Vegas Lt/Rt mixes

seanmccoy wrote on 3/13/2014, 4:48 PM

Anybody have any experience using Vegas's faux Lt/Rt downmix option, and hearing it decoded? As I understand it, it's not truly matrixed but does a decent simulation so that the LoRo when fed through a PL or PL2 decoder, will hold up reasonably well. I'm finishing up a 5.1 mix that is already well past what the client paid for and am in no mood to fork over any money for a legitimate encoder (at this time), but since this film is likely to end up at festivals I'd like to know that the stereo mix won't go completely wonky on me.

We had a similar discussion about this a few years ago and NewHope had had some success, but I'm wondering if there are any new experiences, good or bad. Thanks for any help.

Comments

rraud wrote on 3/13/2014, 5:27 PM

"since this film is likely to end up at festivals I'd like to know that the stereo mix won't go completely wonky on me"
Don't count on it just because the mix sounds OK in the studio. Just plain L-R stereo (or mono) is the safest bet for film festivals. Even if the 'theater' has a multichannel system, it likely won't be calibrated properly and I've heard many 5:1 mixes get butchered, and in other venues, down-mixes where so bad it drove folks out. How lucky do you feel?

seanmccoy wrote on 3/13/2014, 7:36 PM

Not lucky at all! But opinions vary widely on which is the safest stereo format to hand to festivals. I know the technical side of the festival scene has evolved quite a bit over the past decade, so I guess it depends on what caliber fesitvals people are generally dealing with. Bottom line is that there's no perfect solution short of customizing per situation. But the Vegas Pro 'pretend' Lt/Rt seems like a fairly safe bet since it's not matrixed but purportedly handles decoding well. I was just hoping more people had given it a whirl and could share their experiences.