Old 09-29-2017, 07:08 AM   #1
radaget
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Default Help with surround sound upmix set up

Hi

Hoping someone can give me some expert advice.

I currently have a standard stereo home studio set up with a laptop, Roland Octacapture audio interface, KRK 10-3 monitors and of course Reaper as my DAW.

I'm increasingly interested in having the option to monitor / mix in surround sound but don't know what I need to upgrade or if there's anything particular to surround sound other than software that i need? I imagine that the Octacapture can just about handle the number of connections in terms of monitors, Reaper can work with surround sound i believe and i'll obviously need to purchase more / different monitors.

Can someone help to give me some expert advice please?

Thanks
Tim
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Old 09-29-2017, 07:56 AM   #2
analogexplosions
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I work in surround with Reaper all the time.

First, equipment-wise, it looks like the Octa-capture has enough outputs for surround. There are 8 outputs, so you could go as high as 7.1 Surround. I'd recommend a third KRK 10-3 for your center channel and probably some Rockit 5's for your surround channels and a sub.

In an ideal situation, you'd also have a surround monitor controller if you're changing your monitoring levels a lot. Does Roland have a software controller/mixer app for the Octa-capture? You could get by without a monitor controller if you're comfortable with controlling your monitoring volume via software instead of a knob. SPL makes a 5.1 surround controller for under $1k that works great.

https://spl.info/en/products/monitor.../overview.html

To get started without having a full surround speaker situation, check out some software called Spatial Sound Card.

http://www.newaudiotechnology.com/en...al-sound-card/

This works great to monitor surround in headphones. There are a lot of preset filters for popular headphones and the room spatialization is quite good.

Lastly, plugins: ReaSurround works great as a general surround panner.
I use Nugen Audio's Halo Upmix, Iosono's Anymix Pro Upmix/panner, and Exponential Audio's R2/Pheonixverb Surround plugs religiously too.

Ask me anything and I'll be glad to point you in the right direction!
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Old 09-29-2017, 08:05 AM   #3
radaget
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Hey analogexplosions....thanks for the quick reply and excellent tips and advice. Much appreciated.

I'm pleased you mentioned Nugen Halo Upmix. I've been looking into that and also Penteo.

The thing that has sparked my interest enough to look into this is my DeepMind 12 hardware synth. It has a very complex modulation matrix and can produce some very complex sounds with lots of different elements going on for a long time. In stereo it's amazing but in surround sound or even Dolby Atmos, it would be something else.

So I emailed Nugen and they advised that although not designed for that purpose, it should work although the real-time nature of the processing may introduce unwanted latency. It needs trying out. This would apply to soft-synths too. (Sounds like 'll need a beefy PC too rather than my laptop). How the software will separate out the different sounds within the patch will be interesting. It could be amazing but it may not work as I'm thinking.

Certainly an exciting project.
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Old 09-29-2017, 08:41 AM   #4
analogexplosions
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That's a cool looking synth! The modulation matrix does seem really powerful. Since it only has stereo outputs, upmixing is as far as you could go with this. You couldn't really monitor in real-time without latency, for sure.

Soft-synths on the other hand open up limitless possibilities! You could have a midi track feeding several different synths that could sound like they're flying around the room if you wanted.
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Old 09-29-2017, 09:09 AM   #5
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For bare minimum 4 speakers would get you started with a 4.0 quad speaker array. Speaker manage the Center and Lfe channel to the front pair for that. Do at least that. Don't waste your time with the surround simulations in stereo for headphones and such. It works sort of for games and movies but not at all for dense music surround mixes IMHO.

Get 5 identical speakers for the mains if at all possible (for 5.1). Don't get cheap or smaller speakers for the rears! I mention a 4.0 speaker array as an OK starting point because most 5.1 mixes are still heavy on the quad channels. Mixing techniques very but the center channel is often used as a front solo channel.

There's a common misconception that 5.1 surround is highs and mids only to the 5 mains and all the bass to the sub. Which is not how it works! The 5 mains are full range. The sub is an extra channel for extra silly bass. (Think of the semi truck pulling up next to you in a movie scene.) A common efficient speaker array uses small tops and you speaker manage it by removing all the bass frequencies from the 5 mains and adding them instead to the Lfe channel. (Often called bass management on surround receivers.) 5 full range speakers + a sub is 1:1 with what's in the wires for 5.1.

Spend some time with setup and calibration. 5 mains equal distance from the back of your head. Put the sub in the listening position. Walk around the room and listen for the hot spot. Now put the sub there and set the level. Run level checks for balance between channels. Run frequency sweeps on each channel. Listen to a few surround albums (at least Dark Side and anything modern mixed by Steve Wilson) for a sanity check. You know how skewed a stereo mix would turn out if one of your two speakers was at a different level than the other or pointing at an odd direction. That would be 100x out in left field with an uncalibrated surround system so spend the time dialing in and listening to some albums before you start mixing.

If you don't have an analog surround preamp for monitor level control, set the amp levels for a comfortable level with your digital output no lower than -18db. That still leaves you with 21 bits resolution on your output. You have room to listen loud when you want and turning down to very quiet will still leave you with at least 16 bits resolution on the output (going down to -48db on the volume).

PS. You mentioned upmixing to surround in the title. This is taking a stereo or mono mix and finding creative ways to master it into a surround format. Sometimes you can get away with some things and get positive results. More often you get a murky phasey mess that pales compared to the original. The monitor system is still a normal surround system for this. You're just pulling and tugging on an already mixed to stereo source instead of having the luxury of making a real surround mix from the multitracks.

PPS. I prefer the JS surround panner to the ReaSurround panner, YMMV. Reaper is odd in that it has an integrated stereo pan matrix, but for surround you are to insert your own choice of surround panner plugin.

Last edited by serr; 09-29-2017 at 09:48 AM.
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Old 11-17-2017, 01:48 PM   #6
the_drumreaper
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Default Convert 5.1 upmix to 4 channel ambisonic

Hi all. I upmix all the time to 5.1 from stereo. I simply want to preserve as much of the 5.1 speaker arrangement for a 4 channel ambisonic mix, but cant get the mapping of the channels right. I have Nugen. I have been using Reasurround for my 5.1 repositioning of the channels. I also use my own single 5.1 wav files or monos of them. Does anyone have a template translates 5.1 to an ambisonic 4 channel mix so that FL, FR, BR, BL sounds are preserved?
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