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Post by popmann on Mar 29, 2014 21:35:16 GMT -6
Small ambiences are important when faking things with DI--be it a sampled piano or a DI amp emulator. In fact, for years, I used a tube preamp/cab sim (analog)....blended a mono small room ambience in (digital)...and pumped that to analog tape. 456 into the red....done. The flaws showed in that when I moved to digital so I had to go back to old school, but....the idea is solid. Sounds without ACTUAL ambiences, whether from a completely deadened home studio or DI'd faux sources NEED some kind of small ambience to approach sounding real or natural.
I used to use a single reverb instance JUST for the snare--and not to make it some huge 80s drum sound...I mean to make it sound natural--even when it's REAL....a snare NEEDS a room mic...else a faux room ambience to sound like our ears hear a snare drum. A 57 on it's top is NOT how our ears hear a snare drum.
I actually bought into the Kurzweil FX units (first a Rumour laters a KSP8) due to buying a keyboard with the algorithms and in programming it seeing how lousy the samples actually were--it was teh ambeinces in the programs that were making said samples sound so "natural"--it has a way of clinging to and becoming "part of" a sound. IR reverbs do this well in software for a SINGLE sound...like said snare drum...or a dry Egtr...they're not as good at bussing a lot of different instrument to a "faux room".
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Post by lolo on Mar 30, 2014 0:35:48 GMT -6
Out of interest, what sources are you fellas sending to ambience reverb?
I also like the VVV ambient tiled preset. Love it on drums.
Are you guys sending most instruments and vox to the same ambience/small room reverb? To get the feeling that it was recorded in the same room?
Reason im asking is, i normally send drums and gtr's to rooms. Acoustics to room or plate verb, and normally vox to either hall,plate or chamber. Keys and piano to hall or chamber.
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Post by henge on Mar 30, 2014 6:18:11 GMT -6
Out of interest, what sources are you fellas sending to ambience reverb? I also like the VVV ambient tiled preset. Love it on drums. Are you guys sending most instruments and vox to the same ambience/small room reverb? To get the feeling that it was recorded in the same room? Reason im asking is, i normally send drums and gtr's to rooms. Acoustics to room or plate verb, and normally vox to either hall,plate or chamber. Keys and piano to hall or chamber. Usually the whole band minus vox. But I'll have a separate instance of the same program for each grouping of sources. i.e. drums get one instance,guits get another instance etc. |
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Post by lolo on Mar 30, 2014 6:22:08 GMT -6
Out of interest, what sources are you fellas sending to ambience reverb? I also like the VVV ambient tiled preset. Love it on drums. Are you guys sending most instruments and vox to the same ambience/small room reverb? To get the feeling that it was recorded in the same room? Reason im asking is, i normally send drums and gtr's to rooms. Acoustics to room or plate verb, and normally vox to either hall,plate or chamber. Keys and piano to hall or chamber. Usually the whole band minus vox. But I'll have a separate instance of the same program for each grouping of sources. i.e. drums get one instance,guits get another instance etc. Great. Thanks Henge. why not send to the same instance? |
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Post by lolo on Mar 30, 2014 6:28:43 GMT -6
To be clear Henge. Do you set up one aux with the VVV or whatever verb on it? And send drums and gtr's etc... to it? This is what i usually do.
Or do you set ap say 3-4 auxes with same verb. One for each instrument.
