Logic Pro - Air Balloon Stereo Width Trick
Posted by Holger Lagerfeldt, Nov 4 2011
The Air Balloon trick can make the lead vocal (or other tracks) "sit" in the mix and will add a bit of fullness and width without collapsing in mono playback.
It's basically a de-essed, equalized and M/S spreaded short reverb. It should be used in parallel to your regular vocal reverb and/or delay.
Here's How To Do It
You can skip most of these instructions if you simply download and install the Bus Channel Strip below.
Audio Clips
In the mix
Dry
Processed with Air Balloon trick
The speak is 1 single mono track with the above effect on.
Bus Channel Strip Download
http://www.popmusic.dk/links-us.html
Download, unzip and place here:
Mac HD > Users > YourUserName > Library > Application Support > Logic > Channel Strip Settings > Bus > Balloon Vocal.cst
It will only show up on a stereo aux, not on a regular audio or instrument channel.
It's basically a de-essed, equalized and M/S spreaded short reverb. It should be used in parallel to your regular vocal reverb and/or delay.
Here's How To Do It
You can skip most of these instructions if you simply download and install the Bus Channel Strip below.
- Open a send from your already processed lead vocal to an available bus.
- On the aux, insert a Space Designer reverb with the Small Spaces > Indoor Spaces > 0.08 ms Air Balloon preset. You need to insert this as the 2nd insert on the bus, leaving the first slot empty for now.
- Set an appropriate amount of send from the vocal channel to the bus. Once set you should not change the send amount again but control the amount of the effect via the aux level fader.
- Insert a channel EQ with a 6dB/Oct HPF after the Space Designer. Roll off some low end, somewhere between 250 Hz and 1kHz. I often go for 500 - 750 Hz.
- In the first slot you insert a good de-esser plug-in. Or use the Logic Compressor with the de-esser preset available from my downloads page: http://www.popmusic.dk/links-us.html
- This will de-ess the input of the reverb but leaving the original vocal untouched of course. Adjust until you hear no sibilance in the reverb.
- At the end of the chain insert a M/S spreader plug-in and spread to the maximum amount. Do not use a "fake" stereo spreader such as the Logic Stereo Spread plug-in. Instead use the Direction Mixer plug-in instead.
Audio Clips
In the mix
Dry
Processed with Air Balloon trick
The speak is 1 single mono track with the above effect on.
Bus Channel Strip Download
http://www.popmusic.dk/links-us.html
Download, unzip and place here:
Mac HD > Users > YourUserName > Library > Application Support > Logic > Channel Strip Settings > Bus > Balloon Vocal.cst
It will only show up on a stereo aux, not on a regular audio or instrument channel.