I guess this would work on the older reverbs (Silververb, Enverb) and Chromaverb. But Space Designer (which I use for 98% of my reverbs) has this feature built in, meaning you don't have to enlist Direction Mixer or any other clunky Rube Goldberg shenanigans to make it work. The Input Slider (bottom left corner) has 3 main settings: A) It follows the panning in true stereo, B) It presents the reverb in mono, dead center, and C) It flips stereo L and R, which gives the same result as what you're describing. And it is a slider, meaning you can select any partial setting in between stereo, mono, and flipped stereo to any degree you wish. All with one simple slider. It's power steering all the way. An issue I think many get wrong is conflating where the different reflections in time come from in the natural world. They do not all emerge from the same location in the panorama. In the real world (let's assume a small club with a medium-sized stage), if an instrument is situated to the left of the stage, the early reflections emerge mostly from the left, while the medium-length reflections emerge mostly from the side and back walls (which can be considered 'center'), and the latest reflections sound very 'wide', as they are coming from everywhere, including more from the floor and ceiling and back wall than the medium reflections. If the room is fairly reflective, you do get the slapback of reflections (a bit later) from the right. IOW, reverb emanates from different locations based on how late the reflections are. (Sorry, I didn't invent physics-that's just how it works). And humans can echolocate that, so if you set your reverbs up to simulate this, it sounds like your mix is coming from a real, coherent, natural space. To simulate this, what I do is have 3 primary reverbs on sends: a room, a plate, and a hall (actually, I use 3 versions of this, meaning 9 reverbs to choose from, with different lo-pass rolloffs, depending on the instrument). I set the room reverbs mostly to stereo on the input slider, since that makes the early reflections mostly emanate from where they naturally emanate (wherever the source is panned to). I set the plate reverbs (medium reflections) halfway between stereo and mono, which makes the later (but not really late) reflections emerge mostly from the entire room, in keeping with how that works in the real world. And I set the hall reverb (late wash) halfway between stereo and flipped, which gives a bit of that slapback that you are speaking of, also somewhat what would occur in a real setting. I also use a subtle delay that is panned opposite (L to R for instruments panned right, and R to L for instruments panned left) which also adds to that room sound. Then I just dial the room, plate, and hall reverb sends in to whatever needs reverb, and what kind it needs, and how much. That gives complete control of how those reverbs mix, and where in the panorama they emanate from.
This is a great idea as long as the mix isn't too thick. If so, you lose the reverb and the track sounds dry, or you'll have to really turn up the reverb side. But super cool for breaks where not much else is happening or sparse songs (or parts). Another trick is to use this but still have a bit of reverb in the original channel with a delay. Then you get the reverb walking across the pan, which is also cool.
Thank you for this Colin! I remembered you telling us how to do this in GB a few years back but couldn’t remember how to do it or which video. Gonna try this🙌🏻
Great tip Colin, enjoying this series. I must try it on my next mix. I must admit, bad reverb can destroy or muddy a mix if you are not careful. I've found myself reverting back to previous versions and dialling it way back a couple of times.
True- but you could totally do this in addition to the amp reverb. Just because the amp has reverb doesn't mean it can't also have room reverb (as if you were hearing an amp with reverb in a room...)
