Luminous Reverb - an algorithmic reverb in development

[Otto Halmén]

After casually reading about it for weeks, I finally got my hands dirty with audio plugin development. I dream of creating a custom hall reverb. Here's what my umpteenth build sounds like:

Wet mix: https://www.dropbox.com/s/3y84295x87bm3k...t.wav?dl=0
Dry mix: https://www.dropbox.com/s/luy5458byarcba...y.mp3?dl=0

Still a long way to go until release (or even beta), but now I think it's at least possible to tell that it's a reverb, so I thought I'd share a clip over here.

Update: Second preview, this time with one of GeneralUserGS's demo songs.

Wet mix: https://www.dropbox.com/s/2m3wcmkyd0snb2...b.wav?dl=0
Dry mix: https://www.dropbox.com/s/3dy0v5yjo7jk47...b.wav?dl=0

Update 2: Third preview. Now it has a sound that you simply cannot get with a convo plugin. It's fully non-repetitive, sounds smooth across all frequencies, and doesn't use too much resources (and the fidelity is adjustable anyway).

Wet mix: https://www.dropbox.com/s/18es8ycxm2ortz...h.wav?dl=0

Update 3: First draft of discrete early reflections. Things might yet change drastically here, as I'm not entirely sure how I should approach ERs. The demo is Traveling Minstrels by Mattias Westlund.

Dry: https://www.dropbox.com/s/sk97euh4b4pvgq...y.wav?dl=0
Wet: https://www.dropbox.com/s/uxbe9088lnpkyq...t.wav?dl=0

Update 4: Testing a huge concert hall sound with improved air absorption, featuring Exploration by Mattias Westlund.

Dry: https://www.dropbox.com/s/am016kt048kqe3...n.wav?dl=0
Wet: https://www.dropbox.com/s/6fy17h90a2cnwa...b.wav?dl=0

Update 5: Testing a small scoring stage sound with a vastly improved early reflection algorithm. The demo is by Sam Gossner.

Dry: https://www.dropbox.com/s/0t6kvcobukzpxo...y.wav?dl=0
Wet: https://www.dropbox.com/s/wcp4ginoferpug...b.wav?dl=0

[Nayrb]

I'm still a big dummy when it comes to using reverb properly, but I'd be happy to test your stuff out whenever you have something ready.

[Paul Battersby]

I'm no expert but I like the sound of the wet mix. It opens up the percussion a little and provides subtle depth.

[Samulis]

Reminds me of one of those late 90's/early 2000's algo reverbs, like something you would hear in Civ III. I love that little "fizzle" you get after each hit. Doesn't fit in every case, but I like it.

[Otto Halmén]

(01-11-2017, 01:35 AM)Nayrb Wrote: I'm still a big dummy when it comes to using reverb properly, but I'd be happy to test your stuff out whenever you have something ready.

No, you're not. I've listened to all of your Trogool releases, and I've got nothing to complain about.

(01-11-2017, 04:26 AM)Samulis Wrote: Reminds me of one of those late 90's/early 2000's algo reverbs, like something you would hear in Civ III. I love that little "fizzle" you get after each hit. Doesn't fit in every case, but I like it.

You know, it might very well be one of them. Impossible to know due to manufacturers' trade secrets and all that. Mine's loosely based on something from an old paper. It's a fairly simple concept, so chances that some of the old reverbs are based on similar principles are high.

Thanks, guys! I'll let you know when it has matured enough for practical testing.

[Michael Willis]

That sounds incredibly good for a do-it-yourself project. I'm really curious about the technical side of things, I'm assuming you're writing it in C or C++, is that correct? What plugin architecture is it? You're using Mac, so I would guess either AU or VST.

Ages ago I used to be a C/C++ hobbyist, but I never did anything with digital audio. I recently took a cursory glance at the source code to freeverb3, but I don't think I'll be able to make heads or tails of it without spending a lot more time to understand.

[Otto Halmén]

(01-11-2017, 02:09 PM)Michael Willis Wrote: That sounds incredibly good for a do-it-yourself project. I'm really curious about the technical side of things, I'm assuming you're writing it in C or C++, is that correct? What plugin architecture is it? You're using Mac, so I would guess either AU or VST.

Ages ago I used to be a C/C++ hobbyist, but I never did anything with digital audio. I recently took a cursory glance at the source code to freeverb3, but I don't think I'll be able to make heads or tails of it without spending a lot more time to understand.

Thanks, man! I do have a Mac, but I'm developing with RackAFX on my Bootcamp partition, so C++ is the language and VST (Win+Mac) and AU (Mac) will be the release formats.

Reading source code by others is a great way to learn. Doing a full read of zita-rev2 is certainly on my to do list, as Hibiki Reverb is one of my favourite reverb plugins.

[Mattias Westlund]

I think this sounds REALLY interesting. The sort of brittle edge to it might or might not work, depending on source material, but I suppose that is something that could easily be solved with a simple LP filter. Definitely spacey-sounding, which is more than I can say of probably 90% of freeware reverbs out there, which tend to be mush-mashines rather than something used to convey a sense of space.

[Otto Halmén]

Here's a preview with a smaller room size. Also, the algorithm now has some crude modulation in it. The track is one of the demo songs that come with the GeneralUserGS soundfont.

Wet mix: https://www.dropbox.com/s/2m3wcmkyd0snb2...b.wav?dl=0
Dry mix: https://www.dropbox.com/s/3dy0v5yjo7jk47...b.wav?dl=0

EDIT: The most important aspect of any plugin is CPU consumption. So far, I haven't messed up completely. That's RackAFX, by the way.

[Samulis]

I like the sound a lot! Definitely adds a lot of realism. I might tone down the ratio of wet to dry so it's mostly dry with just a bit of that reverb signal mixed in (jazz is typically close mic'd and less reverby than orchestral, but generally it's best to have the reverb just be an ornament on top of the dry rather than let it soak everything 100%).

BTW, I love that you've now added the Bigcat quote to your signature.

I've in the process of typing that had the brilliant notion of starting a blog under the pen-name of Littlecat1669... or Diminuativelyscaledfeline9196...