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I'm wondering if anyone on this group can speak from experience about
using a very large space such as a church as an echo chamber. I'm
about to begin producing a record which is for an ensemble of two
violins, bass clarinet, and electric guitar. We will be tracking in
my studio which is a fairly well designed (good isolation, no parallel
surfaces, reasonably well treated) room, but is only about
17'x20'x12'. After we're tracked and edited, I was thinking it might
be fun to experiment with using a church (there are dozens in the
neighborhood) to create some "reverb" tracks. I know that this will
basically be a trial and error type of situation, but since I'll
probably have a limited amount of time in the space, I thought I'd ask
if anyone has suggestions or tips about what not to do.

Specifically, were echo chambers typically used over an entire mix,
isolated instruments/instrument groups, or all of the above? Would a
pair of nearfields and a pair of spaced omnis be an appropriate way to
handle playback and capture of the room?

Thanks!
Steve

[Richard Crowley]

wrote ...
I'm wondering if anyone on this group can speak from experience about
using a very large space such as a church as an echo chamber. I'm
about to begin producing a record which is for an ensemble of two
violins, bass clarinet, and electric guitar. We will be tracking in
my studio which is a fairly well designed (good isolation, no parallel
surfaces, reasonably well treated) room, but is only about
17'x20'x12'. After we're tracked and edited, I was thinking it might
be fun to experiment with using a church (there are dozens in the
neighborhood) to create some "reverb" tracks. I know that this will
basically be a trial and error type of situation, but since I'll
probably have a limited amount of time in the space, I thought I'd ask
if anyone has suggestions or tips about what not to do.

Specifically, were echo chambers typically used over an entire mix,
isolated instruments/instrument groups, or all of the above? Would a
pair of nearfields and a pair of spaced omnis be an appropriate way to
handle playback and capture of the room?

I would try putting a good-quality speaker "on stage" where the ensemble
would have been, but aimed "upstage" (to maximize ambient and minimize
"direct"). Then I would experiment with spaced omnis at various distances
away from the "virtual performers". Normally I would "tune" the mic location
for the desired direct vs. reflected sound. But here you are presumabally
going for 100% "ambient" to layer back into the original mixdown.

OTOH, since you don't have to deal with either arranging real musicians
on a stage, or sight-lines for an audience, don't be afraid to try more
unconventional locations for the speaker and/or the microphones.

If it were a "classical" ensemble (like a string quartet, et.al.), I would
"reverb" the entire mix. But here I might try a mix minus the e-guitar.
But it would depend a great deal on the nature of the music (undisclosed)
and the nature of the hall ambience (TBD). I would keep in mind that
my location recording junket was only intended to generate a second-
order effect (reverb) to be combined with the primary, main mix.

Assuming you are recording to an additional pair(s) of locked tracks to
maintain sync with the original mix.

[Les Cargill]

wrote:
I'm wondering if anyone on this group can speak from experience about
using a very large space such as a church as an echo chamber. I'm
about to begin producing a record which is for an ensemble of two
violins, bass clarinet, and electric guitar. We will be tracking in
my studio which is a fairly well designed (good isolation, no parallel
surfaces, reasonably well treated) room, but is only about
17'x20'x12'. After we're tracked and edited, I was thinking it might
be fun to experiment with using a church (there are dozens in the
neighborhood) to create some "reverb" tracks. I know that this will
basically be a trial and error type of situation, but since I'll
probably have a limited amount of time in the space, I thought I'd ask
if anyone has suggestions or tips about what not to do.

Specifically, were echo chambers typically used over an entire mix,
isolated instruments/instrument groups, or all of the above? Would a
pair of nearfields and a pair of spaced omnis be an appropriate way to
handle playback and capture of the room?

Thanks!
Steve

One possible approach is to gather impulse responses of the various
spaces, then use a convolution reverb plugin to mix them back in.

SiR is a free VST convolution plugin; there are
ones for money. But it completely decouples the "data gathering" part
of the thing from the music production part of it. This
trades .... I dunno, depth? for convenience. The convolved
reverb signal probably will be a shadow of the real captured signal. And
capturing impulses is one place 24 bit becomes a very good idea.

Voxengo has a freebie deconvolver.

Impulse generation .... I've always used either a handclap or
swept sine tones. I used a close-up omni for the handclap - spark
gap generators and the like are better as impulse generators.

--
Les Cargill

[Mark]

On Dec 1, 10:32*pm, "
wrote:
I'm wondering if anyone on this group can speak from experience about
using a very large space such as a church as an echo chamber. *I'm
about to begin producing a record which is for an ensemble of two
violins, bass clarinet, and electric guitar. *We will be tracking in
my studio which is a fairly well designed (good isolation, no parallel
surfaces, reasonably well treated) room, but is only about
17'x20'x12'. *After we're tracked and edited, I was thinking it might
be fun to experiment with using a church (there are dozens in the
neighborhood) to create some "reverb" tracks. *I know that this will
basically be a trial and error type of situation, but since I'll
probably have a limited amount of time in the space, I thought I'd ask
if anyone has suggestions or tips about what not to do.

Specifically, were echo chambers typically used over an entire mix,
isolated instruments/instrument groups, or all of the above? *Would a
pair of nearfields and a pair of spaced omnis be an appropriate way to
handle playback and capture of the room?

Thanks!
Steve

my suggestion, since you have limited time in the church is to
maintain as much flexibility as you can..

to do this

playback each instrument seperatly, and record the reverb using as
many mics and tracks as you have available.

then when you get back home, you will have recorded several
independent reverb signals for each instrument and you can select and
combine them as you like in the mixing...

Mark

[genericaudioperson]

You might be interested in "convolution reverbs". These reverbs
sample and model the acoustical environments of real spaces. They use
a lot of computer cpu cycles, but it's worth it. Especially in your
situation, where it looks like you are placing a single reverb over
the entire mix. Is your reverb experiment with mabye a set of $500 or
$1000 speakers and average (?) microphones going to beat the results
of the specialists? Are you guaranteed a truck won't drive by when
you are trying to capture your reverbs? Does your mobile recording
rig have outstanding digital converters?

Just some stuff to think about. Convolution reverbs are seriously
outstanding when done right.