How to Create a Reverb Chamber from a Room You Have

[@creativesoundlab]

Free Download for All 8 Years of CSL Downloads and PDF guides: www.creativesoundlab.tv/alldownloads

[@mrdanjames]

I love the 'use your old gear that's lying around' theme for the last two. I miss my 30 metre hallway in my previous studio.

[@jmalmsten]

One thing to test out is a trick I heard Walter Murch talk about when discussing the sound design of THX1138: Basically, you set up a reverb room like is done here. But, you muck about with time on the playback and recording. On the playback side, you play it back at double speed. And you record that in the room. Then, when you put it back into the timeline, you slow down the wet sound to half. The resulting sound has now corrected the speed and pitch shift. But you've quadrupled the time delay of the room echoes. Making the room sound huge in comparison. Having higher than normal sampling rates on both recording and playback side is probably preferable as well since the final sound will end up with a quarter of the original sampling rates soundwaves if my thinking is correct. Yes, it is not a realtime effect as you need to complete the cycle before it's on the timeline ready for final mix. But it'd be a fun thing to try out.

[@creativesoundlab]

I’ve never heard of anyone else talk about this. I mentioned this idea in an interview I did after I saw a BBC video on how they did the models and actually played back tape 8x faster to test the acoustics.

[@creativesoundlab]

Def have to look into this. Super helpful. Thank you!!!

[@lennartgruenewald]

That‘s such a creative idea. Have to check it out.

[@brentsmith9411]

And it doesn't have to be a real room either. This is a fun thing to do with artificial reverbs as well. Ableton makes it easy to experiment.

[@henrydurham6861]

you can do it at a slightly different speed, twice , to make a mono reverb stereo... good way to get some width out of a mono spring

[@deesoundrecordingstudio9739]

Cool, love the Sylvia Massy kind of thinking, more vids like this please, the new direction is great, thanks

[@m.o.n.d.e.g.r.e.e.n]

omg i love sylvias book so much

[@Jasonweckard]

The best reverb, is real reverb. Great video.

[@keithaszilagyi]

Love this! I'm trying to do things in a more analog way. I've been using an old Lexicon MPX100, for most of my reverbs. I can see me at the very least, throwing a mic into my bathroom or kitchen and then combining them. Or, using this technique on guitars, drums... The list goes on and on!!!

[@creativesoundlab]

Thanks Keith and really cool to hear of some of your ideas.

[@keithaszilagyi]

@@creativesoundlab No, no... Thank you! lol

[@MeTuLHeD]

Kind of glues the mix together. Gives it more of a 'live music' feel. Very nice trick. Thanks!

[@nilsgrafo5999]

These episodes are great - be creative with what you got!

[@schipbreukeling3]

yes

[@paulreed1142]

Capitol in Hollywood has been doing this since the beginning in a huge concrete room under their parking lot. This is a good option! Room mics are essential for a big sound. It's not Headley Grange, but it will do. BTW, Analog rules!!

[@thejawshop-AdventureRecording]

I have been doing this with recording my drums, I have a very ''live room'' next to my tracking room in my little barn and put a omni mic in there and it really takes the need of adding verb to the mix, sometimes the wood stove adds crackle. Love the idea.

[@ajmaietta]

I will try this out this weekend in my spare bathroom with an Avantone Mixcube. Thinking of putting one or two small diaphragm condensers in the shower stall and playing the mixcube across the room into them. Or using one/a pair of 57's so I don't get as much of the high end I anticipate will be generously represented with that setup

[@marshallkohlhaas80]

I didnt kno Lester from GTA 5 makes music too ... :) Glad to see yur finally earning an honest living...

[@Martin-kn6vc]

Chambers are so cool! I work at a college, and outside our studio is a lift (elevator) which doesn't have an internal ceiling (you stand on the platform, and as the elevator goes up to the different floors, you get closer to the building's ceiling) It's all steel, and is about 4ft sq, and when the elevator is on the ground floor, you have a height of about 20ft. For my most recent project, I piped the recorded snare drum through a PA speaker in the studio, opened up the main studio door, and had the sound fill into the elevator where I had mics positioned in ORTF about 7ft high. It sounded incredible! In the project, it added a delayed diffused reverb to the snare which added another dimension to the drum sound on top of the room mics I was using.

[@wearashirt]

crazy how that diffuser extended the decay! am I right?

[@mjohns908]

Ryan, you amaze me every time you upload a video. I love your hands on approach. I was wondering if you could make a video showing how to use the IRs. I've never used an IR before, so it would be great to see an instructional video.

[@creativesoundlab]

Yes....amazing concept! Actually explain what the heck an IR is. totally going to do a video on that. Great suggestion.

[@TheRealSorav]

@@creativesoundlab Yeah bro it would be cool to hear you explain what an IR is and how it worked/was made. Felt like an idiot trying to explain it to my father who has used amps and cabs all his life. Even I don't understand how the sweep tone captures the cab. I mean I "understand" it, but I really don't

[@frejberglind7271]

@@creativesoundlab I think it would cool to hear a comparison between the real reverb and the IR-reverb. Theoretically, they should be identical since room reverbs are linear, but I don't think I have ever seen a real comparison.

