KVR Audio

Monkberry · Post by **Monkberry** » Wed Jul 08, 2015 10:19 am

billcarroll wrote:The UAD EMT 140. It just sounds so damn good.

Ha! I have never found another reverb that sounded so right since the UAD EMT 140. I no longer use my UA plugs because I'm on a different computer but eventually I will return to them and it will be like old friends getting back together. Definitely a special reverb!

Ingonator · Post by **Ingonator** » Wed Jul 08, 2015 11:07 am

FWIW i got ValhallaVintageVerb since a while and also ÜberMod since this week and like both very much.

I admit that while i have owned a bunch of hardware synths in the past (also also a few at the moment) and several of them, with built-in FXs i have never really owned a dedicated hardware FX unit (either single or Multi FX).

Currently i do not seem to own many dedicated Reverb plugins besides those included with my hosts. I got e.g. ValhallaVintageVerb the Reverbs in the Korg MDE-X Multi-FX, those in Tone2 Warmverb Multi-FX, Tone2 UltraSpace and also some free plugins (e.g. from TAL). I also own the Space Echo from GSI (the developer of the VB-3 Organ) but this stil seems to be 32-bit only which is why i rarely use it.

Tone2 UltraSpace is a quite new plugin and it sounds really nice IMO. I am not sure if i really prefer it over e.g. VintageVerb but those two seem to sound more or less differently.
Ultraspace could produce some nice Hall Reverbs that are sounding both huge and clean at the same time. Some Reverbs seem to tend to not sounding really "clean" and with too many artifacts (i am no specialist so this is sometimes difficult to describe for me).
Not exactly sure what kind of Refverb this is (while based on the included graphical display it could be a convolution Reverb and taht display changes depending on the parameter settings) but there is no option for different algorithms. It contains 10 knobs with different parametzers. Additionally there is also a Multitap unit that could be also used as an additional Delay FX.

MFXxx · Post by **MFXxx** » Wed Jul 08, 2015 12:09 pm

Interesting and educative thread. Being a novice musician and I use that term very loosely and more of a tech enthusiast in regards to music technology and sound production. Everything is a learning curve of discovery with my limited time and talents.
Reverb is something I have never used a great deal or thought about until recently. I think for several reasons.
1. A lot of sounds and Synth presets automatically have some forms of reverb applied.
2. Not actually understanding the advantages and necessity if using reverb.
3. Reverb for me has always been an effect used for depth with vocals or an overall effect. Everything sounds great with reverb, my singing sounds great in the bathroom in an alternate reality...vocal booth. Lol never me. Just slap on the polish.
In regards to points 1 and 2 and the thread, I am often surprised very little is commented upon the built in reverb of vst instruments or hardware. Yet in regards to reverb and my more recent understanding and broader use of reverb, my focus has become more critical. Ie a lot of patches relying on reverb to qualify the sound. I hope this makes sense? What I now find myself doing as a first action which any preset in a synth is switch off the reverb. Which leads me to point 2.
In regards to percussion and drums, Valhalla room and vintage are my goto. Particularly for the snares and using several instances across the the drum strips pre drum sub. So maybe one on a snare. Then clap, hats., percussion. For this reason the sound and low cpu/ASIO hit suits my purpose.
For synths, instruments or even main groups I have a major love of 2CAudio B2 and aether. On a recent track posting someone left a comment on a track and particularly how well the mix sat and the space applied to the parts. On reflection I had applied several instances of aether and B2 to the main groups. So a lesson learnt. Reverb is more than an effect to enhance my drone full out of tune singing. It's importance lies within its application of the whole mix in its parts.
Apologies for the long post I'm on vacation and missing my man cave studio at home. However it's interesting reading the posts on this thread as I fell into the trap a few years ago of "I need reverb and went and bought lexicon". Nothing wrong with that, however I have found my home with valhalla and 2CAudio. The 2caudio for me cover the rich space needed for a mix to the experimental of sound exploration. Personally I see no need for anything more.

valhallasound · Post by **valhallasound** » Wed Jul 08, 2015 9:35 pm

Monkberry wrote:
billcarroll wrote:The UAD EMT 140. It just sounds so damn good.
Ha! I have never found another reverb that sounded so right since the UAD EMT 140. I no longer use my UA plugs because I'm on a different computer but eventually I will return to them and it will be like old friends getting back together. Definitely a special reverb!

