How to make 5.1 surround sound in a video

To make 5.1 surround sound in a video, open Video by Zaweba and choose Project > Sound layout > 5.1 surround. Every sound track then gets a surround panner with five speakers and an LFE share, so you can place dialogue, music and effects round the room. Export to MP4, MOV, AV1, WebM, WAV, FLAC, AIFF or AAC and the file carries all six channels.

Surround sound is a bigger change than it sounds. In stereo you only decide how far left or right something sits. In 5.1 you also decide how far forward or back, how much goes to the centre speaker and how much rumble goes to the subwoofer. The good news is that most of a surround mix is ordinary mixing, and only a handful of choices are new.

What 5.1 means

The name counts the channels: five full-range speakers (front left, centre, front right, and left and right surround behind the listener) plus one low-frequency effects channel, the ".1", for the subwoofer. The centre speaker usually carries dialogue so voices stay anchored to the screen. The front pair carry music and most of the picture's sound, and the rear pair carry ambience and the occasional effect that moves past the viewer.

Building the surround mix

Switch the project first. Project > Sound layout > 5.1 surround changes every sound track's pan control into a surround panner. Do this early if you know the film is going out in surround, because it shapes how you think about each track.

Bring in your sound. If you have a recording that is already 5.1, put it on a 5.1 track and Video by Zaweba keeps its six channels apart rather than folding them together. Ordinary mono and stereo clips work as normal.

Place each track with the surround panner. Dialogue usually belongs in the centre, music spread across the front with a little in the rear, and ambience wrapped round the listener. Use the LFE share sparingly, for explosions, thunder or a deep musical hit, rather than sending everything there.

Animate where it helps. Pan is one of the values that can be keyframed, so a passing car can be given movement across a shot.

Listen as you go. The preview plays the standard stereo downmix, so you hear a sensible version of the mix on ordinary speakers or headphones even while you are building a surround one.

Export with six channels. Choose MP4, MOV, AV1, WebM, WAV, FLAC, AIFF or AAC. In Export > More options the sound channels can follow the project or be set to mono, stereo or 5.1, so make sure 5.1 is what goes out.

Keeping the mix listenable

Keep the dialogue clear first. Auto-ducking still dips music under speech, and loudness normalising still levels the export, so the basics of a clean mix carry straight over from stereo work.

Don't overdo the rear speakers. A mix that throws every sound behind the viewer is tiring to watch. Ambience and the odd moving effect are usually enough to make the room feel bigger.

Check the stereo version. Many people will watch your surround film on a laptop or a phone, so the downmix you hear in the preview is close to what they will hear. If dialogue disappears in that downmix, pull the music down or move it further forward.

Label your tracks. Tagging clips as dialogue, music, effects or ambience makes it quicker to decide where each sort belongs, and Match loudness can then even out levels within a type.

When to stay in stereo

Surround is worth the effort for films that will be played through a home cinema or a venue's speakers. For most online video, a careful stereo mix is the better use of your time, since most viewers listen on two speakers. A sensible approach is to cut and mix in stereo and move to surround once the edit is locked.

All the mixing happens offline on your PC, with no plug-ins to buy and no account, since Video by Zaweba is free software.