Open Mic: What Advice Would You Give to a Beginner About Reverb?

Adrian Try on Apr 18th 2012 with 12 comments

Each week we open our mic to readers and lurkers alike to come out of the woodwork and tell us your thoughts and opinion, your experiences and mistakes, what you love and what you hate. We want to hear from you, and here’s your chance.

The right reverb can add life and depth to a track. But it’s more of an art than a science. What advice would you give to a beginner about reverb?

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By Adrian Try

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Adrian is writer and editor for Audiotuts+ and Envato Notes. He has been playing keys and acoustic guitar for three decades, and has six kids. Follow him on Twitter at @envatoaudio.

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http://crazyeye.com Dave
Omg, I’ve been waiting for this topic.
I’ve been a mix engineer for as long as I’ve been in the music business (15 years). The use of reverb is a touchy subject with me.
In a nutshell, it takes years of experience to use it right. That said, there are no rules to making music so do what you think sounds right. But I have a plea to all of the newbies – if it’s obvious it’s too much!
You typically hear too much ‘verb on records mixed by less than experienced engineers. They think that you have to hear the effect in order for the effect to be present. This is simply not true. Reverb is a less-is-more effect, it should be used to create depth and space.
When I started behind the borad I had to hear the reverb because that’s how I knew it was there. Now, however, I know that it’s there because I can feel the depth in the track without the reverb getting in the way. I wrote a post on my blog specifically about this topic. The title is “Mixing your own music is like giving yourself a massage.”
Newbies, click my link and read t his post. It’s short, but if you’re serious about mixing as a career you should definitely give it a read.
shacoca
Echoing (ha!) Dave, explore subtlety. It’s too easy to turn a dry mix into a muddy mess and overshoot a sweet balance of depth.
Here’s a great way to learn a lot about using reverb. Take a random recording of any space, like an office background or your living room. Try adding a dry sound effect into it, using reverb (probably some EQ and delay too) to make it sound like the effect was actually recorded in that room. Creating a believable result is tricky. But trying it will teach you a lot about how natural reverb sounds and give you a sense of when you might be pushing it too far when mixing music.
Also, compare reverb and delay effects. Sometimes, instead of reverb, a single tap or low-feedback delay effect is what you’re looking for.
And sometimes reality gets boring! So by all means experiment. Twist and tweak all those knobs and parameters on your plug-in of choice. Learn what they all do and make some crazy, wonderful discoveries. (This goes for any effects, recording techniques, etc.)
Moysey
Reverb sends need as much attention as the tracks in your song, so slapping on a big verb, sending copious of everything to it and hoping that will do the trick is a sure way to muddy and ruin your mix. Solo the reverb when the track is playing and listen to each element to help with the levels of each send . Reverb needs processing too, to fit in the mix, EQ, compression and I often like a light chorus too after the verb, and as mentioned earlier, you dont really want to hear it, but you notice it when its not there.
sonny
What Advice Would You Give to a Beginner About Reverb? Try not to use it.
http://www.tricky-loops.de Tricky Loops
Now we need a little controversy (cause it feels so empty without me… :-)
If you want to create a special effect to fill in the mix, the reverb SHOULD be audible, of course. For example for risers, uplifters, wooshes, textures etc.
(End of controversy, now lets agree Dave… :-)
However, if you just want to make your sound fatter, than you should take only small amounts of reverb. Same applies to chorus, phaser etc. All these effects tend to spread over the whole stereo image and can make the mix muddy – worse, they can even create serious phasing issues and make your song sound like a landing plane.
ab
Do not overdo it!
Mark Harris
Errrr… Is Reverb a “spacialisation” processor, or an effect ?
DK47
As said don’t over do it, I tend to put my reverb fader to the maximum and slowly slide down the fader until It blends perfectly (you can bearly hear it but if you mute you feel its missing).
Protip: Always Equalize your return of the reverb (it also has to sit in the mix) also automate it, per example during a chorus i tend to add 1 or 2dB to the reverb not much, but enough to create the power. Hope it will help you
http://www.crazyeye.com Dave
This was a good topic. Thanks, Tuts!
And thanks, Tricky. Man, I love this side of the business because there’s always something more creative to try. I don’t really use reverb to push builds, unless I’m doing sound design. When mixing music I typically push an instrument/s or use a delay to finish sections or create transitions, but I’m going to use more reverb as a “riser”. Thanks for the tip. :)
On a related note (pun intended), I was recently in a Mastering group where someone mentioned that they use multiple de-essers – each across a different frequency range – to create the perfect de-esser for a song. That’s so simple yet so out of the norm it’s simple brilliant.
And Mark, I personally think of it as an effect.
Keep making great music (and sound)!
http://mixinglivesound.com Wink
I am an owner/operator of a small/medium sound system. My ‘toy’ pa compares to what the more serious local bands might run. I first learned that I might be using too much verb by listening to board tapes of my mixes. In those early days it was mostly local bands playing too loud in small clubs, making effects hard to hear. When I listened to the tapes I cut back on the effects even if they were next to inaudible.
Later down the road, I was supplying production for a small country show in a local venue. In conversation the band engineer stated his practice as ‘turn up the verb until you can just begin to hear it and then back it off a notch or two and it will be about right.’ That was a good statement of the way I had come to treat effects.
max
anyone?????!!!!????

