Surround sound?

[jpolzfuss]

Hi,

I'm currently working on the sound for my latest film. While editing the forrest-sequences I thought to myself that it would be nice to add some additional bird-sounds to the rear-speakers. This would mean switching from Stereo to Quad/Surround sound.

But I do have a general question:
If I would add surround-effects to the forrest-scenes (approx. 1/3 of the whole film), wouldn't it sound strange when the remaining scenes are only in stereo?

And I do have some technical questions since my Adobe-Premiere-version only allows stereo-sound:
* Is there any free or cheap windows/linux-software to add surround-effects? E.g. I could buy Pinnacle Studio 9 SE for less than 10 EUR. All online-stores claim that this version can do surround-sound. But some boards claim that the surround-sound only works correctly (= incl. assigning mono/stereo-wav-files to the rear-speakers) in version 10!?!? Even worse: Pinnacle's webserver states that using the "dolby-digital-surround" in Studio 10 will require an additional online-purchase (without stating the price)!?!?
* I could simply edit the sound for my film twice with my Premiere-version and then assign the "first version" to the front-speakers and the "second version" to the rear-speakers when transfering the sound onto perfo-tape. Anyone tried this before?

Jörg

[mathis]

But I do have a general question:
If I would add surround-effects to the forrest-scenes (approx. 1/3 of the whole film), wouldn't it sound strange when the remaining scenes are only in stereo?

Depends on the remaining scenes. Please describe them.

[mattias]

if you're doing dolby surround some will always leak back so you'll be fine. if you're doing 5.1 surround you have discrete channels so i suggest you put some of the stereo sound in the back speakers as well. it's not surround but it will surround the audience. don't forget the center speaker though. by far the most important one in any surround mix. that's how you separate sounds that come from the screen from sounds coming from ambience or off.

/matt

[jpolzfuss]

The remainig scenes are mainly indoors (in a small room) + there are a few "entering a car"-scenes

[sunrise]

Jörg,

Dolby Surround Pro Logic works by inverting fazes, which you can easily do in any multitrack editing program. It leaves you with a 2 channel signal that you can play back on both stereo and surrond equipment.

michael

[mattias]

Dolby Surround Pro Logic works by inverting fazes, which you can easily do in any multitrack editing program. It leaves you with a 2 channel signal that you can play back on both stereo and surrond equipment.

true, but it's not quite that simple. the encoder uses phase shifts and other tricks to maximize the dynamic separation and minimize channel cross talk. you need a real dolby encoder for that. dolby digital is easier since you can do it with freeware tools. doesn't work on tape or other stereo only systems though.

/matt

[sunrise]

Last time I played with dolby surround was in an analogue 32 track studio more than ten years ago creating some weird ambient music supposed to fill the room.

You are quite right on the channel cross talk, but with only ambient forest sounds it should be allright. You could easily achieve a nice surrond effect with not too many expensive tools.

Another workflow was to mix in Dolby digital and create a pro logic downmix. Some of the earlier DVD-rippers created lots of free audio tools for that.

michael

[Number216]

Dolby Surround Pro Logic works by inverting fazes, which you can easily do in any multitrack editing program. It leaves you with a 2 channel signal that you can play back on both stereo and surrond equipment.

true, but it's not quite that simple. the encoder uses phase shifts and other tricks to maximize the dynamic separation and minimize channel cross talk. you need a real dolby encoder for that. dolby digital is easier since you can do it with freeware tools. doesn't work on tape or other stereo only systems though.

/matt

May I ask what these freeware tools one can use for Dolby Digital are? I'm interested in mixing some of my movies in 5.1, but I can't find any tools to do that.

[mattias]

May I ask what these freeware tools one can use for Dolby Digital are?

ffmpeg.

I'm interested in mixing some of my movies in 5.1, but I can't find any tools to do that.

i doubt there are many freeware tools for *mixing*. i meant for encoding. perhaps protools free does it, but almost any multitrack editing and mixing tool will let you mix basic surround. some have advanced surround panning controls and effects like surround aware reverb and echo, but as long as you have six audio output channels you should be able to send each track to the one of your choice.

/matt

[pulsingcinema]

One of the reasons I chose Sony Vegas to edit my super-8 project was because 5.1 is so tightly integrated into the program that you really don't have to farm the material out to any outside program and it basically supports everything you need - panning, encoding, VST effects, pretty much the whole damn thing in a very forward and intuitive interface which earlier versions of Premiere and Avid Xpress seemed to lack for me IMHO.

My only big disappointment with Vegas was that I thought I could edit individual timelines with multiple channels and then "nest" them into a master timeline with all the original channels intact but when you do this Vegas automatically builds a proxy file for the nested project's audio and DOWNMIXES the whole thing to stereo. Depressing. I had to export 6-channel waves out of the individual projects and import them one-by-one into the master timeline.