Newbie convo reverb question.

[PaulG]

Alright,

I've been reading a lot about the quality of the SIR, Convo Boy, etc, and although I haven't given it a whole hearted effort to incorporate, could someone maybe answer a basic question or two (or three...hey, I'm not picky!)

All you do is get the plug in, load an impulse "file", right, and there you go? What about the "latency" issues I've heard about, and what about that with Sonar?

Another - if you, get, say, a Lexicon - do you have the ability to change parameters like in a standard plug-in reverb? Size, depth, pre-delay, etc? Or is it simply just a "mix" control.

And, maybe out of a sense of fairness, should Lexicon, Eventide and whomever be "compensated" for their "impulses"? I don't feel wonderful about benefiting from something if I can't contribute to the source of that benefit...but that's just me, no value judgement on anyone else.

As always, thank you!

[kritikon]

All you do is get the plug in, load an impulse "file", right, and there you go? What about the "latency" issues I've heard about, and what about that with Sonar?

1. Yes...that's all you do.
2. Does Sonar have plugin delay compensation? If so, then latency isn't an issue. If it doesn't, there are plugins to compensate for latency.

Another - if you, get, say, a Lexicon - do you have the ability to change parameters like in a standard plug-in reverb? Size, depth, pre-delay, etc? Or is it simply just a "mix" control.

No...there is an Eq section (which is very useful), you can create attack envelopes and add a predelay - you can also reverse the impulses and there's a wet/dry mix, but there aren't the number of parameters like on the real thing - that's why you need to have a good selection of impulses because there's only so much you can do to alter them.

And, maybe out of a sense of fairness, should Lexicon, Eventide and whomever be "compensated" for their "impulses"? I don't feel wonderful about benefiting from something if I can't contribute to the source of that benefit...but that's just me, no value judgement on anyone else.

That's a grey area...doesn't seem to have been resolved at present, but as far as I know, it isn't actually illegal (but it's possible it might become so, if the companies involved decide to force the issue.


Download the full set of 24bit impulses from the Noisevault of PCM91, Eventides, Quantec, springs etc and you will be amazed at how much better those reverbs sound than the usual native reverb plugins. Don't use the 16bit ones - they are not as good. They have their limitations, but it's the closest you'll get to the good quality reverbs without resorting to h/w (and you can do it for free - which still astounds me). I won't use any native reverb apart from the Princeton - the others just pale in comparison.

[Hink]

the impulses them selves are the room size, but yes you do get parameters like on a standard reverb (wow, I remember when that was a silver box with springs and rca jacks)...as far as latency I'm using Pristine lite and have seen no latency issues. The impulse modeler is also nice, I have had fun and built some cool rooms, I don't like to emerse everything in reverb, I think it should be subtle. However often it seemed to me that when you applied small amounts of verb you lost some of the space and life of the reveb. (I don't know if that makes sense). I have found with Pristine I can make realistic impulses and not have to "underdrive" my reverb. The result is a much livelier but subtle sound. I now have a drum room that sounds like a room. Not like a room in a dark wet cave. I hope that helps some

[danyell]

2. Does Sonar have plugin delay compensation? If so, then latency isn't an issue. If it doesn't, there are plugins to compensate for latency.

Sonar has had latency compensation since for a while now. I believe since version 2

[PaulG]

Thank you very much, I really appreciate it. It's very good to have this forum and all of the wonderful info.

[M'Snah]

[...] SIR, Convo Boy, etc,

... Pristine Space/Light, AnalogFlux Impulse...

Another - if you, get, say, a Lexicon - do you have the ability to change parameters like in a standard plug-in reverb? Size, depth, pre-delay, etc? Or is it simply just a "mix" control.

It depends on the plugin as well. e.g. Convo Boy can easily load different impulses left and right, Pristine Space has several options to tune EQ, envelope, stereo image, etc.

And, maybe out of a sense of fairness, should Lexicon, Eventide and whomever be "compensated" for their "impulses"?

Some vendors, like Spirit Canyon, are auto-compensated, because they sell their (wonderful) impulse sets...

btw,you didn't ask it yet, but convolution is not only to produce reverb, but can provide you with all kinds of effects, depending on the creativity of the impulse designer (that's why I mentioned Spirit Canyon)

btw2 another unasked question: You can experiment with loading 'random' wav files as impulse files and just listen what happens

[greendoor]

Convolution reverbs are good for acquiring a taste for expensive reverb. This will allow you to hear the weakness of most VST plugin reverbs. But recently there have been some very good algorithm reverbs that are equal quality to hardware reverbs. E.g. AAR from www.artsacoustic.com This gives total flexibility compared to impulses.

[Space Boy]

Convolution reverbs are good for acquiring a taste for expensive reverb. This will allow you to hear the weakness of most VST plugin reverbs. But recently there have been some very good algorithm reverbs that are equal quality to hardware reverbs. E.g. AAR from www.artsacoustic.com This gives total flexibility compared to impulses.

