stems in a 5.1 mix

[jbyerly1]

Could someone point me to a reference, book etc. that might help me understand the principals of 5.1 mixing. I've seen some of the basic guides that cover placements of different sound fields but hoping to get into some details on how you would apply stems to a 5.1 mix. I have not used another DAW so I don't know if all DAW's operate the same in a 5.1 but i'm hoping to learn more so I am ahead of the game this fall when I will be tackling another 5.1 mix. One question I have is : Is it better to start the mix in 5.1 and convert to stereo.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

Are you talking music, SFX, or what?

Music is usually not in the 5.1 format but is stereo. Dialogue is center track. So we're talking SFX?

[jbyerly1]

I'm sorry. yes for film. Basically what I did was take a finished mix then convert it to 5.1 and realized that I could not subgroup stuff together (overheads, music, fx) as I had it. The way I work is to control volume mostly. It was just easier at points to automate the sub fader instead of always having to go to specific tracks. Don't know if this is common but it worked for me. I'm just trying to get my head around how you work efficiently with 70+ 5.1 tracks and was hoping someone might be able to steer me to some good reading materials that might offer some helpful advice.