Eventide blackhole vs VVV

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Is it possible to get close to the sound of the blackhole with Valhalla vintage verb? It's a unique ambienty lush sound. I found an echo-something preset in vvv that was somewhat similar.

Any thoughts? Or is the blackhole unimitable?

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IMO, different horses. I didn't fiddle enough with VVV to see if i can find a algorithm which may come near though. But, Blackhole, and the other Eventide verbs are quite special IMO. I absolutely LOVE the sound of Blackhole. Perfect for spacey, unreal sounds. Also one of the few reverbs which let you make parameter changes without audio artifacts, AFAIK.

I don't know if it's just me, but, reverbs are for me like synthesizers. They all have their unique, distinctive sound, and can't be replaced with one another, if you happen to like it.

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keyman_sam wrote:Is it possible to get close to the sound of the blackhole with Valhalla vintage verb? It's a unique ambienty lush sound. I found an echo-something preset in vvv that was somewhat similar.
Any thoughts? Or is the blackhole unimitable?

I have both. I think Blackhole is really great.For what it's supposed to do, it's unique for sure.

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I haven't even tried VVV, but, I bought Blackhole because Sean, the main developer from Valhalla, basically said that it was rather unique. The closest thing to it is probably Shimmer. If you're into detail, here's the thread.

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=349166&start=45&hil ... +blackhole

My conversation with Sean starts at about page 7.

I still haven't purchased VVV or Shimmer, but I might. Just not this month LOL. I agree with chk071 here though, reverbs are very much like synths, they have a character that can't often be simply ascribed to the science and algorithm behind them. Little differences can make a huge difference in sound. Sean discusses this in the above thread.
Last edited by ghettosynth on Tue Nov 29, 2016 6:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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keyman_sam wrote:Is it possible to get close to the sound of the blackhole with Valhalla vintage verb? It's a unique ambienty lush sound. I found an echo-something preset in vvv that was somewhat similar.

Any thoughts? Or is the blackhole unimitable?
ValhallaShimmer (especially in the "mono" reverb mode) is the closest Valhalla plugin to Blackhole in the underlying architecture. A good starting point for comparison:

- ValhallaShimmer, with Blackhole preset (the default preset that Shimmer opens up with)
- Set Diffusion to 0.827
- Set Color Mode to Dark

You may want to adjust the Mod Rate and Depth to taste. Once you have done the above, ValhallaShimmer sounds REALLY CLOSE to the Black Hole algorithm in my DSP7000 hardware.

The algorithms in VintageVerb have very different architectures than ValhallaShimmer or Blackhole. VintageVerb is inspired by different generations of Lexicon algorithms (224, 224XL, 480L to a lesser extent), while ValhallaShimmer and Blackhole both use more of a "brute force" technique. The cascaded allpass delays in ValhallaShimmer and Blackhole impart a very definite sonic signature onto the reverb, with a super high echo density, a slewed attack, and a decay that can depart away from the standard exponential reverb decay.

Sean Costello

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soooooo different
my music: http://www.alexcooperusa.com
"It's hard to be humble, when you're as great as I am." Muhammad Ali

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Yeah to me it feels like Blackhole is somewhere between VVV and Valhalla Shimmer - it has incredible depth and spaciousness.

Set a longterm goal to get all 3.. if youre serious about lush, spacey reverb. :D

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Maybe time to post this rather cool Blackhole ad video :P:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxhrvO1imJs

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keyman_sam wrote:Is it possible to get close to the sound of the blackhole with Valhalla vintage verb? It's a unique ambienty lush sound. I found an echo-something preset in vvv that was somewhat similar.
Here are some detailed examples of BOTH reverbs.
First, individually, then BOTH together in the same mix.

Blackhole in a mix, automated with the "Extraordinary Spaces" presets:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORCDHkfafZI

Vintage Verb Examples with "Pro Expansion" presets:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B45-GdsEvBc

BOTH reverbs, side by side in the same mix:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2h23_5mrAU

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I often use Blackhole in a stack with VVV and/or Shimmer.

