Reverb: Mono or Stereo? Insert or auxilliary?

[monkey man]

Hi 'Cornies.

I'm placing this thread here rather than in the General Recording forum because of the ProVerb connection and the fact that because of its newly-updated behaviour some of us will be revisiting the plug. Further to this, use of Buffy and aux sends may feature heavily.

I recently canned the aux 'verbs in my template both in an effort to further reduce project bus count (started out at 198 and had it whittled down to half that), and to satisfy a long-held belief that mono, panned-in-place 'verbs would aid stereo-placement definition of the instruments in my mixes. Testing yesterday clearly showed that stereo sources benefitted from s->s processing more than I'd anticipated, but what surprised me more was the fact that mono sources sent to centre-panned aux 'verbs sounded decidedly suffocated/ing. Sure, the plan all along was to place them all in-line and pan them to where the instruments themselves lay, but the smallness/boxiness/claustrophobic nature of the centre-panned setup tested yesterday has cast doubt upon my original premise, in my mind at least. The final nail in my coffin of sanity was hearing mono sources bussed to stereo auxes; indeed they too sounded more open. One would expect this to be the case, but the cumulative effect of this in a mix as opposed to the discreet mono 'verb plan in terms of stereo-placement accuracy belongs in the realm of speculation for me right now.

The only aspect of this I'm sure about is that wide (non-mono) sources sound much more open and clear with stereo->stereo 'verb. This one's thankfully a no-brainer, and although I haven't checked mono compatibility, the vast improvement over mono 'verbs in the case of stereo sources must surely, in my mind at least, take precedence over possible phase-cancellation issues one might otherwise encounter. The only conceivable caveat would be in cases where the fold-down wreaked havoc in this regard, rendering the mono mixes useless… in theory.

Where I'm temporarily stumped is when it comes to mono sources. Which do I go with?

1) Inserts - mono->stereo
2) Inserts - mono->mono (panned in-place?)

3) Aux sends - stereo->stereo
4) Aux sends - mono->stereo
5) Aux sends - mono->mono (panned in-place? Sounds like a lot of work and the reason for the original mono-insert plan)


Adding to the confusion is the distinction, if any, between m->m and m->s processing (IRs in/imported to ProVerb) both insert and aux. All mono sources are already bussed to stereo subs except (I think) for lead vox and bass, both of which are summed to mono ones, but then of course they too are subsequently panned to the stereo mix. Then there're the various flavours of the IRs themselves and indeed how PV handles them.

My preference would be to be able to mute all 'verbs with one click (aux master sub), so this too has lurked in the background as a possible source of regret attributable to the in-line approach I, well, outlined.

Feel free to ignore this paragraph if you already have a headache:
Lastly, the fact that I'll be running a "live MIDI" block of inputs which will be rendered late in projects as audio tracks, has meant, at least as best I can tell from all my experiments, that two discreet aux systems are necessary. This is in order to maintain sync between tracks and their effects; using only one block allows early bleeding of audio from recorded tracks ahead of the live inputs. Buffy on the block buses(!) isn't sufficient to negate this when only one block is employed; it has to be inserted on each track separately, hence my opting for the 2nd FX block and 198 bus template. Of course, all of this was to be ditched by the decision to go in-line, but then there was yesterday's experiment.

I've been immersed in laborious, fiddly stuff for some time and am completely burned out by it: Guitar tuning issues and luthier tweaks, MIDI gear hassles and repairs, patch editing, lib creation and multi template construction, ongoing DP template tweaking, IR library editing, conversion and consolidation (over 20 000 files), and indeed a multitude of simultaneously-manifesting equipment failures have dominated the landscape along with dry, scratchy eyes. I'm over it for now; a break is warranted. My head hurts and I'm tired of imagining configuration possibilities every time I lay my ugly mug down to kip. This is why I'm asking… no, pleading for suggestions, illumination, perspective, insights and whatever else my 'Cornie chefs might cook up. At this stage, I'll eat almost anything. I've only slept 5 times since Christmas, such is the fire in the belly, the frustration and so on. Ridiculous. Help please, 'Cornies!

