Cloning Tracks - tricks?

[jeffsanders]

I never bothered cloning tracks before...I usually physically double a vocal, or record a guitar and pan left, record another and pan right.

Today I cloned the hard left guitar and panned that to 10:00, and cloned the hard right guitar and panned it to 2:00. Sounds huge...got to back the volume down 6db though to compare.

Same with vocals. I cloned a vocal track twice and panned both clones to 1:00 and 11:00 and left one in the middle...sounds thick..

Any reason I should NOT be doing this? It doesn't introduce any phase issues I'm aware of...

Of course, I wouldn't want to go overboard with this, but it does sound nice in the right places. I know, "If it sounds good, it IS good."...

[JasonTheron]

One way to improve on this a bit is to move your copies a hair further on the timline. Makes it nice and thick!
Especially guitar.

[jeffsanders]

Thanks Jason.

How much nudging is possible without introducing phase issues?

[Alistair S]

Loser wrote a JS effect - TimeDelayer - that allows you to adjust a delay separately for the left and right channels. The effect differs according to the difference between the two, but offers some nice options. It can help on acoustic guitar, for sure.

You might want to experiment with it, if you haven't.

[JasonTheron]

Originally Posted by jeffsanders

Thanks Jason.

How much nudging is possible without introducing phase issues?

Well supposedly, once you hit 20ms, your ears can very easily tell the two sounds apart.
Last time I did this I think I nudged it less than 7 or 8ms.
Just experiment with it.
That's where the fun is.
Try LOSER's plug too.
It's just fun to DIY sometimes.

[jeffsanders]

Thanks guys...I love to experiment and get some trippy sounds as often as possible. But this is something new to me, and I want to make sure two years down the line I don't look back on it like compression or reverb overkill and cringe.

I like the sound when it comes to filling out the stereo spread atm though...