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Discrete L&R Mono vs Stereo
I have a level of confusion on this, when it is something I thought was simple and understood. What is the difference between two discrete “mono” channels of left and right vs stereo?
I recently sent a hard drive full of 13 TV episodes to a post house for dubbing them off to HDCAM tape. It was an international version of the show, and had “full mix stereo left” on Ch 1, “full mix stereo right” on Ch 2 and “Mix & Effects Stereo Left” on 3, and “Mix & Effects Stereo right” on Ch 4.
When the post house first looked at the files, they emailed me asking if I wanted them to pan the channels left and right, since it was mono.
If I have stereo left on Ch 1, stereo right on Ch 2, M&E Left on Ch 3, and M&E Right on Ch 4, how is this not stereo on 1&2? How do you pan a single left channel to the left?
Sorry if this is stupid, but I am really having a hard time comprehending the difference between discrete left and right channels on 1&2, and a stereo mix on 1&2.
Anyone have any explanation that will help me past this confusion?
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3 Replies
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It is possible that when the post house imported the files into their editing system, that their system interpreted them as 4 individual mono files was automatically creating a mix mono. It could just be that, because otherwise makes no sense to me.
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yes, guessing that your friendly post house is using FCP to lay off. FCP will take what is known as ‘discrete’ or ‘mono’ channels in a QuickTime source file and automatically pan them all center in a Stereo Output sequence.
What your post house should do is not pan at all, but change the sequence setting to 4-output Dual Mono. Then assign each channel in your QuickTime to the output channel it belongs. It looks like this in the Sequence:
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Thanks. You have helped me keep my sanity, since that made no sense to me. It is a problem of the viewer/editing system, not in my understanding of what constitutes stereo.
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