How to prevent distortion on this heavily reverbed piano?

[denalihighway]

Hey guys.

so I'm doing this piano piece which features a heavily reverbed piano. The filmmaker loves it so the verb is here to stay but I'm finding it very difficult to achieve the required depth of reverb without distortion.

Do you hear the distortion on this? My speakers seem to flutter a little beginning around 20 secs - filmmaker says his are peaking in various spots. https://soundcloud.com/stasissounds/com ... th/s-J5qFf

comments on that?

how does one prevent this?

There's nothing peaking in the channels, I've tried EQing the track, the reverb, compressing the reverb easing off on saturation and maximising etc with little success. Also tried different combinations of re-post fader with the aux track and also sending a duplicate piano track straight to the aux reverb track. If I drastically EQ the mids on the reverb it works but it defeats the whole purpose as the sound is gone.

Just inexperience in this situation basically so looking for some things I could try?

Thanks
Gar

[shorttonpro]

Cool vibe.

I'm not hearing any distortion. Maybe he is not liking the transient spike of individual note hits?

I'd add a high pass filter on the keys to get ride of the rumble below 75hz and then try taming the transients with either a transient designer or compressor with a high ratio, quick attack and release just affecting the loudest notes and see if that makes him happier.

[Len911]

Hey Gar! First I would ask if the piano is an electric one like a rhodes suitcase or wurlitzer, if so it might be the preset, or the sound samples themselves, as it was common to use distortion as an effect.
Secondly, if the distortion is not a part of the samples themselves, the attack or transient part of the sample that needs adjustment. Sonnox Oxford TransMod, SPL Transient Designer, are the ideal tools, however, if you don't have either of these plugins, there might either be cheaper alternatives, or else you might play with the ADSHR envelope if your piano instrument allows for adjustment.

If I remember correctly you are using Cubase? Cubase 7 or later??

"Generally, there are five new features unique to the Steinberg Cubase 7 version: a transient designer,..."

[denalihighway]

Hey guys thanks for the replies

@shorttonpro, yeah I had the piano high passed - but I'll try the transient designer approach you both suggested - great suggestion. I have the SPL.

Here's a shamefully ignorant question... but I hadn't bounced the piano track to audio yet. I assume I would do that for the transient designer to work?

The piano is the NI Gentleman samples, with low velocity values in the MIDI editor and very low velocity in the piano plugin itself.

@Lenny - Cubase 6 - close!

I'll see how I go. I've A/B'd with different verb settings obviously and its the heavy verb that's causing the problems, although to my ears it wasn't that bad - but in fairness, any unwanted distortion is too much...

[Len911]

Great that you have the SPL Transient Desinger!!! Yes you must render to audio, it only works on audio, not midi!

[andygabrys]

Great that you have the SPL Transient Desinger!!! Yes you must render to audio, it only works on audio, not midi!

actually not correct. If its placed on a channel post Virtual instrument (which by default all DAWs do) then it will work on "MIDI" as by the time it hits the inserts on the piano channel its not "MIDI" its audio.


about the tune:

i am with Scott - I don't hear any distortion or clipping. It sounds a little heavy on the low mids on the piano accompaniment track (which sounds like a clean rhodes) which I would dip a little of. That's at 0:54 and beyond. I guess its just the left hand of the upright piano. Re-arrange the left hand part. less notes, different register, softer or heavier velocity, something might work to make it less wooly.

as far as the main piano melody - I wouldn't high pass this any higher than about 80 hz otherwise you are taking the beef out of the sound, and for comparison check out http://www.native-instruments.com/en/pr ... gentleman/ and go to the demo tracks and listen to the one called "Right Now in the Aether". Listen to the softer Right hand - its way fatter than what you have.

as far as velocity - I would tweak the sequence so that the notes played on that piano are low velocity - like 10-30 area. But I can't understand what you mean about lowering the velocity in the plugin as well?

[denalihighway]

Hey Andy

great info as always - thank you Andy.

And my apologies - its not the Gentleman - its the Maverick - http://www.native-instruments.com/en/pr ... -maverick/

got my NI vintage pianos mixed up. What I meant by the velocity in the plugin is that within the Maverick, the 'Keys' menu you can choose between 8 different key velocities. So I had that set at the 3rd softest velocity. In the MIDI editor in Cubase the velocities vary around the 25 mark for much of the piece.

OK so I've remixed, along the lines of everything above. I think its sounding better to my ears. But its late and to be honest I've listened to this tune way too many times, and my ears are probably shot at this stage.

Hopefully I'm getting somewhere though.

https://soundcloud.com/stasissounds/com ... th/s-TQUvW

Thanks again lads. Priceless advice.
Gar

[andygabrys]

okay, now I do hear a distortion kind of artifact like at 1:31 or so and earlier in the piece as well. And 2:36 its sounding a little crunchy/

could be an artifact in the reverb. you are likely using reverb sent from the main piano track right? not just putting reverb inserted on the piano itself?

[remmet]

I'm wondering if the aux sends of the piano audio track are pumping too hot a level into the reverb unit and distorting it. If you mute the reverb track (assuming it's on its own aux track) and listen only to the (presumably dry) piano track, is the distortion gone?

[denalihighway]

Hey lads - OK perhaps I need to do a bit more work on this, regarding the instrument / patches selections etc. And try some different reverbs. It felt like I was close though.

I've noticed how much further away I am now from the sound I want, and I'm getting further away the whole time by trying to EQ my way out of the distortion aspects and whatever mess I've got myself into. But the info on this thread I can implement to great effect regardless.

What I had basically was two piano tracks:

1) The dry piano, mixed low.
2) Duplicate of the above - with output send directly to aux reverb track, as I felt this would be best to be able to drench it in verb and mix back with the dry track. Possibly an ass-ways approach in this instance. I get the desired level of reverb when I crank the aux track but then the problems arise. All the problems are with this track. Like I said, by EQing the low mids, and mids I'm getting less distortion, kinda but then I'm losing the vibe.

The reverb is a Cathedral, around 5 sec, with the mids, and some lows dampened. High and low passed.

I've noticed ironically, that in a earlier version, I had a maximiser in the track chain, and it didn't seem to be distorting like this (I took anything in the latest version that might be pushing resonant frequencies) - but the mix was bounced at very volume. Here is that earlier one. https://soundcloud.com/stasissounds/com ... t-jan-28th

I love the 'thru track' approach to applying reverb but it doesn't seem to be working here. Hmmm.