hey guys i was wondering how to properly use reverb on tracks so that nothing is sounding out of place in a mix. before i would always use the same reverb in a track but just have the amount and decay set differently for each channel. at the time this what i had heard to be the correct thing to do, makes senese right?.

i was reading around on techniques for mixing down and i read that putting some reverb on percussion sounds can help tighten the sound of it. now the thing is i usually use a large sounding reverb becuase i like to apply it onto my saw waves and such, but i don't think that is what i would want on my percussion. i was thinking about using a defferent reverb, maybe a small room verb for the drums, reason has some nice drum verb presets. what do you guys think, any advice?

thanks

Ill tell you how I do it. This is not the only way, but I have seen a lot of others do it this way:

1 Short Reverb on a send, usually 0.2 - 0.5 seconds.
1 Long reverb on a send, usually in the range s 1.5 seconds.
1 Huge reverb on a send usually > 4 seconds.

The short reverb gets sent things like percussion, short, stabby sounds, or anything that I just want a touch of space added. This helps differing drum samples or percussive elements sound like they are in the same "space".

The long reverb usually gets things like pads and other sounds that I want to have an obvious reverb effect or to push back in the mix.

The huge reverb is usually a "special case" reverb, where things that I want to have a huge reverb tail on I'll send to. SO things like explosions at the beginning of a break, crashes over a break that I want to decay out for a few bars, or big noise sweeps.

I also place an EQ on each send bus AFTER the reverb plugin and filter out some of the low end (approx 200Hz and lower) of the reverb and in some cases boost the high's (2k-5k) of the reverb with a high shelf so that it "sparkles" a bit more.

I use Space Designer for most of these, and since it has a built in EQ, then I do not have to place a separate EQ after the plugin. However, if your reverb plugin does not have built in EQ, then you can place any EQ after the reverb plugin.

There really isn't a "right" way, but this method has worked out for me.

Last edited by Eric J on Aug-25-2008 at 21:55

quote:

Originally posted by Eric J Ill tell you how I do it. This is not the only way, but I have seen a lot of others do it this way: 1 Short Reverb on a send, usually 0.2 - 0.5 seconds. 1 Long reverb on a send, usually in the range s 1.5 seconds. 1 Huge reverb on a send usually > 4 seconds. The short reverb gets sent things like percussion, short, stabby sounds, or anything that I just want a touch of space added. This helps differing drum samples or percussive elements sound like they are in the same "space". The long reverb usually gets things like pads and other sounds that I want to have an obvious reverb effect or to push back in the mix. The huge reverb is usually a "special case" reverb, where things that I want to have a huge reverb tail on I'll send to. SO things like explosions at the beginning of a break, crashes over a break that I want to decay out for a few bars, or big noise sweeps. I also place an EQ on each send bus AFTER the reverb plugin and filter out some of the low end (approx 200Hz and lower) of the reverb and in some cases boost the high's (2k-5k) of the reverb with a high shelf so that it "sparkles" a bit more. I use Space Designer for most of these, and since it has a built in EQ, then I do not have to place a separate EQ after the plugin. However, if your reverb plugin does not have built in EQ, then you can place any EQ after the reverb plugin. There really isn't a "right" way, but this method has worked out for me.

This is great advice (sticky?). A lot of the mix engineers I work with have this setup (incl. eq) but actually use 4 seperate reverbs:

1, Short (i.e. small room)
2, Long (i.e. Hall)
3, Plate
4, Spring

This is more of a traditional/oldschool setup and 3 + 4 are substituted by type to personal preference. I jsut thought I would share this typical method - This isn't necessarily how would do it, as this is not tailored to EDM, more to a typical recording/mix session, and in fact I think Eric's advice is spot on for EDM, for the reasons he has explained.

I forgot, a couple of other advantages to this method are:

1. By using your reverb plugins on Send busses, you can save on CPU. Reverb plugins are often some of the biggest CPU abusers, so by only using 3 or 4 on send busses, you reduce to total number of CPU hungry reverb plugins in your track.

2. Also, by having them on a send bus, you can choose how much reverb to apply to each track by adjusting how much of the track's signal you want to send to the reverb bus.

I use the same general approach; however, I usually tend to use just three reverbs on sends:

- short, usually small-room reverb

- medium room or sometimes spring reverb

- long reverb/effects - this is my rarely a straight reverb for me. I usually mix other effects with it (chorus, delay, flange, etc.) that I customize for each track. Tone2 Warmverb has recently become my all-time favorite for these types of effects. Sometimes, for vocals, I'll have a send to a medium-long delay, which also gets routed to this long reverb for a more swirling type of vocal effect.

