Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Discuss music production with Ableton Live.
DangerousDave
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Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by DangerousDave » Tue Jan 03, 2012 7:14 am

Having never had formal instruction on production or ever reading the commonly suggested manuals (I know, someday) I have always been curious about the typical way to set up reverbs. I pretty much always use return tracks and sends, usually with two reverbs, one short, and one mid-ish in room size. I used to use reverb because a big washy tail sounds sexy on pretty much every lead but now I try to use it mostly for getting a cohesive, realistic(ish-as far as dance music goes) placement of instruments in the stereo field. SO:

How do you more experienced types set up verbs? I have heard some use three, different size room verbs, and set the instruments in the stereo field accordingly. What are other viable options? and for those of you who have worked in studios, what is common?

One of the things I am constantly surprised with in commercial tracks is how cohesive the sounds are in terms of how natural their placement sounds, and I understand this means more than just slapping reverb on there.

TL;DR: How do you set up your reverb(s)? Multiple returns with different settings? one verb, multiple send levels?
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LeifonMars
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by LeifonMars » Tue Jan 03, 2012 9:36 am

DangerousDave wrote:Having never had formal instruction on production or ever reading the commonly suggested manuals (I know, someday) I have always been curious about the typical way to set up reverbs. I pretty much always use return tracks and sends, usually with two reverbs, one short, and one mid-ish in room size. I used to use reverb because a big washy tail sounds sexy on pretty much every lead but now I try to use it mostly for getting a cohesive, realistic(ish-as far as dance music goes) placement of instruments in the stereo field. SO:

How do you more experienced types set up verbs? I have heard some use three, different size room verbs, and set the instruments in the stereo field accordingly. What are other viable options? and for those of you who have worked in studios, what is common?

One of the things I am constantly surprised with in commercial tracks is how cohesive the sounds are in terms of how natural their placement sounds, and I understand this means more than just slapping reverb on there.

TL;DR: How do you set up your reverb(s)? Multiple returns with different settings? one verb, multiple send levels?
Multiple insert (one for each track, all very short 10 to 45 ms, wetness varies) and then return track (always 100% wet) for special fxs like walls if noise. For final mixing stage I bounce all the returns (multiple times, if necessary, in case there are many tracks sent to them) and then eq them individually.
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DangerousDave
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by DangerousDave » Tue Jan 03, 2012 11:32 pm

LeifonMars wrote:
DangerousDave wrote:Having never had formal instruction on production or ever reading the commonly suggested manuals (I know, someday) I have always been curious about the typical way to set up reverbs. I pretty much always use return tracks and sends, usually with two reverbs, one short, and one mid-ish in room size. I used to use reverb because a big washy tail sounds sexy on pretty much every lead but now I try to use it mostly for getting a cohesive, realistic(ish-as far as dance music goes) placement of instruments in the stereo field. SO:

How do you more experienced types set up verbs? I have heard some use three, different size room verbs, and set the instruments in the stereo field accordingly. What are other viable options? and for those of you who have worked in studios, what is common?

One of the things I am constantly surprised with in commercial tracks is how cohesive the sounds are in terms of how natural their placement sounds, and I understand this means more than just slapping reverb on there.

TL;DR: How do you set up your reverb(s)? Multiple returns with different settings? one verb, multiple send levels?
Multiple insert (one for each track, all very short 10 to 45 ms, wetness varies) and then return track (always 100% wet) for special fxs like walls if noise. For final mixing stage I bounce all the returns (multiple times, if necessary, in case there are many tracks sent to them) and then eq them individually.
Hmm interesting, I have never heard of bouncing all return tracks, so then you essentially just have the return track as an audio track and then proceed to mix/eq? Cool, thanks for the info. I am not sure I have the cpu power to use a separate reverb on each track though. Is there a specific benefit from using a separate reverb directly on the track over using sends? I always liked sends because whatever sound you are using doesn't lose its power as you increase the reverb, since the dry signal is still present (plus less cpu loads of course.) But direct fx give a more realistic sound?

What about for drums? Same reverb as the other tracks, but maybe with different wetness and room size?

I was under the impression that you would want to use the same room size for each track, but utilize the wet/dry in order to place them in the stereo field accordingly. That way all the sounds feel as if they are in one space, but further forward/back depending on how wet you apply the reverb. Is this not the best way to go?

Thanks again for the info Mr. Mars.
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LeifonMars
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by LeifonMars » Wed Jan 04, 2012 1:08 am

DangerousDave wrote:Is there a specific benefit from using a separate reverb directly on the track over using sends?
Well, it depends on your preference. Let's take a drum kit for example:

You mic a kick most commonly by placing the mic into the kick drum.

You mic a snare by placing a mic on top and underneath of snaredrum.

You mic the toms individually, floor tom with 2 mics preferably.

Then comes overheads over or in front or behind the kit, ambient mics in the end of the room etc. (this is just how it's usually done, not that it could not be done differently).

Now if you listen to the output of all these mics, they have different space due to the placing of the mic and the position of the mic in the room. Some sound like the drums were closer and some like they were further away. By creating space individually on each track you can control this and I find it sounds cooler when the individual elements of sound are coming from separate distances.

Then again, I often route groups of different tracks that I think should sound like being in the same space through a bus reverb as well.

