Stereo spread for mono sounds or headphones panning rules.

Hello!

I just started to learn UE4 native audio and stumbled into a question. Are there any possibilities to spread mono signals between channels when they are hard panned only in one channel?
E.g. a loud 3D mono sound panned hard left, without any additional portion of it in the right channel the result is very unpleasant.

In Wwise I could solve it with spread settings for mono sounds and I wonder if anything similar possible in UE.

It sounds like you have a stereo file that only has audio in one channel (hence why it’s going only to the left ear). The fix is to reimport the sound as a single-channel file, but no you can’t split the audio tracks to new files in editor.

Truly “mono” (single-channel) sounds will play to both ears in UE. Stereo Spread is a term for when you are playing a stereo sound in a 3D world position.

Thanks for the reply TheJamsh. My audio file is correct, it is a simple mono file. The problem is when it is positioned hard left or right in a game world. When you turn your camera and the audio source is on the left or right. And if you are in headphones it is only in one channel which is bad for ears.

Hi, I’m not aware of a way to natively spread mono sounds, or add some 2D’ness to 3D sounds, and it would definitely make a good feature request.
Until then, I find that adjusting attenuation and spatialization parameters can smooth out 3D panning a bit. One thing worth looking at is Spatialization Method - the **Binaural **setting is more suitable for listening on headphones. In this tab I would try increasing Non-Spatialized Radius closer to the current Attenuation Falloff Distance, and along with that, enabling Attenuation Listener Focus and tweaking its Min/Max Distance and Volume can add to the sense of panning, even though the sound is not fully spatialized. Good luck !

Thanks for the tip ebarkani! I will try the binaural setting, though it looks like a drastic approach. But worth checking anyway.