Quote:
Originally Posted by kirk1701
... I recorded two tracks: the 57 is the mid mic, the ribbon the sides. Once I'm done tracking, I copied the sides track and flipped the polarity of the first sides track.
These I put in a folder/buss. The side tracks are panned hard left and right; the mid is panned centre.
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this is correct. the two side "copies" must always be of opposite polarity! Never set both side channels to the same polarity! This destroys MS stereo. If you decide to swap both their (opposite) polarities, this will swap left and right in the final L/R stereo signal. Switching the polarity of the M channel will also swap the final left and right signal.
Recording both MS channels into a single 2-channel ("stereo") wave file on a single track instead of two separate tracks/files greatly simplifies editing and avoids the need for numerous tracks (folder/children). M channel will get recorded on the "left" (channel 1), S channel on the "right" (channel 2). Then, simply put an MS decoding plugin into the track (followed by other plugins like eq, comps, etc.). You can also pan the signal once it has been converted to L/R.
When recording stereo signals (be it LR or MS streo), you should always check mono compatability with a stereo scope (free Melda bundle) or goniometer plugin to avoid phase issues which may cause cancellation of frequency ranges while listening back in mono! For correct mono compatibility, the stereo scope should never show horizontal drawings but always more or less upright shapes! A correlation meter (like in Voxengo SPAN) should always show values between 0 and 1 and never values between 0 and -1.
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