Reverberate - Convolution reverb with modulation for Mac and PC (AU, AAX, VST)

[liquidsonics]

Cool, will give it a go! Any idea about the final cost? I don't want to fall in love with another 600$ app

It's not going to be anywhere near $600 or €600 but maybe 600 Rand is more like it... I'm thinking something more like $50USD (but I'm not 100% decided yet) should be about right (and for more basic uses there's the Reverberate LE side of things).

[liquidsonics]

First impressions are good. I think the interface could use some more contrast. But so far, so good otherwise. Got to do some more testing though once this headache goes away(stupid allergies).

Brent

Hmm, interesting, my secondary screen is really terrible TFT and on that screen I tend to agree, but every other screen I tried it on (including some really tired old ones) it looked ok so I dismissed it - any other people also find this? Maybe I should darken some areas. Which areas of the plugin did you find the most problematic? I think the tab lines perhaps could be a little thicker or darker.

[tinkerpixel]

I think this is really nice! Would definitely buy at that price...I too was concerned that the price would be outlandish...haven't hit any problems yet. I'll mess with some more and see if I can get anything to occur. Seems stable for me though in live 8 vista 32. I do think modulating between irs is a good idea, loading natural sounding irs in one slot and more special effect ones in another is making for some pretty interesting combinations. Sounds very lively. Would like more extensive lfo options, like symmetry/shape for more sound design effects rather than natural sounding reverbs. Also, lfo rate knob produces crackling when moved, it would be nice to be able to automate this as I think you could get some fairly interesting sounds out of it.

[tinkerpixel]

First impressions are good. I think the interface could use some more contrast. But so far, so good otherwise. Got to do some more testing though once this headache goes away(stupid allergies).

Brent

Hmm, interesting, my secondary screen is really terrible TFT and on that screen I tend to agree, but every other screen I tried it on (including some really tired old ones) it looked ok so I dismissed it - any other people also find this? Maybe I should darken some areas. Which areas of the plugin did you find the most problematic? I think the tab lines perhaps could be a little thicker or darker.

I'm working on a pantone color corrected monitor, seems a little light in the tabs, maybe the currently selected tab could be outlined darker. Same for the EQ tabs, I almost missed them at first glance. Also, in the ir mixer section it looks like the final mix knobs could be given some space away from the divider...seems a little close. Overall though I like the minimal look to it.

[liquidsonics]

Also, lfo rate knob produces crackling when moved, it would be nice to be able to automate this as I think you could get some fairly interesting sounds out of it.

Thanks for pointing this out, I'll work on it. Not sure how I am going to fix it yet

I'm working on a pantone color corrected monitor, seems a little light in the tabs, maybe the currently selected tab could be outlined darker. Same for the EQ tabs, I almost missed them at first glance. Also, in the ir mixer section it looks like the final mix knobs could be given some space away from the divider...seems a little close. Overall though I like the minimal look to it.

I've darkened the tab lines and added some grey into inactive tabs, hopefully this will make them more visible. If I still need to work on them shout up. I'm not sure I want to move stuff around on the mixer tab though.

Would like more extensive lfo options, like symmetry/shape for more sound design effects rather than natural sounding reverbs.

Do you mean modulation on the actual IR parameters like the envelopes? This isn't something I've provided as constant recalculation of the IR is really heavy on the CPU. Try drawing a modulation curve in live on one of the envelope parameters for example and bring up your task manager, and you'll notice the CPU goes up quite a lot. The CPU monitor in Live probably won't because this work is done in a separate thread hiding it from Live. What this means is that in a few years when we all have more cores than we can count this kind of approach will be doable, but right now multicore people probably don't want 1 core totally taken up with IR recalculation (and single core people would really notice when their audio engine started breaking up all the time).

[tinkerpixel]

Would like more extensive lfo options, like symmetry/shape for more sound design effects rather than natural sounding reverbs.

Do you mean modulation on the actual IR parameters like the envelopes? This isn't something I've provided as constant recalculation of the IR is really heavy on the CPU. Try drawing a modulation curve in live on one of the envelope parameters for example and bring up your task manager, and you'll notice the CPU goes up quite a lot. The CPU monitor in Live probably won't because this work is done in a separate thread hiding it from Live. What this means is that in a few years when we all have more cores than we can count this kind of approach will be doable, but right now multicore people probably don't want 1 core totally taken up with IR recalculation (and single core people would really notice when their audio engine started breaking up all the time).

That would be cool...but it wasn't what I meant . I could see how that would be heavy on the cpu. Sorry, I just meant more options for the lfo that modulates between IR1 and 2. This seems to be where the sound comes alive(a feat in convolution reverbs), I'm just curious what would happen if the lfo's were given options like ableton's auto pan. The lfo's in the post eq's are a nice touch.

I'm not sure if this is a bug or maybe just bad impulses, but I was using some very short(.5 seconds or less) cabinet impulses last night and was unable to get any sound.

I like the gui as it is...my comments were only minor. Much prefer this look to the fake hardware sci fi video game look thats been going on in audio plugs. I like the knobs you've used alot.

Edit: read the faq about cuda and reverberate. Makes sense.

