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Dialog Reverb. A place to share your experience.


elliotkelly

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I would like to know how do you use reverb on dialog tracks, mostly in TV series.

 

  • Do you send to Mono or Stereo reverbs? 
  • How many reverbs do you start with in your mixing template, which ones?
  • Do you design custom patches for specific locations through all the series?
  • Which reverb plugins or hardware do you like to use for this purpose and why?
  • Any tips and tricks related to the use of reverb in dialog tracks?

 

Whatever information you want to share on this topic will be welcome and I'm sure it will result very, very helpful.

 

Thanks for your time.

 

 

 

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Here's what I do:

  • Do you send to Mono or Stereo reverbs? 
    In a stereo mix, reverb should always be stereo. (Read my reasoning on multi-channel vs. multi-mono )
  • How many reverbs do you start with in your mixing template, which ones?
    My mix templates only have tracks and buses set-up, they don't have any reverbs set-up. It's a personal preference. I know mixers who will have reverbs set-up in their buses. I usually start applying reverb on a case-by-case (or scene-by-scene), or need basis. If I hear it needs it or it could help the scene, I apply it.
  • Do you design custom patches for specific locations through all the series?
    Yes, if it helps save time down the road, it makes sense. However, you may tweak it here and there depending on the production tracks and what's going on in the scene. It's as easy as saving a preset and naming it whatever you want; location name would probably make sense.
  • Which reverb plugins or hardware do you like to use for this purpose and why?
    I use plugins exclusively. DSP has become quite sophisticated, especially in 64-bit architectures, that there is very little (inaudible) to no artifacts produced by using plug-ins. I use between dverb, altiverb, waves ir, waves truverb (each usually for different purposes).
  • Any tips and tricks related to the use of reverb in dialog tracks?
    You could approach it scientifically, by figuring out more or less the size of the room, the materials and how sound bounces off of them, any potential pre-delays, etc..... Or, my preferred way, is to start with an extremely exaggerated setting, and pull-back until you like what you hear. Sometimes what the scene needs is not what is "scientifically correct" but what helps move the scene, or make an impact.

Hope that helps! :)

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Mono/stereo?

  If it's matching ADR (or lav) to boom, obviously it has to be mono.

  If the booming was done right, the mix probably doesn't need additional reverb*… except see the next entry:

  If it's to show that the character is in a large indoor space it'll be stereo, fed by all the (mono) dialog tracks, returning to the dialog stem in stereo.

  If it's a complicated mix with adjacent scenes having different reverbs, I'll use two separate feeds and checkerboard. Saves tricky minute jumps in the automation, and lets scene a ring out under the start of scene b if desired.

  

  * - I have been playing with Zynaptiq Unveil to tweak the reverb level when necessary. Izotope has a similar function in RX3.

 

Specific patches?

  Hell yes. The presets in most reverbs are for music, so you have to build your own and save them in your general library. And you frequently return to a scene, so it's worth saving specific ones with the production.

 

Plug-ins?

  I'm with José. I've got a rack full of external DSP boxes that I don't use any more.

  Today's plugs sound great. And my DAW renders finished mixes much faster than realtime, so it would slow me down to route through a separate box.

 

Tricks?

  I still hear complex reverb occasionally in mainstream films, when a character is supposed to be outside but moving away from us, in a setting without many hard surfaces (in a forest, etc). That's just silly. It takes me out of the movie, to wonder "why does this guy suddenly sound like he's in a concert hall?"

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I know very little other than pointing out what Jay wrote....

Consider the scene prior and the scene after.

I saw a TV show recently. They cut from a scene recorded via a lav in a tie, to a boom a bit looser than it should have been, likely a wide/tight situation. The reverse perspective issue in the direct cut was jarring and "wrong".

The lav scene was in a big hotel lobby, stairway, lots of marble and such, likely no reverb added - sounded nice, albeit a bit too dry. Only choice for PSM.

The boom scene was someone laying on a couch in his living room. No lav here, perhaps due to action of another character coming in to lay next to him and kissing a bit, or perhaps due to the fact that it was an interior. I don't know. But reflection issues were clear, and multiple cameras were likely. It was a bit "loose".

In this circumstance, I feel some more "looseness" should have been added before the cut, and greater effort should have been made to "tighten" the sound after, if that's even possible. Like I said, I don't know much about processing after the fact.

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  • 2 years later...
On March 6, 2014 at 11:04 AM, Henchman said:

For my general template I have 3 reverbs setup.

Mono for matching ADR

Surround for creating space when needed.

External, for outside matching and placement.

 

This way, I can burn through a mix, rarely having to change patches.

Hey Mark,

 

which reverb do do you use for your ADR matching?

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I mix mostly documentaries and use mono reverb for mono dialogue/ interviews. There's very little if any scripted dialogue. For VO's I have used stereo verbs before, even delays, when a character voice speaks from a different space in  time. 99% of the time I use reverb to make natural sounding tails to unnatural sounding dialogue edits (some producers/ editors seem to think of the dialog editing process as something akin to editing a transcript in a word processor, so sentences recorded on location can end very abruptly). My go-tos' are McDSP Revolver  (makes great roomtone as well) and Speakerphone.

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99% of the time I use reverb to make natural sounding tails to unnatural sounding dialogue edits...

Have you tried just cutting to a few frames of clean roomtone after a truncating edit? I've found this works fine most times -- there isn't technical silence but it still sounds like it could be natural, so the ear fills in the missing tail based on context. That saves having to muddy up the dialog with electronic reverb on top of whatever the boom picked up.

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18 hours ago, Jay Rose said:

99% of the time I use reverb to make natural sounding tails to unnatural sounding dialogue edits...

Have you tried just cutting to a few frames of clean roomtone after a truncating edit? I've found this works fine most times -- there isn't technical silence but it still sounds like it could be natural, so the ear fills in the missing tail based on context. That saves having to muddy up the dialog with electronic reverb on top of whatever the boom picked up.

In many instances roomtone won't give me the result I'm after. When an interview subject, located in an ambient environment speaks in long sentences and the editor only uses one sound bite mid sentence, the lack of early reflection at the end of the "last word" (it's not realty the last word of a rapid fire sentence but it's supposed to sound like it) draws attention to the edit. If I use a reverb that sounds similar to the reverb in the room then I can add reverb to the last syllable of the edited sentence and it will sound like it's ringing out in the room. I'm not adding verb to the entire sentence, just the very last part of the last word. Nothing gets muddied up. It usually takes a few passes of riding the aux send, preferably with a fader to get it right but it works great. Speaking about Reverb and roomtone, in my work I find it harder and harder to get good roomtone  because people apparently can't be quiet for 20 seconds anymore these days or hold a boom w/o making noise so I prefer "manufactured" roomtone for many occasions. I don't have to hunt for it in post, it's clean and steady and there's an unlimited supply of it. I use the IR type reverb/pink noise trick with McDSP's revolver, just grab a few frames of silence between words, analyze the Impulse Response, load into reverb, run pink noise through it, works great.

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