Using GVerb+

[Max85]

Hello everybody,
I am a beginner in Mixing. I do classical recordings and wanted to add some reverb to my music. So I kindly ask, whether someone could explain to me the following parameters of GVerb+:
Xover High
Xover Low
Low/High-Mix

By the way: I am a little bit scared by the many parameters. What is the best or at least your way to use GVerb+? My target is to add a natural sounding reverb...

Thanks in advance for any help and hints,
Max

[Dingo]

Hi Max85, welcome to the Forum,
This video should help you find your way.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fs0m-wFXdZ8
If you look at the 'Cavern' preset, it replicates a big boomy space, so the X/overs are set to about 100Hz and the high low mix has a large decay time adding extra complexity.
By comparison, look at 'Great Hall' and the x/overs are set at a very low frequency and the decay mix is relatively short.
As you are doing Classical recordings, I would suggest you start with Great Hall or Cathedral (for a large orchestral group).
Do not be afraid of the controls, the best way to learn a tool is to tweek the knobs and find out for yourself what they do.
You can always recall the preset and get back to the start.
Being classical, the first parameters I would fiddle with would be Room Size and Reverb Time.

Happy mixing

[Max85]

Thank you very much for your answer. The video I still have seen. Unfortunately the options with the dark-grey background are not explained there. To my mind, the color of the reverb is mostly created there.
the X/overs seem to be a Low- and HighCut, or? For me the Low-Xover brings more deepth (perhaps also a little bit more boom) in the reverb, whereas the High-Xover makes the reverb more bright. But the sense of the Decay options is not clear for me. For my ear you can set the mixture of the Low-Reverb and the High-Reverb, but I am not really sure...

It would be very helpful to understand, what there really is going on, with all the options (especially the dark-grey painted). If someone knows this, this would be great.

Besides, skills comes with practise, of course. But at the moment, I exercise a little bit in the dark ;-)

[Sthauge]

There should not be necessary for the users to do guesswork and do research to find out eg. what the knobs do(Gverb+ and 3D delay) or what the "led" means(Dynomite). Some knobs are obvious, some are not. This goes especially for Gverb+. By accident I found out what the Leds on Dynomite means and that also revealed what was really happening in the plugin(eg makeup gain).

During the past 2-3 years there have been some post in this forum asking Harrison to document their older plugins, so do you listen Ben@harrison? Document the old plugins like you have done with the new AWA plugins. :-)

[madmaxmiller]

Do not be afraid of the controls, the best way to learn a tool is to tweek the knobs and find out for yourself what they do.
You can always recall the preset and get back to the start.
Being classical, the first parameters I would fiddle with would be Room Size and Reverb Time.

That's my approach to GVerb+, too. Find a preset I like, play with room size, decay time and predelay.
(while thinking one day I'll have time to fiddle with and work out all the other parameters, but for now it will do...)

MMM

[Max85]

Dear madmaxmiller,
Thank you very much for sharing your approach... I often get problems with the sibilants in my vocal recording using the presets, so that I have to adjust the sound and color of the reverb. But I will try it more. Perhaps the limitation on a few parameter could be helpful..

[Dingo]

To help with that, you could set up a Mixbus with a de-esser or EQ first then GVerb+, use the MB send control to drive the amount of reverb, but use the de-essser / EQ to stop the sibilant transients triggering the reverb. Set Verb to 100% wet and use the MB fader to blend the amount you want back. Also on the input side of GVerb, LHS, you can use the Low Pass Filter to roll off the high frequency going into the reverb.

[jonetsu]

Not sure if you are doing this, although most of the time reverbs are best used on a separate audio bus. This offers the capability to process the reverb with EQ and compression. It also offers the opportunity to blend in with much more detail the reverb to the original track. And to keep EQ and compression of the original track apart from the reverb processing. Also, having more control on the reverb itself makes it less dependent on the reverbs' parameter buttons.

Create an audio bus, mono or stereo, put the reverb unit there. Then add a send to the original track that goes to the reverb bus. Also note that any effect can be moved within a track at any location, after or before the EQ, after or before the built-in compressor.

As Dingo replied, using a de-esser in your case can also be of help. You would want to feed the reverb as good a signal you can get. If not, the reverb will exaggerate some unwanted aspects. Why deal with that within the reverb when it could be possible to feed the reverb a better signal ? It just makes things easier. Some goes for compressors (dynamics). Feeding them a cleaner signal help to focus the compressor on what it is best at doing (dynamics, tone coloration, glue). Again in this case, why feed the compressor an overload of work ? Same approach with the reverbs.

Cheers.

[Max85]

Thank you very much, jonetsu, for your insights. Additional EQ'ing and compressing of the reverb sounds for me a little bit complicated, but I will give it a try..

I have played this day a little bit with GVerb on a vocal track. And after one day training, I also think, that the best approach is, to use a preset and play with time and room size. I had the bad luck to use Small Hall preset as basis before. And this preset has really problems with sibilants. With Great Hall, all my problems went away, without the need of De-Essing or to modify the sound of the reverb with the gray painted options. Also So-So-Hall is very usable. The hereby created reverbs sound much better than a "manually created" reverb (but this can also be due to the lack of my skills :-) ).

Nevertheless I agree with Staughe, that a nice documentation - also of the complicated Xover and Decay parameters - would be very nice.

Again thank you all very much,
Max

[Matt]

Fwiw I only put reverbs in busses. The closest I get to putting on a track is my background vocals. I send them all to one buss and then put the reverb on that buss. So it’s the only one I have to use the mix knob.

As for all my other reverbs, I set them to 100% wet. And send a signal to them from the buss sends. What’s great about doing this in mixbus, is that you can solo that buss and hear exactly what the reverb is doing. So you can tweak to your hearts delight and hear what the parameters do.

I’ll often have the reverb soloed. Then I’ll solo the source track to get an idea of the blend. You can keep soloing/unsoloing the source track as you’re playing around with settings. Then you can listen back to the full mix.

It also makes it super easy to use an eq to really dial it in. Because I always use eq on my reverbs. Typically a gently low pass filter or sometimes a shelf to soften the top end. And definitely a high pass filter to clean up the lows. Then depending on what I’m wanting I can shape the rest from there.

Compression can be fun to try too. However I tend to use the compression before the reverb. This way the signal feeding it more consistent, but you still get a more natural decay. But after can be fun. It just depends on what you want the reverb to do.

Another neat trick on vocals is to use a gate first in the chain. Set it to where only the louder parts come through. With a fairly big sounding reverb it makes the singer sound huge at those parts. It really depends on the arrangement also for this to work. But when it works it’s quite astounding. I picked this trick up years ago, but eventides tverb is designed for this. It’s how the reverb was done in David Bowie’s “heroes”. And it’s actually a set of mics with gates. So it does it even better than my trick.