Layering Reverb

[Garpocalypse]

During the composer's panel at MAGfest, Tommy Tallarico mentioned that Jeremy Soule sent him one his Skyrim pieces for him to look at and that it had 7 layers of reverb. Which seems like it might be an exaggeration but assuming it isn't, is pretty incredible. Does anyone have any resources on the topic? I've tried google and youtube so far but I haven't found much on the subject.

I wish Tommy could have gone into more detail but i'm thinking maybe it's 3 instances of mix reverb loaded into 3 auxes and EQ'd to be Low, Middle and High, preceded by splitting the instruments in up to four different groups and giving each their own reverb which would be applied to the bus.

I know reverb is a very complex topic as it is but layering reverb seems like it would be mindblowing. Anything that could help simplify the reasoning behind it would be great.

Thanks!

[Meteo Xavier]

I've kinda layered reverb at times, no more than two at once, but seven seems pretty wild. I frankly don't believe it until I remember how layered Secret of Evermore's soundtrack was and its clever use of the 'verb.

[Moseph]

My current production chain (which I hope to simplify, since I'm in the process of changing most of my core orchestra samples to a wet library rather than my current dry one) runs each track through something like six reverbs. It's so complicated because I'm doing some subtle sound processing stuff with some of the verbs and also modeling early reflections from both the back and the sides of the hall separately from the tail. I'll post a breakdown of the reverb chain when I get the time.

But yeah, it's definitely not a matter of just waking up one day and going, "USE ALL THE REVERBS!" You keep adding stuff to the chain because you have a particular sound in mind that you haven't been able to get with fewer reverbs. In my case, I've just been generally unsatisfied with how VSL samples sound even with really expensive reverbs (including even the demos I've heard of VSL's MIR, which is designed specifically to work well with VSL samples). VSL samples always sound thin, and clean, and like they're floating on top of a separate layer of reverb that isn't connected to the dry sound. So my ridiculous reverb chain is my attempt to address that, and I've been pretty happy with the results.

(On a slightly unrelated note, it looks like the template I'm putting together with the EWQL Hollywood series, though it may not need six reverbs, is going to have 400+ MIDI tracks and a couple hundred audio tracks. My projects are doomed to be absurd no matter what I do.)

Edited January 7, 2014 by Moseph

[Ryan Jobson]

Yeah I've used multiple reverbs before. Sometimes a few on the same track, but most often just one. Sometimes I'll send a few different reverbs to multiple tracks. There are no rules just experiment and do what sounds best!

[Rozovian]

I would assume it's a case of having convolution positions for a lot of locations in the orchestra.

Convolution reverbs use "impulse responses", IRs, that are recordings of a single loud transient in a room, and using it means you get the sound of whatever you use it on _as if played from that position in that room as recorded_. The limitation is that everything would seem to come from the same point in the room. I don't think that's a big problem for most of us, but it wouldn't surprise me that a big production would warrant a more realistic and wide sound.

Multiple convolution reverbs with different IRs based on different locations of the room would produce something more like a real orchestra's positioning of instruments, should you choose to space out your instruments that way. That might be what he did.

[avaris]

Picked up this reverb over the holidays:

http://www.2caudio.com/products/b2#_overview

It is a modular dual reverb where you can mix between the two engines in various ways. Some of the complex patches that involve using both reverbs are insanely lush and beautiful. Seriously just listen to some of the demo's on their page. So the concepts of what we are discussing are there. Most of what it does with the two reverb engines you can simulate in a DAW with bussing and aux sends.

You could also separate your reverb chains into Mid and Side components. That way they can be treated differently. Like making the Side (stereo) component even wider using various processing techniques.

Also another big thing with reverbs is getting the early reflections right. Have heard of people using a dedicated reverb or IR for just the early reflections.

[Garpocalypse]

Thanks everyone for the replies. IR's are sort of difficult for me to run because my studio is pc is about 8 years old now. I've been meaning to update for awhile and I think this year sometime i'm going to fork out the cash. That B2 reverb seems pretty nice too.

