FCP X Audio Meters - what scale are they at?

Actually it makes absolute sense, providing you don't try and understand how it works!! LOL

It means that no matter where you put your sound in the stereo field it will sound equally as loud.

Without applying the Pan Law, as soon as you start getting into mixing and panning your signals it will mess with their volumes and relationships respective to each other. So you'll have to fiddle around more with the levels before you get the balance right. If you have a big mix and much of it hidden away in Compound Clips it can become incredibly tedious to get balanced again.

By applying the Pan Law, you don't have to mess with any of that. Just pan your signal and be done. It's incredibly useful, incredibly intuitive and is valued by many engineers, mixing, recording, post-production, the like.

The only thing you need to watch out for is if you take a pan a signal it'll run hotter, but that only ever becomes an issue if you are mixing dangerously close to your 0dBF ceiling.

in working with film, video and post production you should be working with 24bit and aiming for your average signal to be between -18 - 24dbFS, if you do this, then it won't be an issue.

As someone who grew up in recording studios, who's been composing and mixing from a very early age, I hate Pan Law forced on me. Garbage theory that no one has agreed on a standard for. Turn it off, mix real world. Just my opinion.

Film, video, and broadcast all have VERY different audio requirements. Can't group them all together.

There are many high end mixers with this technology built in for years.

You'd almost be the only one who prefers to do things the hard way. But you're not hurting anyone so i can't see the harm in it

Most people i know would simply like to set their volumes, pan and be done with it. Faster workflow, and that's what FCPX has been all about.

FYI. Here is a chart showing what is happening in FCPX in regards to Pan Law.