http://audio.tutsplus.com/ Adrian Try
Hi Max. We received plenty of answers to this question. But unfortunately once we switched to Disque for comments, they are no longer visible. So here they are!
===========================
Wink
Submitted on 2012/04/24 at 4:53 pm
I am an owner/operator of a small/medium sound system. My ‘toy’ pa compares to what the more serious local bands might run. I first learned that I might be using too much verb by listening to board tapes of my mixes. In those early days it was mostly local bands playing too loud in small clubs, making effects hard to hear. When I listened to the tapes I cut back on the effects even if they were next to inaudible.
Later down the road, I was supplying production for a small country show in a local venue. In conversation the band engineer stated his practice as ‘turn up the verb until you can just begin to hear it and then back it off a notch or two and it will be about right.’ That was a good statement of the way I had come to treat effects.
===========================
Dave
Submitted on 2012/04/21 at 10:46 am
This was a good topic. Thanks, Tuts!
And thanks, Tricky. Man, I love this side of the business because there’s always something more creative to try. I don’t really use reverb to push builds, unless I’m doing sound design. When mixing music I typically push an instrument/s or use a delay to finish sections or create transitions, but I’m going to use more reverb as a “riser”. Thanks for the tip. :)
On a related note (pun intended), I was recently in a Mastering group where someone mentioned that they use multiple de-essers – each across a different frequency range – to create the perfect de-esser for a song. That’s so simple yet so out of the norm it’s simple brilliant.
And Mark, I personally think of it as an effect.
Keep making great music (and sound)!
===========================
DK47
Submitted on 2012/04/21 at 7:33 am
As said don’t over do it, I tend to put my reverb fader to the maximum and slowly slide down the fader until It blends perfectly (you can bearly hear it but if you mute you feel its missing).
Protip: Always Equalize your return of the reverb (it also has to sit in the mix) also automate it, per example during a chorus i tend to add 1 or 2dB to the reverb not much, but enough to create the power. Hope it will help you
===========================
Mark Harris
Submitted on 2012/04/19 at 4:43 pm
Errrr… Is Reverb a “spacialisation” processor, or an effect ?
===========================
ab
Submitted on 2012/04/19 at 3:04 pm
Do not overdo it!
===========================
Tricky Loops
Submitted on 2012/04/19 at 9:55 am
Now we need a little controversy (cause it feels so empty without me… :-)
If you want to create a special effect to fill in the mix, the reverb SHOULD be audible, of course. For example for risers, uplifters, wooshes, textures etc.
(End of controversy, now lets agree Dave… :-)
However, if you just want to make your sound fatter, than you should take only small amounts of reverb. Same applies to chorus, phaser etc. All these effects tend to spread over the whole stereo image and can make the mix muddy – worse, they can even create serious phasing issues and make your song sound like a landing plane.
===========================
sonny
Submitted on 2012/04/18 at 10:49 pm
What Advice Would You Give to a Beginner About Reverb? Try not to use it.
===========================
Moysey
Submitted on 2012/04/18 at 7:05 pm
Reverb sends need as much attention as the tracks in your song, so slapping on a big verb, sending copious of everything to it and hoping that will do the trick is a sure way to muddy and ruin your mix. Solo the reverb when the track is playing and listen to each element to help with the levels of each send . Reverb needs processing too, to fit in the mix, EQ, compression and I often like a light chorus too after the verb, and as mentioned earlier, you dont really want to hear it, but you notice it when its not there.
===========================
shacoca
Submitted on 2012/04/18 at 1:18 pm
Echoing (ha!) Dave, explore subtlety. It’s too easy to turn a dry mix into a muddy mess and overshoot a sweet balance of depth.
Here’s a great way to learn a lot about using reverb. Take a random recording of any space, like an office background or your living room. Try adding a dry sound effect into it, using reverb (probably some EQ and delay too) to make it sound like the effect was actually recorded in that room. Creating a believable result is tricky. But trying it will teach you a lot about how natural reverb sounds and give you a sense of when you might be pushing it too far when mixing music.
Also, compare reverb and delay effects. Sometimes, instead of reverb, a single tap or low-feedback delay effect is what you’re looking for.
And sometimes reality gets boring! So by all means experiment. Twist and tweak all those knobs and parameters on your plug-in of choice. Learn what they all do and make some crazy, wonderful discoveries. (This goes for any effects, recording techniques, etc.)
===========================
Dave
Submitted on 2012/04/18 at 11:48 am
Omg, I’ve been waiting for this topic.
I’ve been a mix engineer for as long as I’ve been in the music business (15 years). The use of reverb is a touchy subject with me.
In a nutshell, it takes years of experience to use it right. That said, there are no rules to making music so do what you think sounds right. But I have a plea to all of the newbies – if it’s obvious it’s too much!
You typically hear too much ‘verb on records mixed by less than experienced engineers. They think that you have to hear the effect in order for the effect to be present. This is simply not true. Reverb is a less-is-more effect, it should be used to create depth and space.
When I started behind the borad I had to hear the reverb because that’s how I knew it was there. Now, however, I know that it’s there because I can feel the depth in the track without the reverb getting in the way. I wrote a post on my blog specifically about this topic. The title is “Mixing your own music is like giving yourself a massage.”
Newbies, click my link and read t his post. It’s short, but if you’re serious about mixing as a career you should definitely give it a read.