Old 07-26-2008, 09:59 AM   #1
smast
Human being with feelings
 
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: London
Posts: 28
Default Reverb on Reaper

I was wondering if anyone could advise me on settings for a natural-sounding, fairly subtle reverb on reaper, please? Like a large room sort if a sound. I've been messing around with ReaVerb but it makes what I've recorded (acoustic instruments) sound kinda crazy! I think I mut be doing something wrong.
smast is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-26-2008, 03:49 PM   #2
Ollie
Super Moderator (no feelings)
 
Ollie's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2007
Location: On or near a dike
Posts: 9,834
Default

Did you try Reaverbate already? AFAIK it's based on Freeverb and does a fine job for basic reverb (at least for me). Here's a typical setting for a pretty large room (in the size of a cathedral ):

Ollie is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-26-2008, 03:58 PM   #3
bardo
Human being with feelings
 
bardo's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: San diego
Posts: 1,107
Default Sorry for the long post but....

very informative artical from July's S.o.S......
If you've ever spent hours mixing only to be confronted with a wall of mud, you might need to think harder about how to use reverb and delay in your mixes - and some simple tricks can yield dramatic results.


Mike Senior




When using send effects, make sure that the effect is set to 100 percent wet. Some plug-ins, such as the UAD1 Plate 140 reverb, have this setting as a default, but not all do, so remember to check — otherwise when you send a signal to the effect, that signal will not just get the reverb, it will become louder, ruining the balance of your mix.
In hardware systems, the mixer will have auxiliary send controls which allow you to create a number of independent effects-send mixes, each mix appearing on a separate output socket. By connecting different effects units to the mixer's different auxiliary-send outputs, you can drive several independent effects at once, assuming that you have enough free mixer inputs through which to return their outputs. In software, a separate mixer channel usually needs to be created to hold the effect plug-in, whereupon auxiliary sends can be created on each relevant mixer channel to feed it. (This is exactly the kind of setup I used in Cockos Reaper to create my audio examples, using a section of an otherwise dry multitrack project.)


The second thing to ensure is that each channel's auxiliary send is taken from a point in the signal path after the channel's fader — in other words, that you use what is called a 'post-fade' auxiliary send. That way the amount of effects for any instrument will vary naturally as its channel fader is moved. If you fed the auxiliary send from before the fader, then you could, for example, fade a track completely down and you'd still be hearing its reverb — rarely a desirable state of affairs except for the occasional special effect.

For those of you with Cockos Reaper, we've also placed Mike's demo session file up there too — but don't worry if you don't have Reaper, as all the audio files can be imported into whichever DAW system you use.
Choosing Reverb Presets
Now that we're clear on how to set up the necessary connections, it's time to start considering the effects themselves. First of all, let's start by looking at how you can use just reverb to draw a final mix together, and then we'll build on that to show the subtly different possibilities that are afforded by delay effects.
__________________
POD PRO XT,Roland TD-20 E-kit,Fender Telecaster,Rickenbacher,Framis 12-String,Ibanaz Bass,CAD GXL3000 Pro Studio Mic,E-Bow and my "ol' best friend "REAPER"Since 2006
My songs here...[url]
http://www.mixposure.com/bardo/
bardo is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-26-2008, 03:58 PM   #4
bardo
Human being with feelings
 
bardo's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: San diego
Posts: 1,107
Default

As I've already mentioned, there are enough things for newcomers to mixing to worry about without programming their own reverbs from scratch, so I would certainly recommend starting from presets where possible. However, this tactic only lets you off the hook to a certain degree, because it's still up to you to select the right processor and preset for the task. Here are a few tips.


For reverb, it often makes sense to start with a preset, but knowing what makes a reverb patch can help when it comes to final tweaks. In particular, notice the three phases of initial delay (or pre-delay), the early reflections and the dense reflections of the reverb tail, and how high frequencies tend to decay more quickly than lower ones.
The first, and probably most useful, thing I can say is that you should ignore the preset names and instead try to imagine the kind of space you want your mix to inhabit — picturing a real environment can help focus the mind here, although this may not help as much if you're trying to create a more other-worldly sound. A wrong choice in this regard can be almost impossible to sort out during mixing, whereas a reverb with the right kind of inherent acoustic signature but the wrong tone and/or length can usually be tweaked into better shape comparatively easily. It's not uncommon for me to wade through a couple of dozen presets before I find one that instinctively feels like it fits the mix in hand, and it's vital that you don't hurry this process.

