Pan Right/Pan Left Anyone...??

Jim Mattingly

Senior Member
Curious if anyone else uses your pannning option from your board on your kit for both playing live gigs and recording, and if so what are your particular likes and set up for your drums.

I personally like panning and believe it adds another dimension to the overall sound mix. I will typically set up mine as follows. Snare(s), kick and cymbals dead center, #1 tom (left), #2 tom (right), #3 tom (left) and if used #4 tom (right) and so on depending on the kit set up used, very basic but very effective I believe. Of course the sound for live shows is also very dependent on the quality of your board, frontals/subs, the proper mix and of course your sound man/woman if you have one in your band.
 
For recording:

I like to pan the way they are laid out when I'm sitting on the throne.

Using Protools:

Tom # is 35% to the left, Tom #2 is 35% to the right.

Floor tom is 75% to the right.

Snare dead center.

Bass drum just a hair off center, maybe around 8% to the right.

Over heads are100% right and left.

But I got some new Audix mics, so well see if those settings hold true going forward.
 
The only time you really have to pan your signals is if your feeding a stereo mix to the PA or if you're recording your drums and want a stereo mix as your final product. I stand in front of my kit and place each drum's pan in exact relation to the other drums and cymbals of the kit. The only other times I make exceptions to this is if I want to hear the kit from the drummers perspective. The only two controls I pan hard left and right are the overheads. The other pan pots sort of make a nice 180 degrees left to tight with the room mic being dead center. This is if I'm recording a stereo mix, all other times when multi tracking, each track goes to each individual track or channel and when mixed down it'll be like I described above.

Dennis
 
My next YouTube video will be a salute to the 60s. I want the entire band panned hard left and all the vocals panned hard right. That oughta' be refreshing! ;)
 
I know you're asking for one's particular likes and dislikes, but here are the "rules" for the modern age:

Studio - Kick and snare center, rack toms panned right (according to the observer of the kit, not the player) 50-100%, floor toms panned left 50-100%. Obviously, the smallest tom is panned furthest right, and the largest floor tom furthest left. A relative of my family is a world-class audio engineer, and when we discussed mixing records, he told me that his maxim is this: Pan hard left, hard right, or center. If a particular mix element doesn't "work" in any of those positions, hit the mute button.

Live - Same, but the toms are panned 15-30%, because the audience on one side still wants to hear the toms on the other "side". In general, panning in live sound is less severe than studio (mixing for venues rather than cars or ear buds).

There are always exceptions, of course, but this is the standard, to the best of my knowledge, corroborated by my experience, both as an audio engineer and drummer.
 
So far the exact responses I was hoping for. I knew there had to be a standard or I should say an accepted standard from an engineers standpoint for the studio, thanks for that response and info...It is obviously understood that what does not work you forego or make a change in the studio either on a retake or with the final mix. Live gigs are a totally different beast altogether and I was also hoping to get some real pespectives other than the ones I have used and attempted to use. I love to experiment and love to stumble onto something out of the norm that works and is different. Not being a sound engineer, any and all the advice I can get the better off I am...Thanks all, keep em coming..
 
I personally wouldn't bother with a stereo mix at all for live, I don't see the point. The only person in the right position to hear the whole mix is the sound engineer. There is nothing more frustrating in sound terms than being on one side of the stage and only hearing half the band.

For recordings, I position the overheads either side of an imaginary line through the snare and kick, as these elements need to be central in the mix, pan them hard left and right, then pan the toms according to their position in the OH stereo image, which is not quite the same as if you just stood in front of the kit and did it from that. I find this works very well, though.
 
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