The UAD EMT140 is definitely the closest plugin out there right now to a real EMT140 plate. Some "real world" plates have more audible dispersion than the UAD model, but my guess is that the original UAD-1 didn't have enough power to model this dispersion.

Sean Costello

Winstontaneous · Post by **Winstontaneous** » Wed Jul 08, 2015 11:37 pm

MFXxx wrote:Interesting and educative thread. Being a novice musician and I use that term very loosely and more of a tech enthusiast in regards to music technology and sound production. Everything is a learning curve of discovery with my limited time and talents.
Reverb is something I have never used a great deal or thought about until recently.

I'm also only really wrapping my head around reverb now after making electronic music for several years. I highly recommend Mike Senior's "Mixing Secrets"...it's the single best production resource I've found online or off, and his treatment of reverb's five major attributes (blend, size, tone, sustain, and spread) is fascinating.

Beatworld · Post by **Beatworld** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 1:22 am

valhallasound wrote: The UAD EMT140 is definitely the closest plugin out there right now to a real EMT140 plate. Some "real world" plates have more audible dispersion than the UAD model, but my guess is that the original UAD-1 didn't have enough power to model this dispersion.

Sean Costello

A good friend of mine (http://www.shanghaitwang.com.au/) recently had a job tracking and mixing an album for a client. I was pretty closely involved in the project and heard the mixes develop.
The client made a decision to send a song to a highly regarded studio on the east coast (for reasons more to do with certain connections in the industry that studio had and the possible publishing deal implications....) for a test mix to see what they would do.

When that test mix came back my friend asked me to blind test it against his latest mix.
The thing which immediately struck me about what turned out to be the east coast mix was the reverb.
It was absolutely gorgeous........I set about finding out what it was.
Turned out it was the UAD EMT 140.

The market is crying out for a high quality algorithmic 140

Ingonator · Post by **Ingonator** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 7:06 am

Just found a video here and the original EMT 140 seemed to be HUGE (not only sound but also size):
http://www.toolfarm.com/blog/entry/insp ... erb_effect

There they mentioned that the reverb in Izotope Nectar 2 seems to be modelled on a EMT 140 now.
This is also mentioned at the official website:
https://www.izotope.com/en/products/mix ... /features/

Personally i have never used a real or an emulation yet (and do nit have an UAD DSP card). If Valhalla DSP would do a native (non DSP) emulation i am sure it would be great.

Currently downloading the Nectar 2 trial to check the Reverb. Anyway even the standard version of the plugin is very exopensive so i guess i would not buy this only for the Reverb. Will try to find something close in the Reverbs i already got. As already mentioned above for Reverb that is both big and clean i like Tone2 UltraSpace.
Maybe someone with the UAD EMT 140 could compare it to that presets in UlraSpace (there should be demo version).

UPDATE:
Just did a short test of the Reverb in the Trial of Izotope Nectar 2. Not sure how close it is to a real EMT 140 (or the UAD emulation) but it indeed sounds very nice to my ears.
The Reverb on Nectar 2 seems to have a few controls like Pre-Delay, Decay, Width and Dry/Wet. Guess it misses the selection for the3 plates (had a look at the UAD plugin screenshot). Anyway the real thing did not seem to have controls like e.g. Pre-delay, Filters, Width, and Decay.

Did a first comparison with Tone2 UltraSpace using e.g. the "REV Hall Plate" preset (with slight adjustments to Pre-Delay and Decay) and while not identical that UltraSpace preset seems to be quite close (with correct/matching Pre-Delay and Decay settings). The sound character of both seems to be big, clean and smooth (or "shimmering" like some said abou EMT 140...).