Beyond that rather intangible decision, though, there are a few other more down-to-earth things to consider. First of all, if you have a choice of reverb processors or plug-ins, be wary of any that produce a metallic sort of sound, particularly in response to noisy tracks like drums. To show what I mean by this, let me turn to the first of my audio examples: the Reverb1 and Reverb2 audio files. The former has a pronounced metallic ring to it, whereas the latter (while still far from perfect) is a bit better behaved in this regard, and is likely to prove much more usable. The problem with metallic resonances is that, by the time the reverb is at a level where it's doing its job, the overtones become too clearly audible, unpleasantly colouring the mix as a whole and making the effect sound too obvious. Reverbs with obvious resonant 'character' do have their uses at the mix, but typically for other, more specialised tasks beyond the scope of this article, so it's best to steer clear of them to begin with. (It's worth pointing out that the Reverb1 file also veers off to one side of the stereo image as it decays, which isn't ideal either.)

Another basic principle when looking for reverbs that will bind a mix together is to tread carefully with any that seem to have very prominent frequency extremes. Neither very high frequencies nor very low frequencies are much use when using reverb to bind a track together, the former tending to make the reverb too audible in its own right, and the latter reducing punch at the low end of the mix where definition is normally really important.

Tweaking Reverbs: The Controls To Reach For First
If you're lucky, you might have selected a reverb preset that's perfect for your track. In my experience, though, no preset ever seems to fit the mix like a glove, and I routinely tweak the reverb sound in a variety of ways while mixing, to make it match better. What I also find is that amongst the forest of reverb parameters frequently provided, some end up being much more useful than others, so here are a few pointers for getting the quickest results.

The most important thing that you need to get right is the balance between the length of the reverb and its overall level across all the tracks in the mix. Most people who send mixes in for Mix Rescue tend to have misjudged this balance, either by having the reverb too long, so that they can't fade it up far enough without it washing out the whole mix, or by having it too short, so that they can't get a full sound without distancing their tracks to the horizon. Almost every reverb processor has some kind of control to change the length of the reverb (often labelled Decay Time or Reverb Time), so one of the most important things you can do is to experiment with different reverb length settings, juggling the return channel's fader in tandem, to find the best balance between these two parameters. In fact, this is something I often find myself coming back to late in the mix, as it can be difficult to judge properly until the comparative reverb levels for all the instruments are set up.


A useful starting point is to set up four basic send effects: a short (ambient) and long reverb, and a short and long delay. You can then send different amounts of any of your signals to one or more of these effects, to create a feeling of cohesion. Placing an EQ after your reverb or delay can make it much easier to sculpt the sound to fit your mix. Rolling off the low and high frequencies, for example, tends to make reverb or delay less conspicuous.
If you have a listen to the ReverbLength audio files you can hear how the length of a single reverb can affect the fullness of the mix, given a fixed effect-return level. ReverbLengthShort leaves the mix a bit lacking in warmth, while at the other extreme ReverbLengthLong goes over the top, swamping the details in the mix and giving itself away as an unnatural effect. ReverbLengthMedium strikes a balance between these two extremes and therefore sounds more successful in context. I've also created a file of the same section with the reverb bypassed so that you can hear how it's contributing to the song's blend. (Incidentally, If you're having difficulty initially distinguishing the differences between the different sets of audio files, try importing all of them into your own sequencer so that they're all playing back at once, and then use your mixer solo buttons to switch between them while they're playing. This makes subtle adjustments between the files much more apparent.)

The next most common thing I do with any reverb is adjust its tonality to suit the track. Some equalisation controls are often built into the reverb processor, but I usually prefer the extra flexibility afforded by a separate equaliser following the reverb in the return channel. With modern commercial styles I almost always cut away some of the low frequencies with a high-pass filter set somewhere in the 100-300Hz range, simply because it allows me to keep the required focus and punch of kick drums and bass lines uncompromised. I also often cut high frequencies as well, either with a low-pass filter or high shelf. This is partly because it helps make the reverb less audible as an added effect (particularly in response to vocal consonants and high percussion), but also partly because it has the psychological effect of making the reverb seem further away from the listener than the brighter dry sounds.