edit. Im just referring to ambience verb here
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Post by nico on Mar 30, 2014 7:25:34 GMT -6
jazznoise, thx for the info, and indeed starting to talk about reverb tech more in-depth means understanding a bit more what's happening under the hood, and searching around the net, for a not very scientific-geek mind like mine it is now a dilemma between " want to know " and simply the free time available to try to understand all these things, which are pretty complex to me. Anyone know about books, blogs, articles that explain in more general-public-language about the inner workings of digital reverb? I googled " digital reverb for dummies " but stumble upon material that I already digested...and don't want to dive abyssal-deep into geek territory, or my head will overheat and my woman will kick my seat for being hypnotized and zombielike in front of the screen for hours. Regarding impulse vs algo, I agree with popmann that the same impulse can sound great on one source ( or a few ), but for a more realistic general room imitation, I definitely prefer algo verbs. That being said, a little thing I like Altiverb for : putting very small decay presets as insert on an reverb send, then on 2nd insert slot an algo verb...try and you might like what you hear  Oh and VVV is really cheap btw! and you can demo it now that I think of it I do not remember how many seconds of VVV it took when demoing it before heading to the site and clicking that buy button, but it must not have been a lot ....  lolo : to me an identical very short ambience across all tracks does not sound like it is recorded in the same room, bigger ( small/medium ) room settings ( longer decay with more stereo info ) will do that. Small ambience just gives various amounts of depth, width, air around the source, which can help to separate tracks while maintaining a consistency that is present yet not really audible as an effect. To answer your first question: ambience reverb on all sources for acoustic music here ( including kick and bass sometimes ) I like to use 2-3 different small ambience types within one song : most often it is a bright one, a dark one, and a slappy one, each with various width/decay depending on the song. Although not necessarily all 3 ambiences on all tracks. I see it as 3 kinds of spices for my "dish", with different quantities ( aux send ) added to each ingredient ( track OR groups of track but not necessarily busses ) You could try sending drums&percussion to 1 ambience, vocals to a 2nd one, guitars to a 3rd, which, again, won't sound as recorded in a different room, but kind of subliminally tying them a bit more together, yet each in their own bath of air. Now for some standout sources like a snare, vocal, great luthier-acoustic guitar track or whatever...using an exclusive ambience preset with a narrower stereo image panned in the same area as the source, for that track alone will help make it shine in it's own space, although this isn't necessarily exclusive small ambience territory, but whatever space you want to surround said track with to the OP: forgot to mention : IK Multimedia CSR : the Plate and Room plugins have some very nice small ambience settings, the Plate one more audible, bright and effecty, the Room one more subliminal and dark. This plugin is around for pretty long, but I still like it. regards Nico
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Post by henge on Mar 30, 2014 7:42:46 GMT -6
Usually the whole band minus vox. But I'll have a separate instance of the same program for each grouping of sources. i.e. drums get one instance,guits get another instance etc. Great. Thanks Henge. why not send to the same instance? Well, this is just my preference. also I can eq the separate verb instances to suit the particular group of instruments. E.g. I might be rolling off more low end on the drum verb than on the guit verb etc. Maybe make the decay or predelay different on the drum verb than the keys verb etc. |
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Post by henge on Mar 30, 2014 7:45:59 GMT -6
To be clear Henge. Do you set up one aux with the VVV or whatever verb on it? And send drums and gtr's etc... to it? This is what i usually do. Or do you set ap say 3-4 auxes with same verb. One for each instrument. edit. Im just referring to ambience verb here Yup, 3-4 auxes with the same verb than can be treated differently. VVV is so efficient that we can have alot of instances without taxing the comp. Kind of like having as many 224's as you need...;-) imo... |
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Post by henge on Mar 30, 2014 7:49:04 GMT -6
