How do you use reverb

[Scoops]

I'm not looking for what's your favorite reverb
I'm not looking for on track, in an aux, eq'd, and so on.

What I'm curious about is related to the number of reverbs you have, and how do you use them? Do you have specific reverbs for specific things:?

Like many of us, I have plenty of different reverbs. The verbs that I have are all pretty flexible, and can do many different things.

But I usually use just one vendors reverb for an entire project. I usually use it's different parameters (like room size) for the different uses. Like I'll sometimes use a shorter small room reverb on snare, and a very light reverb on the master. But this is usually just a single vendor

Again, just curious

Cheers

[billinder33]

I primarily use 6 reverbs, each for a different purpose:

Realistic(ish) room on a buss with lots of tuning options - Pro-R 5.
Easy to use, fast setup reverb on a synth or instrument insert - Minimal Swarm Reverb.
For a reverb that's tuned to the instrument's trailing notes and has excellent ducking - ADPTR Utopia.
Placing an instrument in a graphical 3D space - Melda MReverb.
General reverb with tons of options/models that I can page through when I'm not sure exactly what I want - Melda MTurboReverb.
Reverb and delay in a single plugin - Baby Audio Spaced Out.


I'm not a super-deep-in-the-weeds reverb geek who does lots of ambient or cinematic work. I'm more concerned about tools that quickly get nice reverb tails that hit the track's vibe with as little time invested as possible. For me, tools like LiquidSoncis Cinematic Rooms and AudioThing Fog Convolver are a workflow killers.

[yzcoruhT]

I do not use reverb plugins at all. Waste of money and time.

[zerocrossing]

I'm not looking for what's your favorite reverb
I'm not looking for on track, in an aux, eq'd, and so on.

What I'm curious about is related to the number of reverbs you have, and how do you use them? Do you have specific reverbs for specific things:?

Like many of us, I have plenty of different reverbs. The verbs that I have are all pretty flexible, and can do many different things.

But I usually use just one vendors reverb for an entire project. I usually use it's different parameters (like room size) for the different uses. Like I'll sometimes use a shorter small room reverb on snare, and a very light reverb on the master. But this is usually just a single vendor

Again, just curious

Cheers

That's essentially how I use it, though depending on what I'm doing, I may also use a "special effect" reverb on specific instruments. For instance, I might use a spring reverb on a guitar, or a shimmer reverb on a synth pad. If you have a lot going on, reverb can be an issue with harsh upper mid range build up, so I'm almost always using some sort of dynamic EQ on a reverb send to clamp down frequency bands when they pass a certain threshold. I'll also put a high pass before a reverb to clean up mud.

[Scoops]

Realistic(ish) room on a buss with lots of tuning options - Pro-R 5.

Pro-R5?
Time traveler are we?

[fisherKing]

i send everything to an aux, so that my track is bathed in reverb. then i run that channel thru a de-reverb plugin.

[Cuauhtli]

No reverb with less than a 30 second decay (tail) is how I use reverbs. Play one note, let the reverb ring out for 5 minutes and call it a song. Sometimes it's a chord (always F#m).

Seriously, it's often one reverb on a bus or the same reverb for the various tracks, unless I want a specific reverb effect on something.

[justin3am]

In my template project, there are 8 reverb focused fx sends/returns. I don't use them all in every project but I do tend to use a lot of reverbs.
I often ride the sends, to change the balance of ambience throughout the project, some reverbs are only activated at certain points, as like an accent (inspired by dub-style mixing).
I love spring reverbs and often use my Fostex 3180 the way some would use a room reverb. It has a much more diffuse sound than a typical spring reverb.
I also like the reverb plug-in which is included in Bitwig, because it allows me to put other effects in the diffusion tank and create feedback loops within the reverb. A simple reverb can really come alive when combined with other effects.
I also use reverbs like an instrument. With a feedback loop or a simple drone/noise wash and the verb set to 100% wet, I'll tweak reverb parameters to create evolving textures. For this kind of thing I typically turn to pedals and rack effect. The Eventide H9000, Eventide Space, Walrus Sloer and my shiny new Fairield Placeholder are great for sound design experiments.

