Reverb Dynamics

[BeniRose]

I've been mixing using the built in reverbs that came with Logic Pro, and they get the job done, but I'm struggling to find the right volume for my reverbs. The problem is, I don't like my verbs to be super noticable, so i'll keep them back in the mix, or find one that isn't so obvious, but then when the dynamics change like some imstruments drop out or something, it sticks out like a sore thumb. Now I know the obvious fix to this is automating the volume on my reverb sends, but I wasn't sure if this was the proper solution or if the problem was rooted in something else in my verb, maybe if I'm using the wrong kind or the ones logic provides are just really obnoxious and difficult to keep subtle in dynamics. Is anyone else having similar problems, especially on vocals?

 

[Simman]

I think you've answered your own question. There is nothing wrong with automating the send. There is also no right or wrong type of reverb since it usually comes down to whatever works for the given situation and what you're trying to achieve. Every situation is different.

"Timing" the reverbs has more to do with how well the verb "plays" in the track than anything else, IMO. Improper attention to the timing (especially with mulitpe verbs) just ends up blurring everything.

 

[mixsit]

Same same and to add, perhaps tailor the verb style' for where it is most exposed like that, work up from there. Or.. maybe two style/setups, and/or even automate within the verb parameters.

p.s. Verb is easy. The 'Right verb.. not so. I hear ya!

 

[Grahamrunsran]

Don't automate the reverb....

Beni, hey man if I where you I wouldn't automate the reverb it's self, I'd automate the sends to the aux you have your reverb on, that way you wont have to worry about the weird things turning reverb down will do to the ear in how it perceives the space of the reverb. You will essentially be controlling how distant the sources in the recording appear to be from the listener.

Check out some of the free convolution reverb plugins if you're on a tight budget. Much better technology that other reverbs: http://www.kvraudio.com/get/3055.html

I use the Waves IR convolution reverb when I'm mixing and need reverb. It's smokin,' but expensive.

 

[Grahamrunsran]

also- try putting an eq on your verb if you havn't already, usually cutting some hi's will help a ton with the problems you described.

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

I agree with all of the above as possibilities, and would like to add another to the pot (you'll just have to try and see what works best for your particular situation):

Automating the FX (send or return) to get the "same amount" of reverb is indeed sometimes desirable, but it is actually creating a more unnatural type of reverberation (there is no send or return reverb automation in the real natural world, there is only the existing ambiance. ) If that's indeed what you're looking for - and it often may be - that's fine, read all of the above.

But if you're looking for more of a "natural" sound, such as actually placing the instrument in a realistic space, then I'd say that maybe you'd want to try using the more dynamic parts of the track as the gauge/guide for setting your reverb level instead of the quieter parts. Set the reverb to sound "right" or maybe just a small touch wetter than "right" on the louder sections and use that for your reverb setting.

You may not hear much, if any, reverb on the quieter parts, but often when you consciously hear verb on the quieter parts it can mean you have too much verb. Besides, in real live situations you often won't hear verb at quieter volume levels anyway, and it's only when things get big that the verb really comes into play.

An additional bonus is that if you're applying verb to more than just that one track, your mix won't muddy up anywhere near as quickly as it will if you automate.

G.

 

[Chibi Nappa]

also- try putting an eq on your verb if you havn't already, usually cutting some hi's will help a ton with the problems you described.

Yes, yes, yes.


To make reverb fade into the music:
Cut the high eq on the 'verb return channel
Set the verb pre-delay to the tempo of your music.


For example, say I'm putting 'verb on the snare. After the snare hits, the reverb starts to sound at the exact instant of the next hi-hat hit.

So we have: Snare -> silence -> hi-hat and snare verb together

You don't notice the reverb because the hi-hat steals all of your attention. But it is there and it adds space. It is something you would notice if you took it away.


Heck, if you really want it to be invisible don't even use reverb. Just use a delay with no feedback. Again, set in time with the music.

 

[BeniRose]

I agree with all of the above as possibilities, and would like to add another to the pot (you'll just have to try and see what works best for your particular situation):

Automating the FX (send or return) to get the "same amount" of reverb is indeed sometimes desirable, but it is actually creating a more unnatural type of reverberation (there is no send or return reverb automation in the real natural world, there is only the existing ambiance. ) If that's indeed what you're looking for - and it often may be - that's fine, read all of the above.

