Only the master bus exposes surround channels.

Why is this limiting?

What benefit would having multiple surround busses mixed to a master surround bus?

Peter

You would be able to use the software to be creative in ways the designers couldn't envision.

I am all for creativity. Could you give an example?

There is nothing that you can't do with the current routing approach.

Peter

I've been mixing some rather complex surround projects for DVD for several years. I have never had the need or wished for another surround bus other than the master.

That being said, there are many times I wished I had realtime encoded Dolby 5.1 from the timeline preview rather than having to render just to test a mix. A dedicated bus for this purpose might be a necessity if encoded 5.1 from the timeline was even possible in the future.

For many reasons, discrete 6 channel pcm playback from the timeline is quite different to the senses than encoded 5.1 in the final delivery.

@real-time encode of 5.1

Dolby has hardware for this, and would most likely charge big-time for such a feature.

It would also require a very specific hardware configuration.

Peter

I was afraid the "big-time" thing was the deal-killer here.
Thanks for a prompt reply.

One thing that has made my workflow easier is being able to prepare a DVD folder on a networked drive and play it on the entertainment center with WDTV Live. Now that WDTV Live supports menus it is quite an elegant solution.

Saves the extra step of burning a disc just to preview the surround (which in my world gets more attention and tweaks than the video content itself).

What I've always wanted is a master volume slider for all channels at once.

What I've always wanted is a master volume slider for all channels at once.

You can achieve this with a volume envelope on the master bus.

Show your bus tracks
Insert a volume envelope (Shift-V)
Move the volume envelope up and down as desired.

Peter

WRT WDTV Live:

It can display DVD menus and controls now?

Does it read the iso or the directory structure?

I had an old WDTV and it was ok, but very limited.

Peter

re WDTV Live:

Since early last fall, you can launch the DVD menu by navigating to the VIDEO_TS.IFO file. I've never tried opening an ISO image, but now you've got me curious.

WD has not been entirely trustworthy with its firmware releases. Some network problems, some bricked units, and the latest firmware is almost a total bust with software media servers. FWIW, I'm running stable with 1.03.49

The master volume is more of a convenience when editing, not something I want to mess with an envelope for nor do I want to use up valuable screen space showing the bus track.

Peter,
Although I haven't tried this I imagine if I were mixing multiple surround sources together I would want to process them (encode, decode) differently before mixing them together. I might want to process two surround sources the same way and a third a different way. They might arrive as discrete or combined.
I hope this example is helpful in this discussion.

Jesse

So here are a few reasons that I would like surround busses (that are not just the master bus)

1) If I have a bunch of surround-panned sound files (panned DIFFERENTLY) that I wish to put through the same effect--- let's say a compressor--- while maintaining my panning for each individual track.

2) I use IK multimedia ARC to eq my room. When working in stereo, I use bus A as a "pre-master" that I can see all my levels on correctly before sending to the master bus with the ARC on it. ARC doesn't support 5.1. I could get around this if there were surround busses-- I could use a stereo ARC on the surrounds, and a stereo ARC on the front speakers and a stereo arc on the center and sub.

3) when working in stereo, I like to send my dialogue to 1 bus, my fx to another bus, my music to another bus, my bgs to another bus, and my foleys to another bus. This allows me to mess with their collective volume. I can't do this in surround without losing my surround panning.

I work with some other sound designers, and while I can't remember everything, I'm sure they have some other reasons to add.

C

ADDENDUM -- Here is a concise version of what I wrote from my friend Robin:

"The big issue I'm having is that if I send either a track or a bus to any bus aside from the master I then lose my ability to pan those individual elements in surround. I suppose I could work around this by just having all my tracks sent straight to the master and not using any additional busses, but that would be even more limiting in a lot of ways. "

1) If I have a bunch of surround-panned sound files (panned DIFFERENTLY) that I wish to put through the same effect--- let's say a compressor--- while maintaining my panning for each individual track.

There are a limited number of FX you can use on the Surround Master bus in Vegas. They are DirectX plug-ins that specifically support n channel mapping. You cannot use any available plug-in you may have. (Try it.)

To do what you want, you should create a sub bus that is routed to the master and do the surround panning and FX processing on that bus rather than on the track.

2) I use IK multimedia ARC to eq my room. When working in stereo, I use bus A as a "pre-master" that I can see all my levels on correctly before sending to the master bus with the ARC on it. ARC doesn't support 5.1. I could get around this if there were surround busses-- I could use a stereo ARC on the surrounds, and a stereo ARC on the front speakers and a stereo arc on the center and sub.

You are not permited to use seperate FX on the pairs of the master surround. Again, you could do this by using a set of sub busses routed to the surround master, with each sub bus addressing a specific channel or channels.

3) when working in stereo, I like to send my dialogue to 1 bus, my fx to another bus, my music to another bus, my bgs to another bus, and my foleys to another bus. This allows me to mess with their collective volume. I can't do this in surround without losing my surround panning.

Again, you could set up a series of sub busses routed to the surround master and do you panning - and processing there.

You can also use an Assignable FX bus routed to the surround master, sending what you need to from your tracks or your sub busses routed to the master surround bus.

"The big issue I'm having is that if I send either a track or a bus to any bus aside from the master I then lose my ability to pan those individual elements in surround. I suppose I could work around this by just having all my tracks sent straight to the master and not using any additional busses, but that would be even more limiting in a lot of ways. "

Again, instead of panning at the track level, pan at the bus level using sub busses routed to the surround master bus.

In general, the addition of surround sub busses would not provide the flexablity you believe you would get as they could only be routed one to one to the master. It would be nothing more than a secondary gain control.

I am not against such a feature, but far more than a simple surround sub bus would be need to achieve the things you are trying to achieve. The work around of using sub busses for your surround panning should allow you to achieve nearly everything you desire.

