Logic Pro 9 Newbie tips for setting samples in stereo image

[Robert Phelps]

Please excuse my confusion folks, but maybe you can help me. I'm a newbie.Anyone have tips for placing samples at various panning points within my overall track using Logic Studio 9.1? Is there any way to look at say, 30 different samples and "place" them on a grid of some sort with various positions in the whole stereo image? I'm looking for the easiest way to do that. The arrange window allows me to place things in an *easy to view* screen as to length, different tracks, etc., but is there a way to do the same thing as to placement in the entire stereo image? Once again, an easy to view grid of some sort using Logic? Hope this makes sense.Thanks much for any help you can give me!!!

 

[SubBlack]

Well I don't think there's one easy tool to do this, but I have a bunch of suggestions on where to start regarding Logic's panning. First off, you should skip the pan knob in the mixer window, and use the Direction Mixer plug-in instead. Here's why:

http://nk-e.com/2010/01/30/panning-the-logic-pan-as-in-dont-use-it/

So now regarding your placement questions: You could probably answer this 100 different ways, so here are some questions:

1. How detailed to you want to get?

a. you could compress, eq, and use Stereo Spread on each individual track. this might take a while, but might give you more control.
b. you could create any number of aux tracks, where each aux track was a separate frequency/imaging setting. that way you could just adjust any individual track's send knob to go to that freq/space combo.

2. What kind of music are you doing?

a. does your style of music require certain instrumentation? for example, if you're doing Celtic music then I would treat the mix a bit differently than if I was doing an Icelandic techno song.
b. do you (or your intended fans) care if you mangle the sounds?

Also, have a look at the MultiMeter plug-in. Speaking of plugs, you should definitely check out an Audio Unit called "Stereo Tool" from the fine folks at Flux (say that 3x fast): http://www.fluxhome.com/products/ Nowadays there are so many ways to do things...maybe someone else has better suggestions? In any case I hope this helps, lemme know how it works out.

sb