how do you create a reverse cymbal effect?

Nola

Nola

Well-known member
just like this.
https://www.freesound.org/people/JarredGibb/sounds/244855/

i have a wav file of a hit but i can't figure out how to do the above to it. thanks!

I'm trying to recreate a reverse cymbal that i used to have on my sr-16 (sadly i sold it).
Here's the alesis sample (10 second mark):

I don't need it exact. I'm just trying to recreate something like that with a wav cymbal hit I already have and keep it in time.

If this is in the wrong section the mods can feel free to move it. Sorry, I wasn't sure where to post it "recording" or "drums".
 
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Yeah, it really is that simple.
Pretty much any DAW should have a wav reverse option.

I use it for piano chords all the time. :)
 
That's what I thought.
But when I reverse the wav, the entire file flips, and the cymbal goes out of time because it's now on the other end of the file. It's weird.

I have the hit 8 times in the song so it's in a long wav file (like 4 minutes with a lot of blank space between hits). Maybe that's the problem? Do I need to cut it down to just one of the cymbal hit and reverse just the one?

I'll try that now. Also, once it's reversed, is there a way to stretch the front part (the tail in the original recording) of the hit so it's longer than in the original recording?
 
Nola said:
That's what I thought.
Do I need to cut it down to just one of the cymbal hit and reverse just the one?

I'll try that now. Also, once it's reversed, is there a way to stretch the front part (the tail in the original recording) of the hit so it's longer than in the original recording?
Click to expand...

Yes use one hit, place it in the song so that it sounds right depending on if it ends on the beat (the usual) or starts on the beat. Time stretch it to fit.

Alan.
 
Just cut out one hit, reverse it, then place it in the song where it belongs. I always put it on its own track.
 
Farview said:
Just cut out one hit, reverse it, then place it in the song where it belongs. I always put it on its own track.
Click to expand...

Thanks. Yeah the problem is I had all the hits in the same wav file.

Do you guys know a way to stretch or lengthen the tail of the original hit (i.e. when it's reversed I want the intro of the hit to be longer and lead into the beat b/c it starts on the "+" of "4e+a"). So I want to lengthen it to start on the "+" beat and then end on the 1 beat of the next measure. I can do it by ear if you guys can teach me how to lengthen it.
 
Nola said:
Thanks. Yeah the problem is I had all the hits in the same wav file.

Do you guys know a way to stretch or lengthen the tail of the original hit (i.e. when it's reversed I want the intro of the hit to be longer and lead into the beat b/c it starts on the "+" of "4e+a"). So I want to lengthen it to start on the "+" beat and then end on the 1 beat of the next measure. I can do it by ear if you guys can teach me how to lengthen it.
Click to expand...

In reaper you place the pointer at the beginning of the wav, press alt-click and a little grabbing hand should appear. Use the mouse to stretch the wav to where you want it.
 
Yeah, Reaper is alt+drag to stretch. By default it should "Preserve Pitch..." You can only really take that so far without hearing artifacts, but it doesn't sound like you're going very far with it. Without "Preserve Pitch..." you can avoid the artifacts altogether, but of course the pitch changes. In extreme cases, it would be better to use a sample with a longer decay to begin with, but sometimes just adding a bit of reverb to the sample before you reverse it can help.
 
I definitely got it to sound exactly how I wanted, but the problem is for some reason it's only in the right speaker, even though it says it's a stereo file. Anyone know why this would be?
 
I don't know reaper, but are there stereo tracks and mono tracks? Did you put it on a mono track that is panned to the right?

Is the stereo track panned to the right?
 
It says mono in track, stereo out, and panning is C. The file is stereo. I wonder if when I took the sample if the cymbal was off to one side on the kit so it's leaning that way.
I'll look into it more, thanks.
 
Hm, I think I got it now. I'm not even sure what I did. I closed the program, reopened, and now it sounds stereo. Crazy!
 
i reverse guitar wav's all the time. for fun, i'll throw reversed clips of one track onto other tracks just to see how it sounds. doesn't need to be on the same channel if it's for effect. i'll take a distorted guitar wav and reverse it onto the vocal channel or a drum channel. just adds more fx without me having to now create a new channel and take up processing power for whatever i'm intending.
 
I'm not a huge fan of actual reversed sounds most of the time, but I have done quite a bit with reverse reverbs and delays. Reverse the original track, apply FX, and the reverse that. One of my personal favorite songs on my last album was "written" by putting one hit of each string on a guitar and a bass (some Em something chord) on a separate track. Then I reversed all of those single hits and added to each an infinite delay set to some prime number multiple of the beat. This created a "pattern" that doesn't repeat for like billions of beats. I rendered a certain length of each of those tracks and then reversed all of them so that they sound normal again, but they all hit together on the last beat of the song. Bused guitar tracks together and bass tracks together and applied amp sims to the buses so it almost sounds like just a single guitar and bass playing some off-kilter syncopated thing. Added vocals and trimmed from the front end to fit. I named it "Falling Together".
 
Earlier on there was mention of the reverse cymbal being too long or too short. All I do is record the hit at the right level, and then apply a fade to make sure it is gone in the desired time. Then reverse it and it fades in correctly for the track.
 
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