Peter

Although I haven't tried this I imagine if I were mixing multiple surround sources together I would want to process them (encode, decode) differently before mixing them together. I might want to process two surround sources the same way and a third a different way. They might arrive as discrete or combined.

I don't know what you mean by encode/decode. You can process, but there is no 'encoding' or 'decoding' possible - at least as I understand those terms.

What do you mean by a "surround source"? Vegas does not support encoded audio on the time line. It must be PCM - or transcode from something to PCM.

You can process sources (tracks or busses) at a bus that is routed to the surround master. However, the master surround bus only supports DirectX plugins that support n channels. You cannot use any plug-in on the surround master bus.

Peter

Peter,
I really appreciate your participation in these forums but I have to wonder aloud why it's not enough that your users want a feature.

Regarding encoding and decoding I am referring to encoding discrete channels to a surround buss matrix and decoding such a matrix to discrete channels. One such example would be the Schopps Surround plugin tool to use with some surround M/S configurations.

http://www.schoeps.de/en/products/dms_plugin/overview

In the stereo M/S world I'm not aware of any vegas encoding and decoding tools so I have to use multiple tracks feeding a buss in order to use a 3rd party plug in that decodes M/S into stereo. Now if I want to process this stereo signal along with another stereo signal I must buss the buss to a buss. Got me so far? Now make it surround.
I hope this explanation is sufficient to consider your users' request. I look forward to your response.

Jesse

...but I have to wonder aloud why it's not enough that your users want a feature.

It can't be enough. While adding surround sub busses sounds trivial, I assure you it is not. The devil is in the details. Undestanding what the users really want is important. You'd be surpised how users all think they want the same thing, but as you start to discuss, they really want something very different either in design or workflow.

I am not saying the extra surround busses is a bad idea. I am trying to determine the need and the specifics. Just asking for more surround busses with out a good workflow and overall benfit to a number of users is not good enough.


A feature request has to be considered at many levels.
- Time to develope, test, and document.
- Is it important to a large user base or only a few
- Are there more important features that are needed first.

Some ideas are great. Others are just impractical. Some just don't fit to the workflow. Many we already do, but not like host XYZ does. (I prefer to think of it that host XYZ does not do it like us.) Some are just bad.

Having said this, your example of workflow with the M/S double plug-in does define a solid workflow. I can see how multiple surround sub busses could be useful in this workflow.

Whether the workflow is main stream, that I have to hear more about.

Vegas does not support 'surround' or multichannel VST plug-ins, so to allow the workflow to happen would involve support for such plug-ins. That type of support would have to come first.

I consider all users requests. That is why I come to these forums. I discuss things with users to better understand what workflows are desired.

While this request seems unique, what it comes down to is more flexible routing as the over all feature. Whether it is mutlple surround busses or mono busses or n channel busses, flexability in routing is what is desired. We have had this request for a long time. We have improved Vegas' routing flexability over the last few versions. We are always looking at ways to expand on this.

Peter

Peter,
Thanks for your reply. As I said I do appreciate your participation in these forums.
I didn't know there was no support for surround VST plug ins. That would come in high on _my_ list of priorities.

Jesse

Here's why a sub stereo bus routed to the surround master doesn't work as well as a sub surround bus that could be routed to the surround master might:

Track one is a flaming tennis ball that flies in a circle counter clockwise
Track two is a water house spinning around clockwise
Track three is part of an AC hum that I'd like in the rear
Track four is more of the room tone that I'd like to move from the front to the back and then side to side.

They all need the same reverb and I'd like to compress them all as a group. I'd also like to maintain the panning for the individual tracks.

So while I can certainly make a cumbersome workaround by applying many instances of the same reverb to all of the tracks, a surround sub-bus would just be much easier.

C

Hope this helps.

I don't see how a surround sub bus would make this easier. I would say it would be more cumbersome.

Your don't even need a sub bus set for this.

All you need is an assignable fx bus for your common rerverb. Send each track to the send, and place the reverb in the surrounnd mix as you desire.

The master has your compression.

Your tracks' panning stay as you want.

I don't see how a surround sub bus would help in your scenario.

What it sounds like you want is the ability to add fx at a surround bus level and have surround stem mixes.

The biggest limitation would be the limited fx you could use on these surround sub busses.

There are alternatives with the existing busses that would permit you to achieve the results, which are not horrific or even cumbersome.

I am not against it, but have to weigh it against other requests and pending issues.

I would suggest you submit a feature request, and it will be consider.

Peter

I have submitted a feature request, but I am worried that it will just go to the same place that my repeated requests for HUI support (since 2006-- it's been five years now) have gone.

To respond to the last posting from Peter (thanks for the input and the thought):

"The master has your compression."

What happens if I want to have a bus for Dialogue, a bus for FX, a bus for BGs, a bus for foleys, and a bus for music and I want them to all have different compression?

"All you need is an assignable fx bus for your common rerverb. Send each track to the send, and place the reverb in the surrounnd mix as you desire."

So if I have 21 tracks with the same reverb, I'm going to need to assign it 21 times. Besides, while I like assignable FX, I don't always want to organize a session like that...

"What it sounds like you want is the ability to add fx at a surround bus level and have surround stem mixes."

Those would both be nice! :p

Anyone else want to weigh in on this?

cchoy,
I'm running vegas 9 and can add multiple surround sub busses. Is version 10 different?

re: buss compression, can you make surround busses (see comment #2 in this thread) for each compressor setting then route these to the master?

re: 21 FX sends, it's not such a pain if you ctrl-click select all the 21 channels that need reverb, then double click the send level on one track. done.

don't forget without surround VST plug in support most of these things that you are asking for can't happen - so consider also requesting the feature of surround VST support.

Jesse