jazznoise, thx for the info, and indeed starting to talk about reverb tech more in-depth means understanding a bit more what's happening under the hood, and searching around the net, for a not very scientific-geek mind like mine it is now a dilemma between " want to know " and simply the free time available to try to understand all these things, which are pretty complex to me. Anyone know about books, blogs, articles that explain in more general-public-language about the inner workings of digital reverb? I googled " digital reverb for dummies " but stumble upon material that I already digested...and don't want to dive abyssal-deep into geek territory, or my head will overheat and my woman will kick my seat for being hypnotized and zombielike in front of the screen for hours. Regarding impulse vs algo, I agree with popmann that the same impulse can sound great on one source ( or a few ), but for a more realistic general room imitation, I definitely prefer algo verbs. That being said, a little thing I like Altiverb for : putting very small decay presets as insert on an reverb send, then on 2nd insert slot an algo verb...try and you might like what you hear Oh and VVV is really cheap btw! and you can demo it now that I think of it I do not remember how many seconds of VVV it took when demoing it before heading to the site and clicking that buy button, but it must not have been a lot .... lolo : to me an identical very short ambience across all tracks does not sound like it is recorded in the same room, bigger ( small/medium ) room settings ( longer decay with more stereo info ) will do that. Small ambience just gives various amounts of depth, width, air around the source, which can help to separate tracks while maintaining a consistency that is present yet not really audible as an effect. To answer your first question: ambience reverb on all sources for acoustic music here ( including kick and bass sometimes ) I like to use 2-3 different small ambience types within one song : most often it is a bright one, a dark one, and a slappy one, each with various width/decay depending on the song. Although not necessarily all 3 ambiences on all tracks. I see it as 3 kinds of spices for my "dish", with different quantities ( aux send ) added to each ingredient ( track OR groups of track but not necessarily busses ) You could try sending drums&percussion to 1 ambience, vocals to a 2nd one, guitars to a 3rd, which, again, won't sound as recorded in a different room, but kind of subliminally tying them a bit more together, yet each in their own bath of air. Now for some standout sources like a snare, vocal, great luthier-acoustic guitar track or whatever...using an exclusive ambience preset with a narrower stereo image panned in the same area as the source, for that track alone will help make it shine in it's own space, although this isn't necessarily exclusive small ambience territory, but whatever space you want to surround said track with to the OP: forgot to mention : IK Multimedia CSR : the Plate and Room plugins have some very nice small ambience settings, the Plate one more audible, bright and effecty, the Room one more subliminal and dark. This plugin is around for pretty long, but I still like it. regards Nico Excellent description of what I was trying to say!! lolo, ignore my posts and read this!!LOL |
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Post by lolo on Mar 30, 2014 8:22:51 GMT -6
To be clear Henge. Do you set up one aux with the VVV or whatever verb on it? And send drums and gtr's etc... to it? This is what i usually do. Or do you set ap say 3-4 auxes with same verb. One for each instrument. edit. Im just referring to ambience verb here Yup, 3-4 auxes with the same verb than can be treated differently. VVV is so efficient that we can have alot of instances without taxing the comp. Kind of like having as many 224's as you need...;-) imo... Interesting. Thanks. Will give it a try |
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Post by lolo on Mar 30, 2014 8:27:48 GMT -6
jazznoise, thx for the info, and indeed starting to talk about reverb tech more in-depth means understanding a bit more what's happening under the hood, and searching around the net, for a not very scientific-geek mind like mine it is now a dilemma between " want to know " and simply the free time available to try to understand all these things, which are pretty complex to me. Anyone know about books, blogs, articles that explain in more general-public-language about the inner workings of digital reverb? I googled " digital reverb for dummies " but stumble upon material that I already digested...and don't want to dive abyssal-deep into geek territory, or my head will overheat and my woman will kick my seat for being hypnotized and zombielike in front of the screen for hours. Regarding impulse vs algo, I agree with popmann that the same impulse can sound great on one source ( or a few ), but for a more realistic general room imitation, I definitely prefer algo verbs. That being said, a little thing I like Altiverb for : putting very small decay presets as insert on an reverb send, then on 2nd insert slot an algo verb...try and you might like what you hear Oh and VVV is really cheap btw! and you can demo it now that I think