However, in addition to cutting high end and low end, it can also make a great deal of sense to sculpt the reverb return's tonality even further if you find that it's colouring the mix's overall tone undesirably. Another reason for doing this is that the fashion these days is for reverb to be pretty inconspicuous, but it still needs to be high enough in level to get the instruments to gel properly. If your reverb has a prominent frequency-response peak where little else is happening in your mix, this will make the reverb effect too audible well before the overall reverb level is high enough. A few well-placed reverb-return EQ cuts once the mix is up and running can therefore really pay dividends if you're after an up-front production sound that is nevertheless still cohesive.
__________________
POD PRO XT,Roland TD-20 E-kit,Fender Telecaster,Rickenbacher,Framis 12-String,Ibanaz Bass,CAD GXL3000 Pro Studio Mic,E-Bow and my "ol' best friend "REAPER"Since 2006
My songs here...[url]
http://www.mixposure.com/bardo/
bardo is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-26-2008, 03:59 PM   #5
bardo
Human being with feelings
 
bardo's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: San diego
Posts: 1,107
Default

To demonstrate the impact of these kinds of EQ changes, I used the same reverb effect from the previous example, on which I'd already used all the types of EQ I've been talking about, to create the ReverbEQFull audio file. I then dropped out each of the three filter bands (a high-pass filter at 240Hz, a very gentle low-pass filter rolling off from around 7kHz, and a 5dB peaking cut over a one-octave band at 580Hz) to generate the ReverbEQHPFOut, ReverbEQLPFOut, and ReverbEQPeakCutOut files.

The final reverb parameter that I regularly reach for is the pre-delay setting, which simply delays the onset of the reverb reflections by a specified amount — the longer the pre-delay, the closer the dry sounds appear to be in comparison with the boundaries of the simulated room. Some reverb plug-ins either have no pre-delay option or have a zero default setting, and if left unchanged this psychologically positions any sound source much further away from the listener, effectively right against one of the boundaries of the simulated room. This isn't the only problem, though, because what also happens is that the almost instantaneous early reflections of a reverb without pre-delay interact unpredictably with the dry sound in a way that can noticeably alter its tone. An immediate reverb onset can interfere with vocal intelligibility too, by blurring important consonants. Again, Mix Rescue candidates regularly encounter all these difficulties, simply because they ignore the pre-delay setting — and even if your reverb has no internal pre-delay, that's no excuse not to dial one in manually by chaining delay and reverb effects in series.



The Long & The Short Of It
On the face of it, if you're trying to get your tracks to sound as though they're all roughly in the same space, sending to a single global reverb from all of them is a common-sense approach. However, in my experience this puts a lot more pressure on the engineer to select and tweak that single reverb to get respectable results, so I usually suggest to those starting out that it's actually easier if they use two. Let me explain how this works.

The idea is that the two reverbs each serve different purposes, and they can be mixed and matched to cope with a range of recording types within most typical projects. The first reverb is short (usually well under a second in length) and with perhaps only 5-10ms of pre-delay. What this does is simply make disconnected sounds stick together more convincingly within the mix, as well as setting the distance between these sounds and the listener, but without making itself obviously audible as an added effect, given its minimal reverb 'tail'. (As a result, some engineers call this effect ambience rather than reverb.) The second reverb can then be set to give much more of a sense of an acoustic space, using a longer and perhaps slightly brighter reverb as required, but combining that with a fairly long pre-delay (maybe 30-70ms), to avoid the effect distancing sounds that it's applied to very much further.


Think about what reverb you want to apply to which instruments. In this picture, the overheads will already have captured some room sound, so while it makes sense to match the sound of your 'long' reverb to them, you might not want to add any reverb to them at all. The close mics, however, may benefit from some short reverb to stop them leaping out of the mix.
Having these two reverbs on hand, you can then deal with a variety of different situations. For example, a bone-dry synthesizer track that belongs in the track's background might need lots of short reverb to push it away from the listener, whereas a lead vocal might only have just enough to make it sound as if it belongs in the mix — indeed, it might have none at all if you want to achieve the most upfront sound, albeit at the risk of it sounding disconnected from the record as a whole. Both of the tracks may need a bit of the longer reverb, though, if you're trying to make them sound natural together.