[@Mats.Fagerberg]

I’ve used your IR-profiles both in Logic (Mac) and in Cakewalk for Windows. It sounds fantastic! Thank you for sharing them!

[@Bishka100]

Two things spring to mind:- Moveable tiles panels. Where you have the dampening panel that you moved around the room ( 9:43 ), a panel covered in cheap bathroom tiles could be used to make the room more lively. (Maybe tile the back of your dampening panel to save space) If you have room were the accoustics are different in different places, you could have someone more the mic as you record. For example going from the bright (tiled???) end to the dappened (Carpeted??) end of the room for diffrent parts of the song.

[@jcabanaw]

Great video as always, Ryan! I've used this technique to "glue" an album together that was recorded over 3 years, in many many different spaces, with some electronic elements. I used a ribbon with the speaker in the null for a mono option, and then 2 stereo pairs at different distances to have options for a bigger sound option in slower/bigger songs.

[@creativesoundlab]

Wow great insight. You used the null and then had two different options. Nice trick and cool that you made lots of different elements sound like they could have been in the same room.

[@J-DUB-F1]

Really nice sound.....software ambiance is great, but organic ambiance always has that special character. Back when i had a space to do this, I did a lot of chamber/reamping of sounds into a room. One time I set up the mic and speaker in a backyard.....that was a really interesting sound. I've missed a lot of episodes.....is that a new desk??. Beautiful piece :-)

[@GarethGras]

i noticed that desk too, would love to know where to get one

[@nathanielnicholson559]

I actually brought home a high-school locker just to see what outrageous sounds I can get from within :) We shall se...hear.

[@RooftopRecording]

Loving the new season. Great stuff, and a Tascam PortaOne in the back.

[@RooftopRecording]

I've done the chamber in my live room. Great idea. It works quite well.

[@whitepony1913]

Great video. Looks like you really changed up your studio lately. Did you get rid of all your Warm Audio equipment? Would definitely be up for a new studio tour.

[@IsaacJDean]

I did once try something along these lines but not quite as well thought out! I put a tiny combo amp in my bathroom, in the bath actually, then placed a mic high in a corner. It was pretty interesting but I didn't have time to experiment. Going back I wouldn't put the mic in the bath instead.

[@joelonsdale]

Great video - I do the same thing, but you've inspired me to do it more often!

[@creativesoundlab]

Thanks Joe! Would love to hear more of what you do at your studio!

[@joelonsdale]

@@creativesoundlab Well, I often leave the studio door open and stick a microphone in my living room to capture real room tone when re-amp'ing electric guitar. Nothing like having a REAL reverb in the mix! Often do the same with snare recordings to capture air that wasn't there! But I love your method of creating a thoughtful submix and sending the whole thing to the room - I will definitely do that... Do your room mics face away from the speaker?

[@jhowellkc]

Same here.

[@GunDogSlim]

This is great. I'm learning so much thanks Ryan

[@Not-Only-Reaper-Tutorials]

I did use this trick many times, adding more flavour to the sound, though

[@Sun-on6yh]

Love it !

[@creativesoundlab]

Thanks Sun and glad to have you for the live stream of the new video. Have a good night man!

[@boxabeatrecordings6309]

Great tutorial Ryan!

[@erlendviken6412]

I once used an amp lying down and placed a snare drum on top to re record it for the room purpose kindof similar? Anyways, love yr vid as always!

[@calvin_E]

Love it

[@guitarnoise]

Good Stuff... Sounds great Ryan

[@riktascale4]

Looks like you got rid of the focals??

[@MsRonirock]

Hi Ryan thanks for the video I found it really useful. I have access to an empty 60mx15mx5m warehouse and want to record reverb from an electric distorted guitar. Where do you think I should place the speaker and the mic in order to achieve a boost in the upper midrange while attenuating the low end? Should I record really loud? I would really appreciate your help.

[@518freakshow4]

Fun fact - Tony Platt did this on Highway to Hell, because the original tracking was way too clean.

[@sugnasugna]

This is better than Mac demarcos tutorial

[@therealrome]

Hey Ryan, I noticed some low rumble when you were speaking in the control room, no big issue, just asked myself if you're aware of it? Great video! How did you create the IRs?

[@jhowellkc]

Great video! I have some other reverb ideas I'd like to share with you. I'll send you an email or some such.

[@creativesoundlab]

Yes, please do. You know my email right?

[@jhowellkc]

@@creativesoundlab y'know...actually not sure that I do, now that I think about it!

[@creativesoundlab]

Just Ryan at creative sound lab dot tv.

[@ajmaietta]

I did try it because I was kind of motivated: it sounds good! I mixed in the chamber track just a little, it became obvious...just enough to hear it. soundcloud.com/anthony-maietta/sets/trying-out-a-mono-chamber-reverb-mic-setup