[LAU] How is the bass mixed? Per-channel frequency analysis? Histogram?

[Rick Green]

On Thu, 6 Feb 2014, Gordon JC Pearce wrote:

> I always thought it was because a) low frequencies are hard to localise, 
> so panning them wildly left and right won't really do much...

Many home sound systems today simply sum the bass energy from both 
channels into a single subwoofer anyway.  It doesn't matter where in the 
room the subwoofer is located, because our ears are too close together to 
detect a phase difference at those frequencies.

  I do live sound in a venue with an installed sound system.  We have two 
large subwoofers, fed in phase from a single source.  The problem is that 
the two boxes are hung from the ceiling 30 feet apart.  Two point sources 
that widely spaced give us interference fringes all across the room.  You 
can walk slowly across the room and hear the bass come in and disappear 
with every step.  I simply turn off the amp for one of the subs, and no 
one is the wiser, and everyone is happier.

   So defy convention if you like, and mix the bass wherever you like, but 
please forgive those of us with real-world transducers, where more often 
than not it's summed to mono before presentation anyway!

I had heard the story about phonograph needles jumping out of the track. 
It made sense to me.  On a stereo phonograph record, in-phase energy (L+R) 
is represented as side-to-side motion of the needle, and out-of-phase 
energy(L-R) is up and down motion.  It can also be thought of as the left 
channel is recorded on one side of the groove(at a 45deg angle), and the 
right channel on the other side.  It seemed plausible that a kick drum 
panned all the way to one side or the other might send the needle into the 
adjacent groove.

-- 
Rick Green

We, the People of the United States of America, reject the U.S. Supreme Court's
  Citizens United ruling, and move to amend our Constitution to firmly establish
  that money is not speech, and that human beings, not corporations, are persons
                        entitled to constitutional rights.

 			http://www.MoveToAmend.org