To take another example, drum overhead mics that already have a lot of room sound on them could easily warrant no added reverb at all (although you might try to match the sound of the longer reverb to them somewhat, to get other, drier sounds to work alongside), but some of the accompanying close mics may benefit from some of the shorter variety, to avoid them advancing too far forward in the mix perspective. A retriggered drum sample, however, would probably need both reverbs, carefully applied, to blend it convincingly with the rest of the kit: the shorter reverb would primarily set its distance, while the longer could help to retrospectively teleport it into the original recording room.

Clearly, both of your reverbs will need to be tweaked to suit the track, but as long as you stay focused on their respective purposes you shouldn't go too far wrong. If the shorter reverb can't blend tracks together before it becomes too audible, try further reducing its reverb time or dial in some EQ cuts on the reverb return channel. If the longer reverb is making things sound distant, you can take off some high end to push it further into the background; if it's making things sound woolly, adjust that level/length ratio or crank up the return channel's high-pass filter.




Probably the most important thing to say about using any reverb, though, is that it's not a bad idea to err on the side of using too little in general, particularly if you anticipate using mastering-style dynamics processing on the final mix at a later stage, because this will tend to increase the levels of mix details such as reverb tails. In a lot of cases where an obviously reverberant sound isn't required, it's quite a useful little rule of thumb to set levels so that the reverb only really draws attention to itself if you mute the reverb return — that way you can be pretty sure it's only supporting, rather than overwhelming, the dry tracks.


Blending Your Mix With Delay Effects Instead
Delay is a much simpler effect than reverb; most of the time you can pretty much set the delay time (the distance between the echoes) and the feedback level (the number of echoes) and you're off! Perhaps it's because of this simplicity that so many musicians ignore it when it comes to the mix, or maybe it's just that they don't want any kind of distracting 'echo effect'. This is a shame, however, because delay is almost as useful as reverb when it comes to gluing instruments together at mixdown. In fact, in some senses delay is superior to reverb for many dry-sounding modern styles, as it can achieve cohesion without any obvious reverb tail, leaving individual sounds more upfront, distinct, and raw-sounding. It also tends to leave the mix sound much clearer, because it doesn't fill up all the gaps in the stereo field in the way reverb tends to.


Again, you could use only a single delay effect to pull your mix together, but I've found that setting up a couple of contrasting effects actually makes it easier to get results quickly: the first is a short 'slapback' delay, with 50-100ms delay time and zero feedback; and the second is a longer delay with some feedback and a delay time synchronised to the song's tempo. The short delay operates much like the short reverb I've already discussed, although you need to be careful feeding high levels of percussive sounds to it, as these can begin to sound as though they're flamming, interfering with the track's rhythmic pulse. Because the longer delay is tempo synchronised, it tucks itself into the mix in a very transparent way, creating the same kind of warmth and sustain as the longer of my two reverbs, but without adding much in the way of a sense of real space.

Much like the reverbs, delays also benefit from judicious EQ'ing to suit the track in hand. Fortunately, exactly the same principles apply when massaging the EQ settings into shape for either effect, so there's nothing more that needs to be said except that you should give it the time it needs. To illustrate the different flavour that delays offer compared to reverb, I've again set up a similar set of rough mixes of my demo song's chorus, but this time using the two delay effects: they're the ones with the DualDelay file names.
__________________
POD PRO XT,Roland TD-20 E-kit,Fender Telecaster,Rickenbacher,Framis 12-String,Ibanaz Bass,CAD GXL3000 Pro Studio Mic,E-Bow and my "ol' best friend "REAPER"Since 2006
My songs here...[url]
http://www.mixposure.com/bardo/
bardo is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-26-2008, 04:00 PM   #6
bardo
Human being with feelings
 
bardo's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: San diego
Posts: 1,107
Default

Bringing It All Together
Many professional mix engineers have a selection of standard effects that they set up before they even start to mix, having learnt from experience which units and algorithms have reliably delivered the results they need on project after project. The four specific effects that I've described here are designed to be fairly all-purpose in this way, and can be used in tandem to tie together mixes in a variety of different styles. For example, if your recording is already fairly live-sounding and mostly needs 'gluing together', the shorter reverb and delay can come to the fore, whereas the longer variants can be faded up when more space or sustain are required to enliven something like a heavily-overdubbed pop or electronica record. Alternatively, the delays might take precedence where a track already has the necessary spatial character (or just needs to sound very upfront), but lacks a satisfying resonance and fullness. To show how these four effects can fit together, I've mixed that demo chorus section one more time using all four effects at once, to create the AllEffectsWet file, and you can use AllEffectsDry to get a perspective on how much difference they're making.

