I would also like to know how to get exactly what you want on each channel.
I want to get exactly what I want on each channel without any "leaking". That should be the defaulted setting.
Getting front and rear speakers the way you want, there should be NO bleed-thru unless I specifically mix it that way.
It really should be as easy as recording regular stereo, to get "NO bleed-thru" 5.1 recording. At least on 5 channels.
Is 6 channel discrete recording to DVD possible? (it won't be used in the traditional way, so that's my question.) I can probably get by on 5 channels, if the .1 is unavoidably a mix.
Please add that information after you answer Per1's question.

Mark, I still not get it.

-- I've set Automation of OFF on all channels
-- For each channel only one speakr is active (light blue)
-- If I set one channel (e.g. Read Right) to Solo or mute all other channels and put the red diamond in the rear right corner sound is also coming from front right...(!)
-- If I move the diamond FROM the rear right to rear left or front right the sounds fades away (as it should).

But why does front right blled-thru the sound then the diamond is in the rear-right corner? It should be 100% rear-right, nothing else. Or?

It looks to me, reading the different posts about 5.1, that Vegas is NOT capable of true 5.1 editing. And apparently Sony don't care.

Any suggestion of a NLE that really works at it should, instead of Vegas?

Regards

"It looks to me, reading the different posts about 5.1, that Vegas is NOT capable of true 5.1 editing. And apparently Sony don't care."

This is COMPLETELY untrue. Most if not all my projects are DD5.1 and I get no "leakage" what so ever. I can TOTALLY isolate any channel I wish. I'm not sure what you're doing but you no doubt have a setting wrong somewhere, ....or a soundcard that's not holding its own. I know through personal experience that if the sound card is not set up right you can get leakage. In fact, if you have all but one channel turned off and you're still getting sound through the other channels then my guess would be sound card or hardware.

What ever the case I KNOW FOR A FACT that this is a case of operator/hardware error. Point blank.... Vegas has one of the better DD5.1 systems. I know because it's pretty important to me and I've done a lot of tooling around with a lot of different editors trying to find a good system.

Can you post a project that you know is working 100% for you so I can test it on my setup?

Throw me your email add and I'll make up an AC3 file and send it to you.

Just out of curiosity.... what sound cards are being used here and what drivers are you using?

I have the soundblaster X-FI pro elite which has an audio creation mode and asio2 drivers. I get total isolation (with exception of course to the LFE channel which is most often common to the center channel)

http://us.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=209&subcategory=669&product=14064&nav=0

And are you using ONE track for your pans or 6 different tracks (one for each channel)?

I have a HDA Xplosion 7.1

Although I think the card is playing tricks on me at playback I either don't get how Vegas should be set to get true 5.1 or there is something strange things going on in Vegas.

Could you please email your vegas project to mats.e.post@hotmail.com Thanks

I tested some in Vegas 8;

-- Took one WAV file (stereo) and put it on 5+1 channels
-- made the last channel LFE
-- activated (light blue speaker) one speaker on each channel/track, track #1=Front Left, track #2= Center etc.
-- moved the diamond to the light (active) speaker in each corner and for each track I made it SOLO and rendered out to 5 AC3 files, one for each speaker position (skipping the LFE)

Now, here's the odd thing I got in AC3 (inspecting them in DVDA)

Center = stereo track with both channels containing "sound". Fine, could be that Center is a mix of L and R...

Front Left = stereo track with LEFT channel with sound, RIGHT channel = 0 "mute" - perfect

Front Right = stereo track with RIGHT channel with sound, LEFT channel = 0 "mute" - perfect

And for the "odd" stuff.

Rear Left = stereo track with BOTH LEFT and Right channel with sound. Why is not Right channel = 0 ("mute")?

Rear Right = stereo track with BOTH LEFT and Right channel with sound. Why is not left channel = 0 ("mute")?

This is very odd. Why does the rear audio files become stereo when they should be "mono", i.e. only one of the channels should contain "sound"..

Yes, I should have started with a mono track that that would have made no different.

This is pure Vegas, no sound card involded, only CPU and VEgas. I don't understand it - or make some error that I cannot spot. This PC that I made these tests have a standard Dell integrated soundcard but I have now tested the same things (see above) on 3 computers with different g-cards and they all behave the same.

Any hints / solutions to my problem most welcome!

I'm thinking of getting the SoundBlaster XFI but right now I'm thinking that Vegas (or me!) is doing something wrong. The output files are most curious, for me.

Have you burned an example to a disc (DVDR) and tried it in a regular 5.1 system?
I'm thinking it's either Vegas or when you try to play back on your computer, it's your sound card remixing the 5.1 and giving you a "simulated" 5.1

>Have you burned an example to a disc (DVDR) and tried it in a regular 5.1 system?

No, not yet. I figured that if the files what provide the audio is not correct any playback system would not be able to correct it. If the rear channels where "mono" I'd test it to judge if the sound card is weird but as of now it seems curious to me why Vegas makes the rear channels "stereo".

> I'm thinking it's either Vegas or when you try to play back on your computer, it's your sound card remixing the 5.1 and giving you a "simulated" 5.1

Yes, true. They card has some part of the odd playback but the generation of audio files (AC3 e.g.) in Vegas cannot be blamed by the G-card. This is 100% internal Vegas calculations (I think...) Once I get the files "OK" I will "take care" of the odd playback with possible bleed-thru sound.