I've been messing around today with a few instances of EpicReverb which is free from Variety of Sound. I seemed to get somewhere with one wide and one narrow. Speaking of that, how do people feel epicreverb compares with other commercial reverb plugins like valhalla? I only have that and Sonitus reverb so I am pretty unopinionated (yea thats a word right?) when it comes to reverb plugins. Would you consider it on par with other reverbs or completely unusable?

I think I just opened a pandora's box with all of this reverb stuff.

[Argle]

7 reverbs? That's crazy, but maybe it gives him his unique sound, which is definitely wet. I'm not into impulse reverbs, I find them sterile and boring. But I'll use 2 or 3 reverbs occasionally when I need a very dense, wet sound.

[avaris]

EpicVerb is excellent. Be hard to find a better free reverb. It is certainly comparable to the Valhalla stuff.

[SonicThHedgog]

2cAther on two return tracks, one for hall stuff, one for room, and done.

sometimes for some other stuff I directly put them on the tracks themselves in case I want something else like a plate or just something or something of the same thing, but something else.

https://soundcloud.com/aires/via-veritas-vita (

https://soundcloud.com/aires/bro-do-u-even-compose

Then again, I dont like using too much verb so I let in some dryness, maybe a very weak ping pong delay.

Edited January 7, 2014 by SonicThHedgog

[Moseph]

Turns out I have seven reverbs, not six. I'd forgotten about number 5 below, because I don't think I always use that one.

Reverb 1: The first effect on each track is a kind of odd thing where I expand the signal, then add a little bit of reverb with a short tail on it, then compress the signal. I find this adds some body to the sound and helps glue the sample transitions together. This uses Breverb 2.

Reverb 2: Each individual track is routed to a submaster for its orchestra section (woodwinds, brass, strings, percussion), and each of these sections is bused to an early reflection similation (Reverberate). This models the early reflections coming from the back of the hall. The size is roughly calculated based on the size of an orchestra shell like you would find in a concert hall. Each section needs different settings, so there are a total of four buses for this -- one for each section.

Reverb 3: Each section is also bused to a second early reflection sim that models reflections from the sides of the orchestra shell. Again, I use Reverberate here. All sections go to the same bus for this.

Reverb 4: Each section, plus its rear ER, plus its side ER, is bused to a reverb tail. I'm using Reflektor here. I have about a 70ms predelay on this, because I don't want Reflektor to interfere with my ERs, which happen in those 70ms.

Reverb 5: The Reflektor output gets run through a Breverb 2 instance that adds some length and density to the tail.

Reverb 6: All orchestra sections, ERs, and the reverb tail get routed to a main orchestra submaster. Here, I have an instance of Breverb 2 (Orchestral Beef-up preset) doing some very subtle, well, beefing-up. It adds a bit of density.

Reverb 7: The orchestra submaster is bused to a bus that I call Warmth. It contains a plugin chain that resembles the one from reverb 1 above. Among other things, there is again a Breverb 2 instance between an expander and a compressor that fuddles the sound slightly.

So generally speaking, I use Breverb 2 for nuance, Reverberate for ERs, and Reflektor or some other convolution unit for tails.

[Garpocalypse]

Turns out I have seven reverbs, not six. I'd forgotten about number 5 below, because I don't think I always use that one.

Reverb 1: The first effect on each track is a kind of odd thing where I expand the signal, then add a little bit of reverb with a short tail on it, then compress the signal. I find this adds some body to the sound and helps glue the sample transitions together. This uses Breverb 2.

Reverb 2: Each individual track is routed to a submaster for its orchestra section (woodwinds, brass, strings, percussion), and each of these sections is bused to an early reflection similation (Reverberate). This models the early reflections coming from the back of the hall. The size is roughly calculated based on the size of an orchestra shell like you would find in a concert hall. Each section needs different settings, so there are a total of four buses for this -- one for each section.

Reverb 3: Each section is also bused to a second early reflection sim that models reflections from the sides of the orchestra shell. Again, I use Reverberate here. All sections go to the same bus for this.

Reverb 4: Each section, plus its rear ER, plus its side ER, is bused to a reverb tail. I'm using Reflektor here. I have about a 70ms predelay on this, because I don't want Reflektor to interfere with my ERs, which happen in those 70ms.

