Audio: Mono and Stereo Tracks

[Luke Hyde]

Hello Support Communuty,

I have a seemingly complex issue that I will do my best to explain and I appreciate you taking the time to read this.

I am a few years into video editing in general and working with Pr Pro. I am studying film and video in college with one intro audio class under my belt and I am currently taking a more intense audio class.

I believe my understanding of mono and stereo to be solid. Mono tracks are a singular track, recorded using a single microphone. Stereo tracks are usually 2 tracks, with varying waveforms on each track, recorded using multiple microphones.

My Timeline preferences for Pr Pro are set to default mono, stereo, and 5.1 audio tracks to Mono, with Multichannel Mono Media set to "Use File." My question is, why is it that when I drop audio clips into my timeline, they appear as dual mono, on two separate tracks, with an "R" and an "L" on each track (I'd also like to point out that the 2 separate waveforms of each clip seem to have very small but appearent differences). The "R" and "L" throw me off becuase that indicates stereo, right? Also, I understand that when I left click the audio clip in the project panel, and select modify>audio channels, I can change that to only import on one track, but still the imported clip has an "R" or "L" on the bottom left corner. 

I would like some clarity to how this works, becasue in my audio classes we work with professional audio software (Avid Pro Tools), and mono tracks are on a singular track, hence "mono" (unless, we are working with dual mono). I am confused how to edit audio tracks in Pr Pro becasue I either have to edit dual mono tracks (which again, seem to have minor differences when zoomed in) which is 2x the work for fades, automation, etc. Or I delete a track and only edit the other one, but the track has either an "R" or "L" in the bottom left, which feels wrong to do because I don't want to send audio only to the left or right.

Attached are screenshots of my project panel and timeline where I drag and drop "Springtime Full.wav" into my timeline. Preferences are set to default mono, stereo, and 5.1 audio tracks to Mono, with Multichannel Mono Media set to "Use File." The bottom photo shows the "L" and "R" in the bottom left corner of the clip. 

I hope I did a proper job demonstrating my issue and I appreciate the time taken to view my post. Essentailly, I am looking to edit mono audio, but am unsure how to do so. Do I have to edit both clips? Or is it okay to delete one and edit from there? Do I need to alter my preferences?

Again, in my mind this is a complex problem so I have asked various questions to help determine what to do. Thank you for your help.

[R Neil Haugen · Accepted solution]

With your preference setting for multichannel mono being use file, yes, PrPro is being told to do dual mono. It sees multi-channel audio, so it goes to the multichannel audio preference, sees 'use file' as set, and creates multi channels of mono.

Neil

[neil wilkes]

I believe my understanding of mono and stereo to be solid. Mono tracks are a singular track, recorded using a single microphone. Stereo tracks are usually 2 tracks, with varying waveforms on each track, recorded using multiple microphones.

This is not the whole story - stereo is not just something done with multiple microphones but a file that contains different audio information in each of the left/right channels. Recording tracks with multiple microphones will simply give you multi-mono, not true stereo. Using stereo gives you a far better sense of space as well.

This article does a really good job of explaining the difference between mono, multi-mono & stereo

https://producerhawk.com/dual-mono-vs-stereo/