Not having tried 5.1 yet, I can't really get too detailed or know exactly what you're talking about.
Were you able to SEE the ac3 files in DVDA to see it the leakage was there, or did you just listen?
If you were just listening, then that's why I suggested your sound card may be re-interpreting the Vegas mix into a simulated 5.1
If you actually saw the mono wave in the rear channels on the DVDA timeline.. then you're right.. it's all in Vegas and the sound card has nothing to do with it (you would know it was mono because both rear tracks would be 100% Identical)

Although if you order Vegas to render a 5.1 from a stereo source, maybe that's the result. Vegas simulates a 5.1 by combining the 2 stereo tracks and sending them to the other channels.

I'm just taking a guess. This is all stuff I need to know too.

"This is pure Vegas, no sound card involded,"

Not necessarily. You're using DVDa and assuming it's correct... I don't use DVDa. I create and export AC3 files (along with the video) to Ulead MF6 where I create hi def avchd disks for playback in the Sony PS3 and an Onkyo 705 A/V receiver. And yes... I get good isolation on all speakers.

I created a AC3 test file (which I will send to you) and exported it to Ulead MF6 and burned it to dvd with some crap ntsc video I had laying around. I played the dvd in my home system and all channels came through well and isolated. I then imported that dvd to vegas and stuck it on the time line. All my audio tracks showed up (not including LFE... which I didn't do in the first place). Now I can't say it played back with perfect isolation. There was a bit of leakage at about the -40 to -50 db (in other words negligible)

Soooo.... the problem is certainly not Vegas. It exports well from Vegas and it imports (as long as you import it in terms of a vob file and use IMPORT DVD CAMCORDER DISK)

It *MAY* be DVDa. I don't know... I just don't use it.

You should also be aware of the fact that dolby digital decoders cost money... they're not free and therefore many soundcards can't decode it. They instead use either a fake decoder or a PROLOGIC decoder which has 4.1 channels (there is one rear channel to 2 speakers instead of 2 discrete channels).

At any rate... I'll send you the AC3 file. It's about 3 meg (hope I don't have trouble!)

Per1.... check your mail.

Might be a long shot but check your channel assignments from surround master also. They do NOT follow the preferences setting. Only if you start new project it gets settings from preferences (or switch current projectr from stereo to 5.1). This did me tricks a while ago. Now I've got the surround to follow my settings perfectly.

Perhaps one step closer to the error...
Found out that the Audio Device Type in Options>Pref...>Audio Device was set to Microsoft Sound Mapper.
Since I replaced my HDA Xplsion sound card with a Creative I changed the device type to Creative ASIO.

But, still Front sound bleeds over to the rear?
The following 3 lines in the dialog box (Vegas 8) are unavailable for change and it says Front L/R on all of them which sounds odd for me.

Any hints if the error is in this dialog box and if I need to make some tuning here?

I still do not get isolated sound from the various speakers (if bleeds through) so something is wrong I guess.

UPDATE: Changed the Audio Device Type to Direct Sound Surround Mapper (whatever that is...) and now it seem to work. I wonder then what Creative ASIO is... since it is a Creative card one would think that would be the choise.

OK, more testing needs to be done.

UPDATE2: Previews well in Vegas (isolated channels). All mixed up in DVDA. In bleeds all over.

Regards
Per

Blink3times's post is quite correct. I think your problem is that you are trying to play AC3 files with no AC3 decoder codec installed.

Surprisingly to many DVDArch DOES NOT have the ability to decode AC3 encoded files... the audio you see on the timeline is just there for reference. Vegas DOES NOT include a decoder either.

AC3 decoders cost money (as do encoders... luckily an encoder is already provided with Vegas... albeit a version which is rather crude). To decode AC3 you need to purchase some extra software e.g. InterVideo WinDVD or suchlike. Once installed and setup properly, you will find that you can use that software to play AC3 encoded files, as well as play normal DVD's, in your PC with the full surround experience; additionally Windows Media Player can also use the same decoder codec and play true surround.

ChristoC,
Interesting.
I will test making an AC3 from Vegas and burn to DVD and play in a DVD-player on my surround system. I tried the file from Blink3times and FL, Center and FR were isolated at playback but not rear (they went on at the same time). I just took the file (+ some crap video) and burnt a DVD in DVDA and played it up on a Samsung DVD player + Yamaha 5.1 amp. I would assume that even a cheap Samsung DVD player have the correct decoder...

Went to the local radio store and tested on their Sony setup - even worse. FL, Center and FR OK, rear were separated but muffled sounding like LFE...

More testing needs to be done.

Are there encoders to be bought that integrates well with Vegas and do a better job than the one supplied with Vegas?

"I tried the file from Blink3times and FL, Center and FR were isolated at playback but not rear "

Just curious... what did you use to burn with? I ask merely because it works for me. Good isolation when brought back into Vegas, good on the computer and good on my home theater. (I used Ulead MF6 for the burn)

> Previews well in Vegas (isolated channels).

Good, that's as it should be.

> All mixed up in DVDA. In bleeds all over.

That's only to be expected. The playback monitoring facilities in DVDA aren't intended to be used as a fully fledged DVD player. In particular, the audio playback is always downmixed to a stereo signal. This should appear in the front left and right speakers, of course, but depending on how your audio playback apparatus is configured it may also appear elsewhere (rear left and right for example). This could mislead you into thinking that it "bleeds all over".

There doesn't seem to be anything about this in the manual or the help files, but if you search the forums you can find a few instances of Sony people confirming it, for example here.

Mark