I was tweaking a few of the ValhallaVintageVerb Plate presets to get close but first i had some problems to get that kind of "clean" sound. Anyway VVV has a lot of parameters and after a little tweaking i guess i got closer.
Even if those attempts with UltraSapce and VVV maybe do not nail the real thing (which i am not sure as i only have the Reverb in Nectar 2 as a reference) most important seems to be to find a result i like myself.

UPDATE:
EMT 140 Impulse responses for Altiverb 6 and 7 seem to be availbale here:
https://www.audioease.com/IR/VenuePages/reverbgear.html
Anyway Altiverb seems to be very expensive (the "Regular" version is close to buying a UAD-2 Solo and the EMT 140 plugin by UAD and teh XL version even worse).

Free impulse responses seem to be available here:
https://www.gearslutz.com/board/music-c ... -here.html

I first imported some of the IRs into the Reverence plugin in Cubase Pro 8 but not really happy with the result.
Then loaded some of them into the Convolution Reverb Pro plugin at the Max 4 Live essentials pack (included with live 9 suite) and this sounds much better now (i mostly ignored that Reverb plugin so far but actually it seems to be quite good...).

Monkberry · Post by **Monkberry** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 10:28 am

Ingonator wrote:UPDATE:
I first imported some of the IRs into the Reverence plugin in Cubase Pro 8 but not really happy with the result.
Then loaded some of them into the Convolution Reverb Pro plugin at the Max 4 Live essentials pack (included with live 9 suite) and this sounds much better now (i mostly ignored that Reverb plugin so far but actually it seems to be quite good...).

Interesting. I'm on Cubase 6.5 and have tried various IR's in Reverence that I used in Altiverb 6 and they don't seem to strike me the same but convolution hosts shouldn't impart a "tonal character" of there own should they? This came up in a thread somewhere on KVR. Is it just a matter of level matching, etc.? I can't compare the 2 as I'm on a different computer at 64 bit now. In all fairness, since buying Sean's Room and Vintage Verb I have never looked back. Certainly one of the most talented and generous devs in the business.

Ingonator · Post by **Ingonator** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 10:39 am

Monkberry wrote:
Ingonator wrote:UPDATE:
I first imported some of the IRs into the Reverence plugin in Cubase Pro 8 but not really happy with the result.
Then loaded some of them into the Convolution Reverb Pro plugin at the Max 4 Live essentials pack (included with live 9 suite) and this sounds much better now (i mostly ignored that Reverb plugin so far but actually it seems to be quite good...).
Interesting. I'm on Cubase 6.5 and have tried various IR's in Reverence that I used in Altiverb 6 and they don't seem to strike me the same but convolution hosts shouldn't impart a "tonal character" of there own should they? This came up in a thread somewhere on KVR. Is it just a matter of level matching, etc.? I can't compare the 2 as I'm on a different computer at 64 bit now. In all fairness, since buying Sean's Room and Vintage Verb I have never looked back. Certainly one of the most talented and generous devs in the business.

Maybe i did something wrong in Reverence or did not tweak it long enough but it did not sound great there for me.

Anyway when loading those free EMT 140 IRs in Convolution Reverb Pro (Max 4 Live device) they seemed to sound instantly great and the "Bright" ones sound damn close to the Reverb in Nectar 2 that is suppopsed to be an EMT 140 emulation.

As mentioned above i also got some very close results in Tone2 UltraSpace and also could get somehow close in VVV with some tweaking (will post a preset at the Valhalla DSP KVR sub-forum ASAP). Still got a few problems to get VVV as "clean" sounding as with those IRs or with UltraSpace, especially at the later stage of the Reverb tail. The Dry/Wet control seems to be essential too as at 100% the IRs do not seem to sound really great (AFAIK the real EMT 140 did not have such controls).
Nice to have those IRs as a reference now (while i do not own the real thing or the UAD one). Actually i do not think i will any longer need the trial of Nectar 2 as a reference (did not want to buy it anyway).