I think that's why 2016 turned out so strangely...tearing at the fabric of time and all...

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ontol wrote:I often use Blackhole in a stack with VVV and/or Shimmer.
My advice for this: Put Blackhole first, VVV and/or Shimmer second. Blackhole sums to mono at its input, while VVV and the stereo modes of Shimmer have stereo input/output processing.

Summing the outputs of VVV to mono shouldn't sound bad, but it is better to preserve the stereo field. Summing the outputs of Shimmer (or of Blackhole) will sound weird, as this involves summing the outputs of parallel allpass chains, which can result in unpleasant phase cancellations.

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valhallasound wrote:
keyman_sam wrote:Is it possible to get close to the sound of the blackhole with Valhalla vintage verb? It's a unique ambienty lush sound. I found an echo-something preset in vvv that was somewhat similar.

Any thoughts? Or is the blackhole unimitable?
ValhallaShimmer (especially in the "mono" reverb mode) is the closest Valhalla plugin to Blackhole in the underlying architecture. A good starting point for comparison:

- ValhallaShimmer, with Blackhole preset (the default preset that Shimmer opens up with)
- Set Diffusion to 0.827
- Set Color Mode to Dark

You may want to adjust the Mod Rate and Depth to taste. Once you have done the above, ValhallaShimmer sounds REALLY CLOSE to the Black Hole algorithm in my DSP7000 hardware.

The algorithms in VintageVerb have very different architectures than ValhallaShimmer or Blackhole. VintageVerb is inspired by different generations of Lexicon algorithms (224, 224XL, 480L to a lesser extent), while ValhallaShimmer and Blackhole both use more of a "brute force" technique. The cascaded allpass delays in ValhallaShimmer and Blackhole impart a very definite sonic signature onto the reverb, with a super high echo density, a slewed attack, and a decay that can depart away from the standard exponential reverb decay.

Sean Costello

IIRC, however, this is about the basic sound, but that the ribbon modulation is something rather unique. I know that I use it extensively and while I suppose that I could setup modulations for each of the controls or use something like MUX, it works well out of the box.

I felt like that was the main advantage over Shimmer. I'm sure that I also thought that it was $40 right now, and it wouldn't always be that price but that Shimmer was always going to be $50.

At any rate, reading my own words in that thread is interesting a year or so later. I use Blackhole a LOT. It was the modulation (of the parameters via the ribbon) that sold me and I still feel pretty much the same way about it. That is, the pure reverb sound itself isn't exactly clean or impressive, but with modulation, it yields really interesting sounds.

I'm sure that I'm not done buying reverbs but I look for specific kinds of things and I've found the reverbs that I've been searching for, since back then even, with Reverberate 2 and Ircam Verb 3.

I think that before I buy another reverb I'm going to buy a book on reverb algorithms, any suggestions?

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MusicRadar verdict is good in both regards:

http://www.musicradar.com/reviews/tech/ ... ole-556994

http://www.musicradar.com/reviews/tech/ ... erb-574692

But both these plugs are getting to be 4-5 years old now, hasn't anything come along in the meantime to match them?

Those reviews don't mention CPU hunger, but I would imagine BlackHole with the ribbon controller in real time will require a bit of juice to run properly ?

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Numanoid wrote:MusicRadar verdict is good in both regards:

http://www.musicradar.com/reviews/tech/ ... ole-556994

http://www.musicradar.com/reviews/tech/ ... erb-574692

But both these plugs are getting to be 4-5 years old now, hasn't anything come along in the meantime to match them?
Blackhole is based on a DSP4000 algorithm, that dates from the early 1990s. Algorithmic reverbs don't necessarily become obsolete with the passage of time.

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valhallasound wrote:Algorithmic reverbs don't necessarily become obsolete with the passage of time.
But we usually take for granted that plugins become "better" as they are newer, due to them for example being better tailored toward usage on newer computers with more power.

I mean, the Moog emulations keep coming, but why would anybody need another Moog emulation, when there are already so many about being emulated from the same hardware

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