of it I do not remember how many seconds of VVV it took when demoing it before heading to the site and clicking that buy button, but it must not have been a lot .... lolo : to me an identical very short ambience across all tracks does not sound like it is recorded in the same room, bigger ( small/medium ) room settings ( longer decay with more stereo info ) will do that. Small ambience just gives various amounts of depth, width, air around the source, which can help to separate tracks while maintaining a consistency that is present yet not really audible as an effect. To answer your first question: ambience reverb on all sources for acoustic music here ( including kick and bass sometimes ) I like to use 2-3 different small ambience types within one song : most often it is a bright one, a dark one, and a slappy one, each with various width/decay depending on the song. Although not necessarily all 3 ambiences on all tracks. I see it as 3 kinds of spices for my "dish", with different quantities ( aux send ) added to each ingredient ( track OR groups of track but not necessarily busses ) You could try sending drums&percussion to 1 ambience, vocals to a 2nd one, guitars to a 3rd, which, again, won't sound as recorded in a different room, but kind of subliminally tying them a bit more together, yet each in their own bath of air. Now for some standout sources like a snare, vocal, great luthier-acoustic guitar track or whatever...using an exclusive ambience preset with a narrower stereo image panned in the same area as the source, for that track alone will help make it shine in it's own space, although this isn't necessarily exclusive small ambience territory, but whatever space you want to surround said track with to the OP: forgot to mention : IK Multimedia CSR : the Plate and Room plugins have some very nice small ambience settings, the Plate one more audible, bright and effecty, the Room one more subliminal and dark. This plugin is around for pretty long, but I still like it. regards Nico Great info. thanks Nico |
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Post by nico on Mar 30, 2014 8:46:15 GMT -6
Another one for small ambience sound, though more of a delay because it is one : Soundtoys Echoboy has nice impulses burried in the far right scroll down menu that sound close to ambience to me, and very good, also tweakable in different ways than a reverb, which might trigger original sound
regards, Nico
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Post by henge on Apr 1, 2014 7:37:43 GMT -6
Ok using VVV's Ambience Tiled Room as the standard I tried all the R2 " small "presets to see which one could be a replacement or come close.
These are the presets that imo can fill the same role as Ambience Tiled Room.
Studio A.
Thick amb Lite
Bedroom 3
Little red car ( all the presets in this series are killer imo!)
Airless room
Velvet Room
None of the presets are an exact match but I forgot that I made a preset that i think nails the VVV Ambience Tiled Room.
It's called Henge tight Plate. Let me know if anyone wants it!
Off to check what PhoenixVerb can bring to the tiny space table...
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Post by henge on Apr 1, 2014 8:09:19 GMT -6
PhoenixVerb kicks major ass!! What a great verb for small spaces, some I think I like better than the VVV offerings.
The Sml Front Chamb presets are wonderful!!
Presets that get you close to VVV Ambiance Tile room are
SML Perc Plate (wide)
Sudden snare ( lite) ( wide)
Sml Close Hall 3 and wide version
Studio 1,2,3
Live room 1,4
The Muted Live rooms are the tightest verbs I've heard...killer!
Cookin Kitchen
Balance room
Live Vocal Booth
Bongos med room
If I remember correctly Cookin Kitchen sound pretty dead on.
VVV overall sounds more agressive to my ears than the Expo verbs, which have a refinement that VVV's small spaces don't have. Not better or worse just another colour in the palette.
Off the compare the Lex PCM Small spaces.
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Post by lolo on Apr 1, 2014 8:45:17 GMT -6
Also used one of the phoenix live rooms tonight for what we spoke about earlier in the thread. Killer
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Post by henge on Apr 1, 2014 8:50:02 GMT -6
More than honourable mention goes to ValhallaRoom. The small spaces are excellent as well. Fast Chorus is a standout for me in terms of tiny space!!
Btw I found the Lex PCM small spaces to be less that satisfying...
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Post by dandeurloo on Apr 1, 2014 8:57:41 GMT -6
The small wooden room in the Bricasti gets used a lot. When in doubt or in a hurry I use it. It adds a nice weight and motion without being to much. Studio B does the same sometimes.
I also use the UAD 140 or 250. The problem with those are they never add weight and I always have to eq the return. That's not a big deal. They add ambiance but they don't make things sound rich like the Bricasti does.