UPDATE:
Just played with TAL Reverb-2 (one of the most popular freeware Reverbs) again which is also available as a 64-bit VST2 and seems to emulate a Plate Reverb.The overall sound is very nice too but only has few controls (no Decay time knob). Overall in the later Reverb tail ot seems to be less "clean", comnparable to the preset i was just doing in VVV (which sounds comparable to TAL Reverb-2 at the moment).
TAL Reverb-3 (another free Plate Reverb) has comparable features like TAL Reverb-2 but a slightly different sound. This one seems to sound a bit "cleaner" in the later part of the Reverb tail so i lslightly prefer it over TAL Reverb-2. Like v2 the v3 of the plugin has no control for the Decay.

TAL Reverb-4 is very new (same as in the new TAL Sampler plugin) and sounds a bit more "diffuse" at the later Reverb tail (not as "clean" as v3). Anyway all 3 plugins (v2 to v4) seem to actually sound really nice to my ears (while v3 seems to be best so far). v4 besides VST2 is also available as an AAX plugin (both 32-bit and 64-bit).

Ingonator · Post by **Ingonator** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 12:44 pm

So basically based on my current tests i could sum my favorite Reverb plugins up to those at the moment:

- ValhallaVintageVerb
- SKNote Verbtone (physical modeled Plate)
- SKnote Necklace (physical modeled Spring Reverb)
- Tone2 UltraSpace (especially the "REV Hall Plate" preset)
- Convolution Reverb Pro (from Max 4 Live Essentials) with the free EMT 140 IRs

UPDATE:
Just updated the list with SKNote Verbtone, a physical modelled Plate Reverb (created based on measurements of a real custom made plate).
UPDATE:
Also got the physical modeed SKNote Necklace Spring Reverb with the upgrade price from Verbtone.

gaf_thit · Post by **gaf_thit** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 2:35 pm

Straumsundbrua.jpg

Here's a picture of a construction that blew my mind when I sneaked into it:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/dzmx3157yqmhd ... a.jpg?dl=0
Built in 1990-1991, when it was just finished, it wasn't closed, so it was possible to go inside. It is hollow and the floor inside is curved, like you see in the picture. Above each fundament it is two vertical concrete walls. There is also some concrete shapes on the floor in the shape of giant wedges.

The reverb was changed drastically as I went along. Standing in the middle, you got reverb coming from both ends. Standing in one of either ends, the reverb has a deep tone the farther away it goes.

Amazing reverb. Need to bring a boltcutter and my portable recorder next time I visit my parents.

Orbit-50 · Post by **Orbit-50** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 2:48 pm

ArtsAcoustic Reverb of course. Why? Because it does everything it needs to, and dammit, that makes me feel good sonny!

.-.

Ingonator · Post by **Ingonator** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 4:45 pm

Orbit-50 wrote:ArtsAcoustic Reverb of course. Why? Because it does everything it needs to, and dammit, that makes me feel good sonny!

.-.

So far i only got the Big Rock Phaser from Arts Acoustic and that one is gorgeous. By far my favorite Phaser plugin (actually i rarely seem to use others).

Orbit-50 · Post by **Orbit-50** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 4:57 pm

Ingonator wrote:
Orbit-50 wrote:ArtsAcoustic Reverb of course. Why? Because it does everything it needs to, and dammit, that makes me feel good sonny!

.-.
So far i only got the Big Rock Phaser from Arts Acoustic and that one is gorgeous. By far my favorite Phaser plugin (actually i rarely seem to use others).

I actually have not tried it. I think I will. Thanks for the suggestion.

.-.

gaf_thit · Post by **gaf_thit** » Thu Jul 09, 2015 8:01 pm

Glaceverb is mentioned earlier. That was my first downloaded and much used reverb plugin. It's very good in my opinion. Simulating reverb though different materials for example. Does it sound real? I don't know, but it sounds good. Does anyone know what lies in the term Abime modeling? It's a preset in Glaceverb that is instant ambient. Used it a lot some years ago. Must try it more. Ah memories...

What are your favorite non-Valhalla reverbs, and why?