be ok.

what would you recommend for reliable measurements?

Colin OOOD
Moderator

Started Topics : 95
Posts : 5380
Posted : May 14, 2014 03:01

I'm a big fan of the TT Dynamic Range meter.
http://www.dynamicrange.de/sites/default/files/DR-Meter%201_4a.zip

If you use RME interfaces the DIGICheck analyser is great for spectrum analysis, goniometer and correlation.

frisbeehead
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics : 10
Posts : 1352
Posted : May 14, 2014 11:52

^ yeah, will check it out even though I'm mainly on the mac these days. many thanks

RME's digicheck is the most trust worthy thing I've known so far, would like some alternative to use on the go (that's available for mac), no need for eye candy graphics, just after some very reliable readings.

Trance Forum ť ť Forum Production & Music Making - Haas effect frustration