But if you're looking for more of a "natural" sound, such as actually placing the instrument in a realistic space, then I'd say that maybe you'd want to try using the more dynamic parts of the track as the gauge/guide for setting your reverb level instead of the quieter parts. Set the reverb to sound "right" or maybe just a small touch wetter than "right" on the louder sections and use that for your reverb setting.

You may not hear much, if any, reverb on the quieter parts, but often when you consciously hear verb on the quieter parts it can mean you have too much verb. Besides, in real live situations you often won't hear verb at quieter volume levels anyway, and it's only when things get big that the verb really comes into play.

An additional bonus is that if you're applying verb to more than just that one track, your mix won't muddy up anywhere near as quickly as it will if you automate.

G.

So I tried to post a reply to this about 3 weeks ago, but the server went down after I hit submit, and I didn't want to retype it all because I was at work, so I'm just now responding!

I agree with you Glen, automating reverb wouldn't feel natural for me to do, because in a proper environment, it's not natural. I would do this if I was going for an effect, and I often have shot up send volumes or aux volumes in order to achieve this, but that's not what I'm going for here.

I think calling this reverb dynamics was maybe the wrong word choice. The content of the track I have the reverb on isn't specifically dynamic, it's the whole song I'm talking about. For example, if I set the reverb on the vocals so that it comes through the track and warms them up when everything is in full swing, it's way too obvious when the drums and bass drop out.

I'm just using the convolution verbs that come with Logic Pro, so maybe part of it is that they aren't that great. But I also just don't really know what I'm doing. Maybe I'm using the wrong kinds of verbs in the wrong places. Specifically I find this happening on snare drums and vocals. Do you have any other recommendation for the problem now that I cleared it up a bit? I am going to try bringing some of the highs down on my verbs.

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

if I set the reverb on the vocals so that it comes through the track and warms them up when everything is in full swing, it's way too obvious when the drums and bass drop out.
...
Do you have any other recommendation for the problem now that I cleared it up a bit?

I still offer the possibility that you're simply adding more reverb than you really want/need during the denser parts of the mix, and that's why it sticks out so much when things get quiet. IMHO/IME, probably the number one mistake that most people new to this make with reverb (including me for a long time ) is to simply use too much of it. I'd at least try setting it so that it sounded good during the quiet parts instead of during the busy parts. It may or may not sound like there's not enough during the busy parts, but you might just find that it actually works that way. if not, then just try nudging the verb up just a little; possibly a compromise level between the two may work.

If you strike out with all of that, then next I personally would probably try would be quickening the decay on the reverb setting so that the verb doesn't have as much time to "stick out" in the quiet parts.

The final alternative (off the top of my head) would be to keep the longer delay, but to throw fade outs on the vocal track over the reverb tails in the quiet section so that you get the full verb during the busy parts, but don't let them stick around for quite as long when it's quiet. That's not 110% "natural", but sometimes just a little unnaturalness can actually work better for the recording.

G.

 

[noisewreck]

Do you sing more quietly in the sparse sections vs. the full sections? If so, you might want to setup your send pre-fader, and compress the vocal somewhat heavily. What this will do is keep the vocal volume steady, while the reverb will open up when you're singing more loudly, since the reverb send will be pre-fader/pre-compression.

Hope that makes sense.

 

[witzendoz]

Why not compress the send (signal) going to the reverb, that way you could compress the reverb signal harder without affecting the original vocal. Whit this set up if there is a loud vocal peak the reverb won't take off.

Cheers

alan

 

[BeniRose]

Thanks for replying Glen. I actually wasn't sure if anyone would because I was pretty much resurrecting a 3 week old thread! I will definitely try getting my verb levels in the quieter parts of the song. Do you set your verbs when you solo the track or while it's in the mix?

Here's a perfect example of what I'm talking about. If you listen to this track I did for a friend of mine, the vocals sound pretty much exactly how I want them in the verses while the guitar's playing, it has a good spacial depth to it I think, if anything it just has a tad too much verb on it, but to me it sounds natural. However, when it gets to the chorus and the guitar cuts out, it sounds like it's swimming in cathedrals. How do I get that spacial definition without having a reverb that trails so horrendously when nothing else is playing?

Also, here's another song I did for the same girl, and honestly I think I didn't put enough reverb on some things (or maybe not on the right things), because it's lacking a little bit of spacial quality to it, so any feedback you have on it regarding the reverb is appreciated (I'm actually going to start another thread for feedback on this mix)

But I appreciate everything you've said so far. I'm looking forward to a new project to try to implement some of these suggestions

 

[BeniRose]

Do you sing more quietly in the sparse sections vs. the full sections? If so, you might want to setup your send pre-fader, and compress the vocal somewhat heavily. What this will do is keep the vocal volume steady, while the reverb will open up when you're singing more loudly, since the reverb send will be pre-fader/pre-compression.

