Cubase for last many versions does not have a possibility of pan in any of its active channels, no matter MAIN or cues. What I have learnt from Steinberg (and in general I agree with it) the reason is to avoid accidentally “contaminating” the mix by changing what you hear in Control Room. So, the basic question would be why even think about having pan there? The answer is related to individual hearing characteristics. In general we should be able to hear sound equally well on both ears, but some people have this ability unbalanced, either temporarily or permanently, what in turn will make their mixes heavier on the side of the weaker ear. And there is a very smart way to avoid it without impacting the final mix: using cue channel. The Stereo Out channel that is used to export audio mixes is also the channel where Control Room takes its sound from, but as we know, manipulations in Control Room have no impact on it. BUT, Stereo Out also has cue sends, and there you not only have volume, but pan as well. So, in Audio Connections you activate a cue channel (call is somehow meaningful), in Stereo Out you activate this cue send and it appears on Control Room channel list. Next you set up the pan in Stereo Out’s cue send (using, for example Cubase Test Tone Generator) and under one click you have the “non-contaminated” sound on MAIN and your private, adjusted to your particular hearing characteristics reference signal on cue channel. I personally have a particular problem with unbalanced hearing when I catch anything giving running nose. So in these moments I use the modified cue channel avoiding wrong balancing of the whole mix and once the illness goes away I return to using MAIN.
An alternative to your excellent idea would be to use a panning plugin on the main section directly and then either bypass that or not.
Cubase Pro offers a couple of plugins capable of panning, e.g. Mix6to2 or VST MultiPanner:
Thanks a lot for your suggestions but I have tried both. VST Multipanner for me has a very basic inconvenience, it works similarly to a regular linked panner, which means that in order to move the centre of the mix you need to narrow the stereo space from left or right. If you push it fully right or left it turns stereo into full mono in just one channel. Of course, if your corrections are cosmetic the difference may seem unimportant, but I am not happy with processing the whole mix this way. When it comes to Mix6to2 I am even less inclined to use it. It works on a trivial basis of separately manipulating the volumes of L/R channels and in consequence the overall volume changes. If I use output faders and reduce even slightly the channel that is too “loud” in order to reassign the centre, switching the plugin on/off gives observable difference in volume, with the plugin being off louder. There are two additional reasons I decided to search (and find) more natural way, the one I proposed. First is that putting anything active in the MAIN channel will always impact the sound we hear. If you do this on purpose (like EQ) that’s OK, you know what you are doing, but these two plugins most definitely impact what I hear and I have my doubts if I can trust them. We can’t forget that manipulating CR has indirect impact on the mix, because we mix taking as the reference what we hear, so the more accurate is the CR representation of the real mix, the bigger the chances the music that flows from Stereo Out is correctly mixed. And these two plugins definitely introduce some sort of distortion, like false positions of instruments on panorama or incorrect level of the signal. Second reason comes from Murphy’s law that if something can break it will break for sure. Putting inserts that have such an impact in a neuralgic channel defies the idea of avoiding accidentally “contaminating” the mix. Sooner or later you touch a fader without noticing it and you find 5 hours later that you were working hearing an incorrect material. There is also a reason 2.5: having the second undistorted signal on cue modified only by pan and MAIN untouched frees me from all plugins, their potential distortions, my human errors in manipulating their parameters, and they are separated by being mutually exclusive, what also prohibits me from forgetting to turn something off. (like a bypass in plugin).
But, of course, to each his own. By the above explanation I simply show the potential risks, but whether anyone wants to take them into consideration it is not for me to decide.
In Cubase the Stereo Balance Panner (I think this is what the Cue Send uses) is the same as what Mix6to2 does: It just lowers the level of one side.
The MultiPanner works like the Stereo Combined Panner does, as you rightfully pointed out.
So one can chose, which panner works better for one’s needs.
I don’t think there are any contaminations introduced by these plugins other than what you would get with the panner from the Cue Send.
I posted my alternative for people who want to achieve the same as what you described but cannot spare a Cue Send because they use all four of them already.
For such cases using plugins may be the only option, but believe me, these plugins impact what we hear. About Mix6to2 just make an experiment, first use cue send with pan correction and then MAIN with Mix6to2 and compare both them between and against clear, unaffected MAIN. The difference can be heard, but as we both agreed, to each his own.
First of all I assume they are identical across Cubase and Nuendo, and secondly I will just note that those of us in post production for TV and streaming have to downmix from surround to stereo and to mono all the time and those submixes as well as stems all get run through QC departments and their software.
If there was a problem with downmixing then we’d be running into problems constantly, and we’re not.
Therefore I think it’s very reasonable to conclude that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with those plugins.
I made my post to present the option of using cue send as a simple and secure way of having pan in Control Room, not to invoke a large discussion about using plugins in order to obtain exactly the same.
So, let’s get the pan in CR the way it pleases any of us.
I just thought it was important to point out that there is most likely absolutely nothing wrong with those plugins, since you claimed there was a problem.
Here I disagree, but this comes from my IT engineer side and I see absolutely no reason to invoke a battle over it. As long as the user is pleased, the objective is attained.
I, for sure, prefer simpler solution, but as Johnny_Moneto rightly pointed out, there are users who have all 4 cue channels used and their only option is a plugin.
I am sure Steinberg observes this discussion and perhaps they will think about adding a kind of non-obvious option for adjusting the pan in CR. By “non-obvious” I mean the option that cannot be activated accidentally to prevent the famous “contamination”. That would be very helpful, I think.
Disagree with what? If there was a problem with the plugins then the hundreds of shows I deliver every year would get kicked back from QC departments all the time. You being IT makes no difference. If you hear distortion using them then either it’s somewhere else in the Control Room signal chain, or you’re doing something wrong, or the plugins are literally not the same in Nuendo.