There remains one final very important point to make, though: the effects levels on most modern records don't stay static throughout, but actually adapt to suit changes in the arrangement and underscore the long-term ebb and flow of the mix. That means you shouldn't expect the reverb and delay balance in your choruses necessarily to translate directly onto a contrasting verse arrangement. To illustrate this, I've created three longer audio files of the demo song (the Automation files), taking in the first verse as well as the chorus. For AutomationInactive I've just kept the same effect settings I used in the chorus, and you can hear that the effect levels become a bit overbearing in the sparser arrangement. However, just fading down the levels of the two delays and the longer reverb during the verse using mixer automation easily sorts out this problem for the AutomationActive file, with the beneficial side-effect that as the effects levels fade back up for the chorus section it makes the sound a bit more expansive and 'widescreen'. Again, compare these two audio files with the effectless AutomationDry for an idea of what the effects are adding overall.
__________________
POD PRO XT,Roland TD-20 E-kit,Fender Telecaster,Rickenbacher,Framis 12-String,Ibanaz Bass,CAD GXL3000 Pro Studio Mic,E-Bow and my "ol' best friend "REAPER"Since 2006
My songs here...[url]
http://www.mixposure.com/bardo/
bardo is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-26-2008, 04:02 PM   #7
bardo
Human being with feelings
 
bardo's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: San diego
Posts: 1,107
Default

Again sorry for the long post but I really got a lot of good info from this and wanted to share.
Also they mentioned that they used REAPER because of it's great side-chaining ablity.

Bardo
__________________
POD PRO XT,Roland TD-20 E-kit,Fender Telecaster,Rickenbacher,Framis 12-String,Ibanaz Bass,CAD GXL3000 Pro Studio Mic,E-Bow and my "ol' best friend "REAPER"Since 2006
My songs here...[url]
http://www.mixposure.com/bardo/
bardo is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-26-2008, 04:27 PM   #8
Art Evans
Mortal
 
Join Date: Feb 2006
Posts: 6,654
Default

And if the reverbs that come with Reaper don't seem to produce the results you want, there's any number of freeware ones out there. Find one that is a combo of the kind of sound you are looking for, coupled with ease of use.

http://www.gersic.com/plugins/index.php?daCat=12 should get you started.
Art Evans is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-28-2008, 12:51 PM   #9
martygras
Human being with feelings
 
martygras's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: In a cave
Posts: 672
Default

Bardo,
Thanks for the ideas.
Even though I've been mixing for years with rack gear, doing this through a DAW is definitely a different approach for me.

Almost like starting all over again. (almost)

I can't wait for your next novel.
__________________
Sometimes it's intermittent, sometimes it's not.
"Don't quantize me bro".
martygras is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-31-2008, 05:16 AM   #10
smast
Human being with feelings
 
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: London
Posts: 28
Default

Thank you - that's incredibly useful stuff!
smast is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-31-2008, 05:32 AM   #11
Triryche
Human being with feelings
 
Join Date: Jun 2008
Posts: 50
Default

Nice Post!!

I learned much from reading this.

Thanks!!
Triryche is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 07-31-2008, 03:57 PM   #12
bardo
Human being with feelings
 
bardo's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: San diego
Posts: 1,107
Default

Just copy and paste on my end.
This was from last month's Sound on Sound mag.

Bardo
__________________
POD PRO XT,Roland TD-20 E-kit,Fender Telecaster,Rickenbacher,Framis 12-String,Ibanaz Bass,CAD GXL3000 Pro Studio Mic,E-Bow and my "ol' best friend "REAPER"Since 2006
My songs here...[url]
http://www.mixposure.com/bardo/
bardo is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -7. The time now is 05:32 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions Inc.