One other tip is to use some pre-delay on your reverbs for sounds that you want the transients to come through cleanly (e.g., vocals, percussion). By delaying the reverb slightly (20-30 ms), it allows the initial attack to come through cleaner without being so muddy or lost in space.

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hey thanks guys great advice and greatly appretiated.

let me just break it down to make sure i understand correctly. i still think i have a couple questions to.

ok, for me i use reason stand alone. i have a few mixers for different areas in the track; bass & kick, percs, synths, and FX.

on my perc mixer i would set up a short room reverb, followed by and eq.
on my synth and fx have two return sends one with long and one with huge reverb each followed by eq . then just adjust how much i want with the aux amount?.

so if i do this i probably wont need to have any reverb on anything before the mixer, unless i'm going for some sort of effect?.

i used to have my reverb right after the synth or whatever followed by eq and such. not a good idea huh? i think i was changing the reverb sound too much becuase some sounds would get eq'ed quite a bit.

anyway thanks for the advice , can't wait to put it into use

quote:

Originally posted by lowski ok, for me i use reason stand alone. i have a few mixers for different areas in the track; bass & kick, percs, synths, and FX.

This is one way to approach it, although, I think you could get away with just a single mixer. The reason mixer has 4 Aux busses and that should be plenty. The only reason i don't like this approach is that you don't always want to just use the short verb for percs. It can sound great on synths as well, depending on what you re going for.

quote:

Originally posted by lowski on my perc mixer i would set up a short room reverb, followed by and eq.

Correct, although you do not need to EQ as aggressively on a short verb.

quote:

Originally posted by lowski on my synth and fx have two return sends one with long and one with huge reverb each followed by eq . then just adjust how much i want with the aux amount?.

Yes, however, again I still think the single mixer approach works best here. What if you want a big verb on a piece of percussion? or if you want to automate the send amount? Or hat if you just need to use the short verb on a synth as described above. The bigger the verb, the more carefully you might need to EQ it. This is also an area where a spectrum analyzer can come in handy on that particular track. Generally, your reverb tail shouldn't have any business playing much lower than around the 120Hz mark (unless you are going for that type of effect, which is rare). It's more likely to just muddy up the mix.

If you must have multiple mixers, then just sende the busses from the "child" mixers to a "master" mixer so you can apply the different effects to any type of sound.

quote:

Originally posted by lowski so if i do this i probably wont need to have any reverb on anything before the mixer, unless i'm going for some sort of effect?.

Correct. Although using verb as an insert can have its place. Just consider it a "guideline" rather than a hard and fast rule.

quote:

Originally posted by lowski i used to have my reverb right after the synth or whatever followed by eq and such. not a good idea huh? i think i was changing the reverb sound too much becuase some sounds would get eq'ed quite a bit.

Its not inherently a bad thing, but it can muddy things up a bit if you are not careful. I also would recommend placing the EQ before anything else in the effects chain as a general guideline. I like to rid the sound of any stray frequencies before applying any effect to it. This also goes for things like compression.


One other note on this: Choosing the right amount of reverb is a skill unto itself. One way I go about it is once I select the send bus, I then turn up the send amount of the track slowly until its obviously too much, then back it down until it starts to sound right. Once you have done that, go ahead and mute then unmute the reverb track a few times so you are alternating between hearing the sound with and without reverb. This is generally a good guideline to making sure you have the "right" amount for the sound you are going for. Remember that the "right" amount is going to be completely subjective, but with time you'll start to get a feel for what sounds right for your particular style.

Also, be careful with reverb and how much you use. Sometimes you can get a bit crazy with reverbs and add a whole lot of it to a bunch of elements in your track. Individually, the parts may sound good, but before you know it, your mix is drowned is reverb and everything sounds muddy and in the background. Good mixing needs to have an element of contrast, so remember that the more reverb you add to a part, the less that part is going to stand out within the context of a mix.

If you still want that "supersaw big reverb" sound (not necessarily applied to a supersaw mind you), and you still want it to stick out, then you can try adding a gate at the end of the effects chain, so you get that "big verb" sound without the tails cluttering everything up. This is a common trick to getting that "huge snare" sound. Again, thats kind of an art, so practice is key.