Just out of curiosity. Are you absolutely sure that the AAR is not using a convolution process? Looking at the UI I clearly see an impulse response in the top right display. Is it possible this plug-in uses the knob parameters to design an IR and then uses a convolution process?

Just a thought

Paul

[nick at artsacoustic]

Convolution reverbs are good for acquiring a taste for expensive reverb. This will allow you to hear the weakness of most VST plugin reverbs. But recently there have been some very good algorithm reverbs that are equal quality to hardware reverbs. E.g. AAR from www.artsacoustic.com This gives total flexibility compared to impulses.

Just out of curiosity. Are you absolutely sure that the AAR is not using a convolution process? Looking at the UI I clearly see an impulse response in the top right display. Is it possible this plug-in uses the knob parameters to design an IR and then uses a convolution process?

Just a thought

Paul

nope. pure algorithmic.
you couldn`t define roomsize, density, and modulation
if it would be convolved.
the upper graphic displays are only graphics, to inform the user.
all the convolution processes would cause pre calculations. creating an impulse response collection to reflect all the possibilities and combinations of settings would lead to probably the highest amount of data possible ever seen in a plugin .
up to now i don`t know of an acceptable, realistic way to do such complex dynamic convolution.
of course i coud be wrong and you pull that right out of the bag .
btw, just try the demo, you`ll hear that it`s algorithmic by simply tweaking it.

[Space Boy]

btw, just try the demo, you`ll hear that it`s algorithmic by simply tweaking it.

Just tried it. Sounds good! Nice controls!

The shorter reverbs could be realized with similar quality using convolution. However, the 40+ second long reverb, possible on the AAR, is not really practical using convolution (it takes a lot of CPU).

Nice work!

Paul

[nick at artsacoustic]

Just tried it. Sounds good! Nice controls!

thanks!

The shorter reverbs could be realized with similar quality using convolution.

nope, not with this functionality. that would mean we`d have to record an impulse response each for all combinations of possible settings. would be impossible to do, besides that fact it still would require the hugest ammount of ram.

However, the 40+ second long reverb, possible on the AAR, is not really practical using convolution (it takes a lot of CPU).

heh, i`d really like to see that desktop system that would be capable of an reality-use of that .

Nice work!

Paul

thanks again. happy to hear you like it.
btw, i up to now was not able to test your plugins.
will try them out soon.
very interresting, from what i read.

[Space Boy]

The shorter reverbs could be realized with similar quality using convolution.

nope, not with this functionality. that would mean we`d have to record an impulse response each for all combinations of possible settings. would be impossible to do, besides that fact it still would require the hugest ammount of ram.

What I mean is that, for any given short reverb, a convolution process should yield a similar sound quality. I didn't mean to suggest that that is what you are doing in AAR. I was just trying to differentiate between two different types of quality: sound quality and, let's say, functional quality. Clearly, AAR is excelling in both - but there is no reason that a convolution reverb will have a lower sound quality (assuming the quality of the IRs are good).

Paul

[nick at artsacoustic]

The shorter reverbs could be realized with similar quality using convolution.

nope, not with this functionality. that would mean we`d have to record an impulse response each for all combinations of possible settings. would be impossible to do, besides that fact it still would require the hugest ammount of ram.

What I mean is that, for any given short reverb, a convolution process should yield a similar sound quality. I didn't mean to suggest that that is what you are doing in AAR. I was just trying to differentiate between two different types of quality: sound quality and, let's say, functional quality. Clearly, AAR is excelling in both - but there is no reason that a convolution reverb will have a lower sound quality (assuming the quality of the IRs are good).

Paul

that of course is right, convolution reverbs can be good.
is`s easy: input=output .
good impulses can bring you to what you might need,
but you cannot edit the reverb in it`s given sructure.
it`s a "frozen" appliement to the inputsignal.
so every "liveness" of the reverb that the ir is from
is "frozen" to that splitsecond that it`s taken from.
the problem is, that, what makes reverb actually "good", is (as an add on) the thousands of little variations made by the algorithmic/nature over the time.
also, to suit a reverb to the given situation, i allways had the problem that i cannot edit the impulse reverb to to fit. if it fitted in the mix it was pureley coincidentally, because i found the right impulse for that requirements. but then it sounded superb. hmmm ... it seems it`s all a matter of convolution technics having to be enhanced over the time. i`m thinking of an enhanced calculation specification that leads to constantly apply those changes that were taken from a reverb source over a greater ammount of time, or something similar.
but with today`s cpu`s i doubt it might be possible.

btw: i didn´t take your post as an assumption of your`s in terms of the ArtsAcoustic Reverb beeing convoluted . i just took this as a question to be answered, so i didn`t feel offended in any way