[billinder33]

Realistic(ish) room on a buss with lots of tuning options - Pro-R 5.

Pro-R5?
Time traveler are we?

Yeah, the 'two' on my typewriter is broken so I chose the next best number!!

[billinder33]

i send everything to an aux, so that my track is bathed in reverb. then i run that channel thru a de-reverb plugin.

Crush dynamics, restore dynamics, crush dynamics, restore dynamics, crush dynamics, restore dynamics... it's the cycle of life.

[foosnark]

For me reverbs are a part of sound design. Sometimes subtle, sometimes extreme. Each voice gets its own reverb (or none, or multiple reverbs). I stick them directly in that voice's effects chain in Bitwig. It's not a send, but if I put it inside of some other container (like a Chain device) it operates like one.

I have several reverbs for different flavors. I don't care about "realism" (I'm using very synthetic sounds) but texture and interest. Some hardware (Eurorack and pedals), some software. Sometimes I use non-reverbs in a reverb-like role -- delays, granular, resonators etc.

Sometimes I will actually use Phonolyth Velvet Machine in a cleanup role... if I put it inside ZPlane Peel or Bitwig Multiband Split etc. to restrict the range it operates on, I can often clean up unwanted crunchiness if I drove something a little too hard when it was supposed to be smooth.

[Benedict]

I use primarily one Reverb on a Send for the whole 'song' to keep all the parts in the same 'room' space (otherwise the poor listener's brain is confuzzled as to why Tom Cruise is in the bathroom whilst kissing Scarlett Johansson in the kitchen).

My preference is for a low density/diffusion 'clattery' echo so mostly I use echo/delay devices with several taps and more feedback - along with modulation to offset some of the ring, but not all as room ring is reality. I make this room sound per song and not just dropping presets. This is because, even if the songs need a similar feel, each should evoke a different facet. Unless perhaps we decide this should be like a concert in one room from start to finish (then the recording need to match that too, or it breaks and feels faux).

This is a multi-tap echo but once you understand how the echos gang up, you can make almost any kind of space to place things in (always remembering this is all illusion).

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

I serve it cold, atop a bed of spring greens, with a balsamic glaze and surrounded by a moat of raspberry coulis (To be voiced by Lloyd Grossman).

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

I typically might have 4 sends setup like: 1) Ambience (most ER's), 2) Room (Short Decay), 3) Medium Decay, 4) Longer Decay. But it varies. Sometimes I have a dedicated snare verb, sometimes gated. Sometimes, vocals may get a dedicated verb. Sometimes, I'll use inserts on an individual track, particularly in large projects or high CPU tracks. Why? Once you start sending a bunch of tracks to one bus, the CPU usage actually goes up because you're creating a multithreading bottleneck. Individual inserts can alleviate that.

[jamcat]

Different types of reverbs are used for different purposes and will be implemented in different ways at different times in the record-making process, at different points in the signal chain. It’s good to think through the process, and use each reverb accordingly.

If I’m creating a physical acoustic space for a performance, I use Audio Modeling Ambiente. Each instrument gets a track insert that places it in its own unique location within a single, shared acoustic environment. It’s used as an insert, because the whole sound is originating completely within the acoustic space.

If I’m using a reverb device for tone building, such as a spring tank on a guitar, this also goes on an insert, because the way it would be used during recording is to send the instrument signal through the device.

If I’m using a studio reverb rack processor, like a Lexicon 224 or 480, then it gets an aux send on the mixing console, since these have traditionally been used in post to create a halo around a recorded vocal, or add a sheen to sweeten the mix.

An EMT 140, on the other hand, may be inserted on the tracking console channel before tape, since plate reverbs were quite often printed to tape while recording back in the day. But a chamber reverb will be on its own aux channel on the tracking console, since recorded tracks are played back through a speaker in a chamber in the recording studio, and recorded to a separate track during the recording session.

So how I use a reverb is going to depend on what story I am trying to tell about the record.