Personally, I do not think it is necessary to have every possible notch in the frequency spectrum filled up with sound, even in trance. I've been making some really great sounding tech-house type stuff with just simple drum lines and precise use of effects and its sounds fantastic, but because the use of effects is sparing and everything is well-placed, then its sounds very "pro".

Last edited by Eric J on Aug-26-2008 at 00:24

^^^ again great advice , i think i almost have it understood.
when i was talking about the different mixers i just ment beacuse i usually fill up the synth mixers 14 channels. basically what you are saying is that the three reverbs can be placed on all mixers so if i do decide i want a huge verb on say a perc sound i have the option, correct?

as for the eq i place after the reverb; i just want it to cut low frequencies? so don't cut anything too high that might effect the original sound

as for where i have been placing my eq in the effects chain, i have started to have eq then compressor be the first effect i run a sound into.

last question. as for finding the right reverb, i noticed that if i turn the return amount on the mixer past 64 it will become loaded then the original signal. should 64 be my max? i'm still not totally sure what the return amount does. is 0 no effect, and 127 only the effected signal? or is that what the aux nobs do? might be a dumb question but i will look in the help section when i'm at my computer.

again thanks for the advice it was very helpfull !!

quote:

Originally posted by lowski basically what you are saying is that the three reverbs can be placed on all mixers so if i do decide i want a huge verb on say a perc sound i have the option, correct?

The way I would do it is have a single "master mixer" that I have the effets on the AUX busses. Then for each submixer, patch the return of the "child" mixer into the "send" of the mixer above it. so if you have 3 mixers and 1 is at the top, 2 is below that, and 3 is at the bottom. Patch the returns from 3 into the sends of 2, then the returns of 2 into the sends of 1. You are then effectively "daisy-chaining" the mixers. You might have to play around with it a bit, as I haven't used Reason in a long time, so I can't be certain of this. Some other Reason users can probably give you better advice on how to "daisy-chain" your mixers.

quote:

Originally posted by lowski as for the eq i place after the reverb; i just want it to cut low frequencies? so don't cut anything too high that might effect the original sound

In general it is desirable to cut low frequencies for your verb because if a sound already has a decent amount of low frequency, then it s going to take up even more headroom if that low frequency is sent through the reverb. Think of placing a kick through a huge reverb and how "boomy" that is going to sound. You generally do not want too many "boomy" sounds as they take up lots of headroom. Its going to sound like an explosion. Sometimes you want this, but usually only as a one-off effect (such as at the end of a measure going into a break).

quote:

Originally posted by lowski as for where i have been placing my eq in the effects chain, i have started to have eq then compressor be the first effect i run a sound into.

That is usually how I do it. I want the compressor reacting to the post-EQ sound, although sometimes you want to do it the other way. There have been times that I have placed an EQ before AND after the compressor, if I want to shape the post-compressed sound, but this is uncommon.

quote:

Originally posted by lowski last question. as for finding the right reverb, i noticed that if i turn the return amount on the mixer past 64 it will become loaded then the original signal. should 64 be my max?

Well a send is nothing more than a wet/dry knob, so if 64 is the max, then that means your signal is 100% wet, which is the same thing as placing the reverb as an insert effect.

This brings up another good point. Anytime you place a reverb on a send bus, make sure you set the Reverb Wet/Dry knob to 100% Wet and 0% dry. Then you vary the amount of reverb in a sound by choosing how much to send to the aux bus.

quote:

Originally posted by lowski i'm still not totally sure what the return amount does. is 0 no effect, and 127 only the effected signal? or is that what the aux nobs do?

Possibly, you'll need to consult your manual about this, I cannot remember how the Reason mixer works.

ok i think i finally have it haha.

i will daisy chain my effects and save some cpu. as for the return amount the max is 127 and thats what i want it set to (100% max), then i adjust how much i want to effect each channel with the aux nob. got it!!!

huge thanks you have made this very clear

quote:

Originally posted by Eric J Some other Reason users can probably give you better advice on how to "daisy-chain" your mixers.

Reason will daisy-chain mixers automatically if you create a new mixer below an existing one.

ok ive been using this new technique on my latest track and i'm loving it !!!. my drums have never sounded better

one question though. for the large reverb and huge reverb, should i use the same preset reverb but just adjust the decay? i'm having trouble finding two different ones that sound like they make sense together.

thanks