PS: It's all MOTU's fault. If PV hadn't been "fixed" already I'd still be cruising my way through all this, anticipating a wait of at least a few more months for said cure. Of course, when the fix arrived the starter's gun fired and I haven't stopped running since. Dammit, MOTU, do you have to be so… wonderful?

[donreynolds]

I usually pan my mono or stereo reverbs to match the pan of the instrument track.. I also choose mono if it needs mono, or stereo if i want it very wide or actually hard split between left and right.
I am always thinks of placement in the field as i pan my instruments. Just like a live setting, everyone has their place.

Many times I add a very subtle room ambience to the whole mix if i want it to sound a little more "live". Depends how I feel, I will sometimes add it directly to the master track and set the verb mix very, very low or I will add on a stereo aux traxk and again set it very low in the mix. Depends on the song.

[David Polich]

For aux reverbs, a mono-to-stereo reverb would be impossible, I would
think. Auxes are always stereo input - um, aren't they?

The only time I use mono-to-mono reverbs is for something like a mono
guitar track where I want the impression that the "amp" has a spring reverb
or is off in a corner. I see no point in a mono-to-stereo reverb on an insert
slot.

As a matter of fact I'm just now using reverbs less and less, in general.
Most sampled instruments have some reverb in the samples anyway, as the
instruments were almost never recorded in an anechoic chamber. I prefer
to use faders and pan positions and EQ to set up my "stage view", as it
were.

One thing I do like to do, with that said, is put a different reverb on
a vocal and not have the vocal in the same reverb as the instruments.
I really like either a plate or an algorithmic reverb on the vocal.

[stephentayler]

For aux reverbs, a mono-to-stereo reverb would be impossible, I would
think. Auxes are always stereo input - um, aren't they?

Not true.... I most frequently set my aux channels to mono input for delays and reverbs

Cheers

Stephen

[daniel.sneed]

Monkey Man, of course that's just me, but I always send mono to reverbs and delays. Except when adding general reverb to an already processed stereo mix.
I take much care about returns width though. The wider is not always the better to my ears.
Sometime I slightly pan returns opposite to the dry track. When working on the front instrument, or voice, it may *open* space.

[Armageddon]

I always set up and use reverb busses, stereo-to-stereo, and usually no more than two (room and hall) -- these days, I set up four: a room and hall with early reflections turned off for wet samples and a room and hall with early reflections on for everything else. I guess I always assumed that sending a mono audio track to a stereo send meant mono-to-stereo, though DP's sends allow you to send more left or right, if that's your taste, to allow you to create a comparable stereo image. In my case, I always imagine sending to a regular stereo 'verb with equal amounts of send is akin to sending from an analog mixing desk to a live plate room. Does the reverb really need to be panned to match the source? In an actual live room, the sources all bounce off of the walls (early reflections) and don't necessarily adhere to one side or the other -- the width of the room and its stereo behavior determine its image (the rule of thumb is, reverb is what determines "near" and "far", not right or left). That's one school of thought, anyway ...

[David Polich]

For aux reverbs, a mono-to-stereo reverb would be impossible, I would
think. Auxes are always stereo input - um, aren't they?

Not true.... I most frequently set my aux channels to mono input for delays and reverbs

Cheers

Stephen

Thanks, Stephen. You know, I feel totally dumb. I never thought you could
set the input of an Aux track to be mono, for...well I just don't know why
I thought that. 10 years of DP and I've always set my aux tracks inputs to
stereo.

[Armageddon]

Not true.... I most frequently set my aux channels to mono input for delays and reverbs

But you'd still have to set up stereo-to-stereo for a stereo source, no? I always assumed that, unless you panned a mono source straight down the middle (and even then), it still made sense to send stereo-to-stereo, since your mono signal exists in a stereo space (panned more left or more right, thus occupying two sides of a stereo track), and that in DP, you had the luxury of sending more right channel or left channel to taste. Bear in mind, your plugin itself also has to support mono-to-stereo operation (for example: LexiconLXP only supports stereo-to-stereo, but LexiconPCM supports both stereo-to-stereo and mono-to-stereo).