Bouncing the return tracks is a trick I learned from a top producer in Finland; he felt like he got the ultimate control over return tracks this way and very often I do the same since I find it makes my mixes sound better.
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davros303
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by davros303 » Wed Jan 04, 2012 1:20 am

Hi Leifon,

Can you please explain the idea of "bouncing" your return tracks. Does this mean that you export the output of the returns to a separate audio file and then apply EQ to that file before reintroducing to the final mix? Why is this superior to simply placing an EQ on the output of the return in real time?

Cheers,
Davros

LeifonMars
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by LeifonMars » Wed Jan 04, 2012 1:30 am

davros303 wrote:Hi Leifon,

Can you please explain the idea of "bouncing" your return tracks. Does this mean that you export the output of the returns to a separate audio file and then apply EQ to that file before reintroducing to the final mix? Why is this superior to simply placing an EQ on the output of the return in real time?

Cheers,
Davros
The idea is this: let's assume you have multiple tracks going into a bus that consists a long reverb. In case you just place an eq after the reverb on the bus you sure get to eqing the sum, but if you bounce every return bus of each track to an audio file and eq them individually you get to control which range each track in the sum fills. I'm not suggesting that it's the only or always the best way to go around, it just works very often in the process of cleaning up a mix.
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davros303
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by davros303 » Wed Jan 04, 2012 1:44 am

LeifonMars wrote:
davros303 wrote:
The idea is this: let's assume you have multiple tracks going into a bus that consists a long reverb. In case you just place an eq after the reverb on the bus you sure get to eqing the sum, but if you bounce every return bus of each track to an audio file and eq them individually you get to control which range each track in the sum fills. I'm not suggesting that it's the only or always the best way to go around, it just works very often in the process of cleaning up a mix.
If separate EQ of each sound going into the reverb bus is the objective, why wouldn't you run a separate instance of the reverb on each sound and EQ outside a bus?

LeifonMars
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by LeifonMars » Wed Jan 04, 2012 2:03 am

davros303 wrote:
LeifonMars wrote:
davros303 wrote:
The idea is this: let's assume you have multiple tracks going into a bus that consists a long reverb. In case you just place an eq after the reverb on the bus you sure get to eqing the sum, but if you bounce every return bus of each track to an audio file and eq them individually you get to control which range each track in the sum fills. I'm not suggesting that it's the only or always the best way to go around, it just works very often in the process of cleaning up a mix.
If separate EQ of each sound going into the reverb bus is the objective, why wouldn't you run a separate instance of the reverb on each sound and EQ outside a bus?
Of course you can do that as well, but I was talking about special fx kind of reverbs etc, which are applied to signal maybe once or twice during a tune (what ever you find easier to automate).

Then again, as this producer friend of mine said, he trusts more in a waveform :wink: .
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Muzik 4 Machines
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by Muzik 4 Machines » Wed Jan 04, 2012 2:28 am

master reverbs on return tracks with aux sends
special fx inserted on relevant tracks

i'm from the old school, in my days, having2 reverb unit was prohibitive so i learns it the correct way with sends, but sometimes in logic the channel strip has a verb on it and i just leave it there, but when final mixing, i remove all those "inserts" reverbs and use sends as i learned in school in in live situations

i3igTripplets
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by i3igTripplets » Wed Jan 04, 2012 4:21 am

Like my women, 100% wet, then about 90% dry

hps909
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by hps909 » Wed Jan 04, 2012 5:47 am

on single source reverbs you can also side chain a compressor to the reverb on a send using it's source as the key.... so you get better separation of the track and the reverb cleans them up quite a bit especially with long tails .. works well on delays aswell
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kev herb
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by kev herb » Wed Jan 04, 2012 2:16 pm

hps909 wrote:on single source reverbs you can also side chain a compressor to the reverb on a send using it's source as the key.... so you get better separation of the track and the reverb cleans them up quite a bit especially with long tails .. works well on delays aswell
+1 also it prevents any phase problems caused by the reverb tail overlapping and playing the same time as the source which could effect your mono play back :wink:
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UncleAge
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by UncleAge » Wed Jan 04, 2012 2:17 pm

hps909 wrote:on single source reverbs you can also side chain a compressor to the reverb on a send using it's source as the key.... so you get better separation of the track and the reverb cleans them up quite a bit especially with long tails .. works well on delays aswell
Can you clarify this a bit more for me? Are you sidechaining to gate the tail or to gate the attack (delayed) of the reverb? My guess is that if you gate the attack you could lose the character of the early reflections. And if you s-chain the tail then you just end up with a gated verb, no?

UncleAge
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by UncleAge » Wed Jan 04, 2012 2:19 pm

kev herb wrote:
hps909 wrote:on single source reverbs you can also side chain a compressor to the reverb on a send using it's source as the key.... so you get better separation of the track and the reverb cleans them up quite a bit especially with long tails .. works well on delays aswell
+1 also it prevents any phase problems caused by the reverb tail overlapping and playing the same time as the source which could effect your mono play back :wink:
I learned something new, thanks :idea:

florian_bl
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Re: Reverb Theory: How do you set yours up?

Post by florian_bl » Wed Jan 04, 2012 6:22 pm

Have a look here for a couple of tips:

http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=172219

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