In mixing session, it is important to correctly pan guitar in the mix. Panning is all about assigning a location in the stereo field with left to right user perspective (including center).
Read this introductory guide on panning instruments in a mix. Inappropriate panning can result to mud or unrealistic guitar sound.
Overview of guitar panning in the mix
The main objective of panning is to give a mix a realistic stereo image as if the listener of would be listening to a performing live band on stage.
If you have been to live concerts; the guitarist are mostly found on the left and right side of the stage (live PA speakers are also located on that side). The live sound engineers do all pan the guitar performance on both left and right.
It is why you always hear the guitar sound far from the center and usually located in the left and right of the stereo field. The same concept when you are NOT mixing for live sound but mixing guitars for a recording project.
Guitars are either panned to the left and right of the stereo mix. And for details, they are either panned:
a.)Hard left
b.)Hard right
c.) Mid left
d.) Mid Right
“Hard” pan setting values are usually 85% to 100%. Mid pan settings are usually 50% to 85%. Most DAW software allows you to easily assign panning settings.
To make an effective panning settings (which handles the left to right location of your tracks), you should consider the front and back audio mixing techniques.
Front and back are usually enhanced using effects such as reverb, EQ and compression. Make sure that when you are panning guitars, you should also consider its front and back aspect in the mix.
You can picture out using the diagram below:
audio mixing panning
Guitar panning settings and the concept of “MIRROR”
Numerically the center is assigned as “0” while the rightmost part of the channel is assigned as +100 and leftmost part channel as -100. In some DAW the polarity sign might be opposite.
For example, if you assigned a certain musical instrument at panning setting of “0”, it means that you have assigned that instrument in the center of the stereo. In other DAW, it uses percentage. So 0% means center pan and -100% could be hard left or hard right. You need to consult with your DAW software documentations for details about its panning feature as this would be different from every software.
When panning guitars, you need to implement the concept of “mirror”, this works like this:
1.) If you only have one guitar track, you should pan them equally in either left or right at the same panning setting value but in opposite.
For example, if you start panning a guitar on LEFT 85%, then you should make a copy of that guitar and put it on the RIGHT 85%. This will ensure stereo balance of your guitar tracks.
2.) If you have two different guitar tracks played together (such as guitar rhythm 1 and rhythm 2), pan one guitar on the left and the other on the right with exactly the same value.
You can decide on the panning values, this depends largely on the material being mixed and there is no standard. As discussed previously you can pan the guitar either in MID Right/Left or in Hard LEFT/RIGHT.
Example: Rhythm 1- LEFT 90%, Rhythm 2- RIGHT 90%
This creates a slight layering of guitar that adds some feel or ambiance.
3.) If you have two or more guitars, same mirroring concept applies. For example if you are recording 6 different guitar tracks and would like to layer them all in the mix. You can create a wall of guitars using the following panning settings (assuming: Guitar 1&2, Guitar3&4, Guitar5&6 are overdubbed pairs):
1st overdub guitar pair
Guitar 1- 50% LEFT
Guitar 2- 50% RIGHT
2nd overdub guitar pair
Guitar 3 – 75% LEFT
Guitar 4 – 75% RIGHT
3rd overdub guitar pair
Guitar 5 – 100% LEFT
Guitar 6 – 100% RIGHT
Read the following tutorial below on how you can further create these walls of guitar sound in the mix by recording overdubs:
Recording Overdubs for Guitars
Best practices on panning guitars
a. If you need the guitar to be more punchy, strong and dominant, you can pan it at -50 , +50. This is best for guitar riff power chords and complete acoustic guitar chord strumming.
b. For background guitars which the sole purpose is for accompaniment and with lots of instruments involved, you can pan it hard left and right (-100 and +100).
This is best for high guitar notes arpeggios and high note fillers.
c. If there are 2 guitarists (lead and rhythm guitars), you can pan the lead guitar near to the center to give more “presence” in the mix (-25, +25) while the rhythm guitars will be placed at -85 and +85.
For more spacious, ambiance and live feeling on the sound of the guitars, you can even put a delay between the left and right channel. So if the right channel is lagged at 2ms from the left channel, this creates an illusion of wide stereo.
For best results with panning, you can record the guitar track twice, first place the 1st guitar on the left channel. Record the guitar track again and place it on the right channel. This creates a nice ambiance very ideal for pop, acoustic and country recordings.
You can read more about this technique in double tracking guitars.
Content last updated on June 20, 2012