Reverb 5: The Reflektor output gets run through a Breverb 2 instance that adds some length and density to the tail.

Reverb 6: All orchestra sections, ERs, and the reverb tail get routed to a main orchestra submaster. Here, I have an instance of Breverb 2 (Orchestral Beef-up preset) doing some very subtle, well, beefing-up. It adds a bit of density.

Reverb 7: The orchestra submaster is bused to a bus that I call Warmth. It contains a plugin chain that resembles the one from reverb 1 above. Among other things, there is again a Breverb 2 instance between an expander and a compressor that fuddles the sound slightly.

So generally speaking, I use Breverb 2 for nuance, Reverberate for ERs, and Reflektor or some other convolution unit for tails.

You are awesome! That's what i was looking for. For early reflections is that using predelay? Could you give some examples of timing on your ERs?

[Moseph]

My ER calculations are based on the dimensions of an orchestra shell and the speed of sound (~1,100 feet/sec). I think the dimensions I was assuming for the orchestra shell were something like 40 feet wide x 30 feet deep. You can do some Googling for concert hall dimensions and read specs for various halls if you're really interested in that aspect of it.

The important thing to remember is that the closer an instrument is to the listener, the longer it will take for the ER vs. the direct signal to reach the listener, and the more muffled the ER will be (more on that in a moment). As far as predelay for back-of-the-shell ER goes, my values are 57ms for strings, 42ms for woodwinds, 28ms for brass, and 12ms for percussion.

For side-of-the-shell ERs, I did some fudging and concluded that a 9ms predelay worked for all sections. That's less realistic/precise than the back of the hall calculations (shells are typically wider in the front than in the back, for example, and the sections' distances to the sides won't technically all be the same), but it seems to work okay.

Reverberate is a convolution reverb that gives some special controls for ER and includes separate impulse responses for ERs -- so you can have just the ER without the tail. If you happen to have Reverberate and are interested in my specific settings, I can link you to my presets. Basically, I have the size set as close as I can to the shell size with the predelay values listed above, and then adjusted other settings based mostly on what seemed to sound good.

The ERs from the sections closest to the listener travel back through the orchestra, hit the back wall, then travel forward through the orchestra to the listener. The ERs from the sections farthest from the listener immediately hit the back wall, then travel though the orchestra only once to reach the listener. Because of this, the ERs from the closest sections should have more of the high frequencies rolled off than those from the farthest sections. Conversely, the direct signal from a closer section doesn't travel through the orchestra at all, whereas a farther section's direct signal does travel through the orchestra. Because of this, the direct signal from a far section will have more of the high frequencies rolled off than the direct signal from a close section.

In short, the high frequency content of a section's direct signal vs. its (back-of-the-hall) ER should be inversely proportional. A close section's direct signal is less rolled-off than other sections' direct signals, but its ER is more rolled-off than other sections' ERs. A far section's direct signal is more rolled-off than other sections' direct signals, but its ER is less rolled off than other sections' ERs.

Here's an example track with the reverb discussed in my previous post. It's all VSL SE Plus, except for percussion, which is a grab bag of stuff. The reverb is arguably a little wet -- a matter of taste, I think -- but if I were to change that, it would be by lowering bus levels and not by deleting reverbs. I may also be fudging percussion positioning some -- in a live orchestra, percussion is placed behind the orchestra, but in film score stuff, percussion is usually much more forward-positioned, and I don't remember specifically what I did in this track.

Edited January 8, 2014 by Moseph

[timaeus222]

Moseph's got it down pat with those calculations, but I'd say ArtsAcoustic Reverb is my go-to reverb and it always will be. I've hardly ever needed to layer reverbs since I've used it so often that the ins and outs of it seem so intuitive and the most fitting tone is so feasibly accomplished with one instance, even for meticulous reverbing for orchestral like Moseph's done. Although, listening to the reverb example with my good headphones, it does sound a little overly wet like Moseph believes, and these headphones actually have a minimal reverb response.

Edited January 9, 2014 by timaeus222