When is the best moment to use reverb on vocal?

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kys1991

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Hi,

1) Anyone know when is the best time to use reverb in vocal?
2) Does reverb create echo effect?

Thanks... Appreciate lot... :D
 
kys1991 said:
Hi,

1) Anyone know when is the best time to use reverb in vocal?
2) Does reverb create echo effect?

Thanks... Appreciate lot... :D
Click to expand...

could you elaborate?

even without getting more specific, the answer to any "best" question is "depends". you gotta experiment and listen and have some idea in your head of what you want the end product to sound like. for some people the best time to use reverb is never, for others the best time is all the time.
 
aaronmcoleman said:
could you elaborate?

even without getting more specific, the answer to any "best" question is "depends". you gotta experiment and listen and have some idea in your head of what you want the end product to sound like. for some people the best time to use reverb is never, for others the best time is all the time.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your information :) In fact I am just a starter in playing these recording stuff, so I hope to learn more about when to use for reverb effect without pulling down the entire audio quality.. :)
 
Reverb won't affect audio quality as such.

Too much reverb will make whatever you've recorded unpleasant to listen to.

It's like adding salt . . . too much makes it inedible. Add reverb to taste.
 
When you envision the singer standing on a mountain top, making big dramatic gestures, with long hair blown back by the wind, and the camera flying around.

Seriously though, listening is key. Just do what you think sounds good. If you think the recording needs some reverb, just try it out. If it doesn't work, just remove it. If it does, adjust it to your liking. For me, a good rule of thumb is adding enough to make it sound a little bigger but not enough to notice it in the mix. That keeps it natural for me. But maybe you want to go crazy. Just listen.
 
It depends on what effect you are going for, and personal preference. Some people hate reverb. Me, I usually add just enough to a vocal in a pop/rock mix to make the vocal sit better in the mix or sound fuller. It can also be used to effect as someone else said, if you are trying to make the singer sound as if they were singing in a cave or soaring from the mountain tops. Not sure how often that situation comes up in a song that doesn't sound completely ridiculous though :)
 
A trick I've been using recently is where you automate the send to your reverb bus during the song, so (often but not always) you have a more dry 'in your face' verse sound, then dial in more 'verb for a more epic sounding chorus, then back down again for the second verse.

I think this is quite a new trick, maybe 10 years old or so, but I could be wrong on that.

Going into detail, the amount I like on the dryer portion (compared to bone dry) is kind of like the difference between someone talking directly in your ear (bone dry-possibly annoying) and someone speaking at normal conversational distance (sounds dry but isn't)
Choosing the right size reverb on the bus is also important as too big a room size and tail will flood the mix before you can turn up the send enough to smooth your vocal, and too small (for my taste anyway) sounds to me a bit like a boxy bedroom (which I don't need a plug in to achieve).

One last thing, when turning up the send for the chorus don't go crazy, just enough to make it sound big but not wash out the mix, there's a fine line between epic and tragic.
 
I hate reverb!! Don't get me wrong, I love the effect, I just hate dealing with it. Nothing worse than a bad reverb or the misuse of it. Still a few suggestions tho. Most of the time you want to bus your source signal to a reverb aux track. Much easier to blend and control it if its on a seperate track. Always listen to your reverb with the the mix with the source track muted. It's much easier to set the proper level, decay, pre-delay,length, eq etc without the source track. It's always a good idea to eq your reverb the way you want it with a seperate eq. If you are trying to tempo sync your reverb and do not have that option in your reverb, divide 60.000 by your beats per minute. That will give you miliseconds. Or divide BPM/60 and that will give you seconds.
you can also mess with panning your send the same as your track.
 
Elton123 said:
I hate reverb!! Don't get me wrong, I love the effect, I just hate dealing with it. Nothing worse than a bad reverb or the misuse of it. Still a few suggestions tho. Most of the time you want to bus your source signal to a reverb aux track. Much easier to blend and control it if its on a seperate track. Always listen to your reverb with the the mix with the source track muted. It's much easier to set the proper level, decay, pre-delay,length, eq etc without the source track. It's always a good idea to eq your reverb the way you want it with a seperate eq. If you are trying to tempo sync your reverb and do not have that option in your reverb, divide 60.000 by your beats per minute. That will give you miliseconds. Or divide BPM/60 and that will give you seconds.
you can also mess with panning your send the same as your track.
Click to expand...

Previously i wasn't know much about reverb..after I have known about it, same as what you said, i muted the source track and listen the recording :) May i know do you usually apply reverb after a delay?
 
kys1991 said:
Previously i wasn't know much about reverb..after I have known about it, same as what you said, i muted the source track and listen the recording :) May i know do you usually apply reverb after a delay?
Click to expand...
Try both, and also try delay on a separate aux.
 
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