Here's a tip I do to help them sit in the mix better. Because the UAD verbs don't add as much weight as I would like and they have grainy tails. I send some of these verbs into the Bricasti setting I am using. It really ties things together and smooths out the tails of the UAD plugs.
The Quantec Yardstick is pretty sweet as well. Believe it or not, the Beringer V verb is pretty ok. I wouldn't want it for my only verb but it does sound better then most cheap verbs and often times better then the UAD. I don't use mine much. I will once I get my console completely wired up.
Cheap hardware verbs can be great. Don't forget the SPX90.
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Post by henge on Apr 1, 2014 13:10:34 GMT -6
The small wooden room in the Bricasti gets used a lot. When in doubt or in a hurry I use it. It adds a nice weight and motion without being to much. Studio B does the same sometimes. I also use the UAD 140 or 250. The problem with those are they never add weight and I always have to eq the return. That's not a big deal. They add ambiance but they don't make things sound rich like the Bricasti does. Here's a tip I do to help them sit in the mix better. Because the UAD verbs don't add as much weight as I would like and they have grainy tails. I send some of these verbs into the Bricasti setting I am using. It really ties things together and smooths out the tails of the UAD plugs. The Quantec Yardstick is pretty sweet as well. Believe it or not, the Beringer V verb is pretty ok. I wouldn't want it for my only verb but it does sound better then most cheap verbs and often times better then the UAD. I don't use mine much. I will once I get my console completely wired up. Cheap hardware verbs can be great. Don't forget the SPX90. So you send the uad verbs to the wooden room in the bricasti or whatever your using the Bricasti for in the song? |
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rumi
New Member
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Post by rumi on Apr 1, 2014 16:27:44 GMT -6
The best ITB small rooms I know are the ones in Nebula. "70 small room" is even available in the free edition of Nebula.
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Post by tonycamphd on Apr 1, 2014 17:02:41 GMT -6
Cheap hardware verbs can be great. Don't forget the SPX90. holy moly havent heard that name in a while, nooooiiiiiizzzzzyyyy, always liked it though. |
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Post by Johnkenn on Apr 1, 2014 20:38:02 GMT -6
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Post by WKG on Apr 1, 2014 21:15:28 GMT -6
PhoenixVerb kicks major ass!! What a great verb for small spaces, That's what I've been pulling from lately and I agree completely. Loving Phoenix here! |
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Post by Johnkenn on Apr 1, 2014 21:20:51 GMT -6
Damnit...stop it...I'm poor.
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Post by dandeurloo on Apr 1, 2014 21:26:48 GMT -6
The small wooden room in the Bricasti gets used a lot. When in doubt or in a hurry I use it. It adds a nice weight and motion without being to much. Studio B does the same sometimes. I also use the UAD 140 or 250. The problem with those are they never add weight and I always have to eq the return. That's not a big deal. They add ambiance but they don't make things sound rich like the Bricasti does. Here's a tip I do to help them sit in the mix better. Because the UAD verbs don't add as much weight as I would like and they have grainy tails. I send some of these verbs into the Bricasti setting I am using. It really ties things together and smooths out the tails of the UAD plugs. The Quantec Yardstick is pretty sweet as well. Believe it or not, the Beringer V verb is pretty ok. I wouldn't want it for my only verb but it does sound better then most cheap verbs and often times better then the UAD. I don't use mine much. I will once I get my console completely wired up. Cheap hardware verbs can be great. Don't forget the SPX90. So you send the uad verbs to the wooden room in the bricasti or whatever your using the Bricasti for in the song? I do. It makes them sound so much better. Smoother, deeper more alive. It also helps blend the tracks together. Before I had the bricasti I would some times add a small delay to the return of the UAD verbs to help vibe out and smooth out the reverbs. You could try that instead of buying a bricasti. |
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Post by Johnkenn on Apr 1, 2014 21:47:16 GMT -6
You could try that instead of buying a bricasti. What fun is that? |
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