Hope that makes sense.

Hey, thanks for the suggestion. I don't think this is the problem, I think it's more of using a super wet reverb that sounds good in the mix when everything (drums, bass, guitar) is playing (because it's mostly getting covered up) but when things start to drop down on the instrumental front, the verbs really stand out.

I actually do most of my sends prefader, but I'm having an inverse problem with my snare's reverb, where I'm setting the reverb to sound good for most of the mix, but there's always a few hits the drummer does that are extra loud, which cause the reverb to really flare up and become over-apparent, so I may try to the opposite of your suggestion and put an extra compressor on the reverb send to keep that from happening. Thanks!

 

[noisewreck]

Why not compress the send (signal) going to the reverb, that way you could compress the reverb signal harder without affecting the original vocal. Whit this set up if there is a loud vocal peak the reverb won't take off.

Cheers

alan

Because that will do the opposite of what we're trying to achieve here. With my method, it will be more dry when singing quietly and more wet when singing more loudly, since the actual volume of the vocal itself (due to compression) will stay the same, however the signal going to the reverb during loud sections will be louder, since it will be pre-compressor.

With your signal chain, it will be more wet during quiet sections and dry during loud sections. It's a good effect in it's own right, and very useful when trying not to clutter up the mix when it gets busy, however, that's not what the OP is looking for.

 

[witzendoz]

I may be missing the point of what you are trying to do?

Ok, what I was suggesting was going to stop it getting louder when the vocal was loud, I.E set the reverb to be correct during quite passages but not let it increase drastically during loud phrases.

If you want the reverb to get louder as the vocal gets louder then just send a vocal aux to the reverb so that as the vocal level increases the reverb increases.

You could just automate the reverb level (out to mix) for different parts of the song.

Cheers

Alan.

 

[noisewreck]

I may be missing the point of what you are trying to do?

Ok, what I was suggesting was going to stop it getting louder when the vocal was loud, I.E set the reverb to be correct during quite passages but not let it increase drastically during loud phrases.

Yup, I got what you were saying. We're trying to do the opposite. Keep the vocal level the same, but have the reverb come out more during the busy phrases.

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

when it gets to the chorus and the guitar cuts out, it sounds like it's swimming in cathedrals. How do I get that spacial definition without having a reverb that trails so horrendously when nothing else is playing?

I listened to "Moscow" and I hear what you're talking about. I think the biggest issue is something you actually hinted at an answer to in the above quote: i.e. it's sounds like she's swimming in a cathedral because she *IS* swimming in a cathedral . You're using a very large space as the reverb model, and when the instruments rest you can hear the whole cathedral around her.

I don't think it's a question of wet/dry mix so much as it is the choice of room size/model you're using in the reverb. Maybe if you switched to something a bit smaller like a "medium hall" or "warm space"' (the names may be different in Logic's verb), you should still be able to get a nice wet verb in the verses without getting such extreme spaciousness and slow decay in the chorus.

G.

 

[BeniRose]

Yeah, I think I'm realizing that too. I wish I knew how to pick out a good verb! A lot of my favourite records use long verbs, but for some reason they just don't seem to be swimming in it. I guess I'll have to try to start with something of the small and medium variety before I make my way to the larger spaces. I tend to feel like my reverb selection either has that slapback echoey bathroom sound or that giant soaked cathedral sound. Like I said, maybe the verbs in logic aren't that great, but then again, maybe I just don't know how to find what I'm looking for. Cheers for the help, and any links or suggestions you have at honing my ears to find better suited reverbs are also appreciated

 

[BeniRose]

IYou're using a very large space as the reverb model, and when the instruments rest you can hear the whole cathedral around her.

Just reading back over it again, this line stuck out to me. I know this is true, but when the instruments are in action, it's swimming in just the right amount to me. I'm still unsure what kind of verb I want to get this sound that's of the medium or small sizes. I guess I'll just have to go through every single one!

 

[TexRoadkill]

It's pretty common to automate the reverb sends or volume. I like to setup multiple reverbs and delays for fast/loud or long/quiet parts and then automate the sends to those. You might want one sound for a verse and another for a chorus, etc.

I sometimes run the reverb through a limiter if I need it to sit up in the mix better. It can also make a big difference if you route your Reverb send pre or post compression on the track that is being affected.