Again, I'm not saying that my way is the right way, because, in the pre-DAW days, of course, I had a hardware mixer with mono channels only and one send on each channel. The returns were stereo, meaning you had the ability to send either one mono channel to a stereo reverb and get it returned in stereo, or, you had a stereo source occupying two mixer channels, panned hard left and right, and you were still sending mono left and mono right into a stereo effects unit. Has anyone tried it both ways? Sending a mono source to a mono-to-stereo FX buss, or sending a mono source to a stereo-to-stereo buss?

[stephentayler]

I think it depends on whether the plugin actually responds to left and right input.... in many hardware reverb units the left and right inputs were summed before processing, while more sophisticated units like Lexicon 224X and 480 responded to L/R signals. I shall have to run a simple test on my reverb plugs to see what's what!!

Cheers

Stephen

[mikehalloran]

>The only time I use mono-to-mono reverbs is for something like a mono
guitar track where I want the impression that the "amp" has a spring reverb
or is off in a corner<

My thoughts, too.

[Armageddon]

I think it depends on whether the plugin actually responds to left and right input.... in many hardware reverb units the left and right inputs were summed before processing, while more sophisticated units like Lexicon 224X and 480 responded to L/R signals. I shall have to run a simple test on my reverb plugs to see what's what!!

I may run a test to see which one sounds more convincing, but I tend to think I'll likely still be sending to a stereo reverb buss -- I like the idea of sending everything to a unified space.

Delays, on the other hand, would likely work better mono-to mono (lead vocals, guitar solos) or mono-to-stereo, simply because most delays work on either giving you a little bit of slapback (vocals, spring reverbs for guitars, leads) without taking up stereo space, or are themselves stereo effects (ping-ponging or sweeps) which would interfere with or even be masked by the stereo-ness of the instrument already in place. Same goes for choruses. I've often just placed delays or choruses as inserts, rather than sends, but the best delays I've used have often been mono-to-stereo "send onlys" that would hash up a direct signal as an insert.

[Don T]

Hello,
My short answer: It's totally source dependent so all options can be the right one.

Reverb setups that make things sound small has more to do with the settings than the routing. It's all about mating reverb early reflections to room sound/acoustics recorded. The wrong ER settings will collapse the stereo field. The right ones expand/enhance even clarify the spatial image. It's one reason why some people say a reverb (plug-in or stand alone) is stellar while the next says there weren't any usable settings. Once coupled to your studio sound/acoustic signature, it either works or not, although, some have enough adjustable parameters to make almost everything workable. Plate reverb has no ER field so that becomes preferable to the destructive interaction of halls, rooms and chambers as long as your room sound is ok.
Sometimes when you can't get a reverb to work, invert the phase on the return. It may make the phase relationships add in a good way instead of destructively.

OK, so the second part wasn't so short.

On Edit: I use stereo aux's mostly although I may have one for each subgroup to straighten out the imagery.
I have my students test all the reverbs for L-R summing and stereo processing. That way they know which to use as Aux verbs for spatial placement and which to use as source based or for specials.

[monkey man]

Thank you all for contributing; I half expected to be laughed at, but as always, the 'Cornie community has complied.

There still seem to be a few loose ends to tie up here... kinda, but nevertheless, thank you all again!

[FMiguelez]

.

Hi, Nicky.
I remembered reading, a while ago, a very interesting thread about Proverb and "proper" reverb usage.
I remembered it was started by Armageddon, one of his first threads, actually, and my memory didn't betray me. I dug it up for you because you might find it interesting (it was for me):

http://www.motunation.com/forum/viewtop ... reverb+bus" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[monkey man]

Thank you, 'Nandito!

Yeah, I remember the thread well.

No time right now, but the link is on my desktop; I'll read it again ASAP.