[liquidsonics]

Regarding the cabinet impulses you were using, feel free to email them a few to me (support at liquidsonics) if you still can't get them to work. I had a quick go with the cabinet ones from Voxengo (http://www.voxengo.com/files/impulses/IMreverbs4.rar) and they sound exactly the same using the SIR2 demo as my app, so I think short IRs are not causing a problem. Remember to pick a clean preset when loading stuff like this as the envelopes etc etc could be messing with it. Also the default level is quite low (as this suits reverb) so maybe you need to mess with the gain and mix bit too. Did the impulses you were using show anything in the visualisation window?

I can see the argument for shaping the LFOs a bit more, having a peek at the autopan in Live they do look pretty flexible. I think in a version 2 I would add in those shaping options but also build a mod matrix in too; that's for the future if this is successful as I can't see the point in half implementing a proper modulation system as it's quite a redesign.

Glad you like the UI, I also think clean and simple is attractive and makes a change. The way Live has gone is very nice.

[tinkerpixel]

I tested the voxengo ones they worked just fine. I looked into it further and some were just really quiet, probably a user error on my part ...sorry. But I did get a crash, not a major one...when user is browsing for irs in the explorer window and accidentally deletes the plugin (I didn't see that it was open) Live crashes and wouldn't release the asio driver(hard restart required).

[liquidsonics]

I tested the voxengo ones they worked just fine. I looked into it further and some were just really quiet, probably a user error on my part ...sorry. But I did get a crash, not a major one...when user is browsing for irs in the explorer window and accidentally deletes the plugin (I didn't see that it was open) Live crashes and wouldn't release the asio driver(hard restart required).

So you clicked 'eject' and then was able to close the plugin? The file selector explorer window is supposed to be modal (so it locks out the rest of the plugin and host from any interaction unless cancel is clicked) so I'm very surprised this happened (I tried for ages to get modal operation working because I knew this was an issue otherwise and thought I'd succeeded). It's modal on Reaper, the FL Studio demo and Live 7 on XP and Vista on my machine.

The only time I've found it isn't modal is if you're loading a previously saved song, it finds the IRs have moved and it then asks you to locate a file (due to an issue of not knowing if the editor is open and hence which window to lock out).

Perhaps you could try it in Reaper, I guess it could be a Live8 issue perhaps?

You've got me intrigued!

Glad the short IR issue is resolved.

[tinkerpixel]

Ok It is modal but I figured out how it happened. You have to open the browser, then click on the left right arrows next to the eject button, this pulls focus away from the explorer window. I was able to hit the delete button on my keyboard (now that the explorer window no longer has focus) deleting the currently selected item in live, which in this case was the plugin. I will try on another host once I've gotten my system back from live (I've got to say that when live does crash it doesn't do so very gracefully and usually when I try to restore from a saved undo state it usually hangs again). I'll see if theres any other way I can get this to happen I've got plogue bidule, renoise, cubase 4.5, sonar music creator 5, and fl studio 8 on this computer.

[tinkerpixel]

Update:
closing plugin window by clicking x can cause crash on cancel. Nevermind what I said before you only need to click the plugin gui window then press delete or the x. tried in both live 7.0.14, 8.01 & 8.02.

[koolkeys]

Sorry for taking so long to get back. The weekend is my busiest time.

The parts of the interface that I think could use more contrast are things like the colored section of the dials(the "filler") that shows you what a knob is set at. It's hard to just see at a quick glance what a knob is set to. Maybe make the bar slightly wider, or a different color?

The tabs could use some "definition" as well, as mentioned above.

Even the EQ page, the EQ line itself is quite light against an already light background. Hard to see for me.

On the IR editing pages, the line(s) that go through the IR window don't show up well being the same color as the IR representation. Does that make sense?

It's possible that it's my monitor, but I don't generally have any contrast problems with other plugins.

I think this has great potential. It even sounds pretty good. And the interface isn't bad at all. Just needs more readability!

Brent

[tinkerpixel]

I'm back again this time with more hosts:

Renoise v 2: Throws this error message but keeps working:
Ouch a fatal error happened (GUI, peeking messages)... It goes on about saving project under new filename and contacting support...nothing else technical

FL studio v 8:
Could not get a crash, window has true modal behavior. Could not click on gui.

Cubase v 4.5: throws error message similar to renoise but keeps working fine (including plugin) until you close the program then it hangs... but closes out entirely.

Plogue Bidule v 0.9685: I could close plugin window but no error messages.

Cakewalk music creator 5:
Cannot close window.

Seems live is the only one that crashes in this volatile way. This is not meant to be discouraging in any way...I love the effect, its exactly what I've been after for a while now.

[liquidsonics]

Update:
closing plugin window by clicking x can cause crash on cancel. Nevermind what I said before you only need to click the plugin gui window then press delete or the x. tried in both live 7.0.14, 8.01 & 8.02.

Thanks for the info, I've been able to recreate the issue but am struggling to solve it, appears I can make the window modal on the host or the plugin, not both (so there is a way to close the plugin window either on the plugin GUI or via the host and make it crash either way). I've found some other plugins have the same behaviour using file selector boxes. How annoying!

[koolkeys]

By the way, you mention Cubase 4.5 giving an error and a hang. I can say that at least on my system with Cubase 5, there are no issues like that. Other variables can come into play obviously.

Brent