What 3rd Party Reverb do you use in Live?

[mholloway]

I know questions like this usually just result in a thread-long list of every known product in the category, but what I'm hoping is that in addition to simply posting the name of what you're using, you could also give some insight into -why- that particular reverb works for you.

I'm becoming insanely picky about which verbs I use, and while I realize this is a rabbit hole with no real end in sight, I'm curious what are people's current go-to 3rd party reverbs when working in Live. I've relied on Arts Acoustic Reveb for years now, with four instances loaded onto 4 sends in my default template, ranging from ambience to a huge hall.

What I'm looking for, though, is something really transparent -- the kind of verb where the newly inhabited space of the instrument is what is noticed, not the sound of the verb itself (e.g. the shimmer or sparkle or whatever). With live's verb and Arts Acoustic, my attempts to, for example, make a kick or snare sound "distant" usually wind up in larges washes of verb coating the sound, which is not what I'm looking for. If possible, I want the simulated space to make it sound "far away" but without all the whooshy reverb. And yes, I've tried dialing in every sort of combination and, for my tastes, I'm just not getting there yet.

thanks, -M

[timday]

Well I could go on about how I like the convolution pro (sounds at least as good as Altiverb as far as I can tell) but you know what? The best results I'm getting at the moment are by putting a SE2000 mic at the back of the room, playing the track out the speakers and recording what the mic picks up as a reverb track.

SE2000s cost about 80 GBP. If you can afford a more expensive mic it would probably sound better as well. A bit time consuming but worth it.

[electroandy]

Go to reverb for me is 2cAudio Aether. Very flexible verb with extensive settings, for not to much cash. Or try the 112db Redline reverb. It's good sounding and very easy to use.

[login]

Valhalla Vintage Verb: nice on CPu, sounds icnredible good and also has three modes to get the vintage vibe. Few controls, easy to use. Great interface.

[TomViolenz]

The best affordable algo-reverbs at the moment are the Valhalla ones. Pretty light on CPU too.

The sound is in the direction you describe: creating a convincing room feeling, without an obvious reverb sound. (Depending on how you use it of course )

With enough money, I would go for the Lexicon ones. Best smoothest algos I heard.

And then there are of course convolution reverbs, but if you have Suite you should check out the provided M4L one before spending money. I think it is quite good.

[tedlogan]

I like the M4L Convolution Reverb Pro. I have two Return instances in my default template - a very short smallroom one which is occasionally used on drums and a general medium hall one for just about everything else. The lows are EQed out below 250hz and the highs gently cut around 10k just to avoid muddiness. I don't really know what I'm doing, but it sounds nice if used subtly on each track just to add space to a mix and glue things just a bit more together. Reverb without hearing reverb, but when taken away, you instantly know something's not right/missing. I turn the sends up quite a bit more on orchestral music.

There are sooo many impulse responses to experiment with still, and so many of them sound wonderful actually.

I wouldn't put much value in my opinion though. I've only used this reverb, Live's default one, ZRev, Bazille's (which is niiiiccce for what it emulates) and played around with the Uhbik demo's reverb.

I don't think my ears are experienced enough with reverbs to really recognize the finer details and how they translate in a mix. But as I said, M4L CRP sounds great to me.

[eyeknow]

I have a very tough time with this.

I the RC verbs from NI and they are very good. But, I get a bit bored with them at times. I've been trying a million and one verbs and liked the hofa convo verb best. But, it has dropouts for some reason. It doesn't in studio one with the exact same settings. So ditch that.

I picked up the RVB500 from overtone DSP. It's not a "is all" but it's a terrific character verb.

Valhalla vintage verb is back on my radar. I sold it a million years ago because I thought it was redundant. I'ma check it out again.

Special mention to eareakon's verb. Nice, smooth, easy to use, but it wasn't 100 dollars worth for me

[Machinesworking]

For what you're looking for you want a good convolution reverb.
If you can handle dongles/iLok, then there isn't anything that compares to Altiverb.
Audio Ease has been recording impulses in acoustic spaces for 15 odd years now, their library simply can't be beat. Altiverb is a well designed convolution reverb, but what you're paying for is all the time that vast library cost to make.

Barring that, using the Max convolution reverb with impulse responses from around the web would also work.

What I use right now is the Lexicon MPX and the Eventide Ultra Reverb. They're both pretty dammed good, but what you're describing is a convolution reverb for sure.

[Steve Glen]

2C Audio's Aether!!! this thing is amazing. There are two separate engines: one for ER and one for LR.

If you don't know anything about sound design for reverb, the supplied presets are fantastic.

You can scroll through presets just for ER, or LR independently.

Tons of options and ways to find the sound of your reverb. Intelligent programming with many features. I love the sound.

[ImNotDedYet]

2 for me: Valhalla Vintage for more effect-based verb and Acon Digital's Verberate for more natural, subtle verbs.

Sounds like Verberate might be something to demo based on what you're looking for, although convolution verbs might be truly what you're after.

[antarktika]

My answer as regards what 3rd party verbs I use would be Audio Damage's EOS, and 2CAudio's Aether, EOS for that epic superhall shimmer you seem to want to avoid, and Aether when I want tons of control over every aspect of the sound. Though I'd probably also somewhat agree with whoever said to get a good convolution verb for what you are describing. I've only ever used the M4L Convolution Pro, but it definitely seems more "transparent" or, in the background as opposed to seeming obvious!
I assume that you know about the whole early reflection thing already, but I'd play with that if you want it to sound far away, you know, shorter tail, but with a bit of early reflection so it sounds like it had to travel a ways before bouncing back, instead of just sounding like it is bouncing all over the place in an echoey room? I guess in that way Aether might actually be decent for that kinda thing, now that I think more about it.

[mholloway]

Great responses and ideas in here, thanks guys! I'm going to mess with the M4L convolution pro to begin with -- forgot I even owned that thing! (there's tons of Max stuff I keep meaning to check out further, damn.. this will be a great place to start).

[PHY6]

Another 2c audio fan here... I'm using the b2 instead. Great reverb.
Can't really tell how much it differs to aether. But it's got huge reverbs and nice drum room verbs also.

[fishmonkey]

Great responses and ideas in here, thanks guys! I'm going to mess with the M4L convolution pro to begin with -- forgot I even owned that thing! (there's tons of Max stuff I keep meaning to check out further, damn.. this will be a great place to start).

this is a really good impulse response library (donationware):

http://www.samplicity.com/bricasti-m7-i ... responses/

[cotdagoo]

Valhalla Vintage Verb: nice on CPu, sounds icnredible good and also has three modes to get the vintage vibe. Few controls, easy to use. Great interface.

Been getting lots of use out of Valhalla's Vintage Verb too, use it first & foremost and the interface is pretty simple for anyone to get a grip on.

Mangleverb by Audio Damage has been a bit of fun to mess around with too