Has any software managed to create an adjustable Pre-Delay amount on a send channel or is there any workaround that's easy to create?

I'm talking about the positioning of sounds inside a reverb field (pushing them around the room to sound further away and closer) using the reverb's pre-delay amount, without affecting everything that is being sent to the same reverb. So where you adjust the in-built pre-delay for the entire reverb, every sound gets the same delay and sounds in the same space. I'm thinking about controlling the amount of delay that each instrument going into the verb can have, to control its positioning.

Easy enough to set up multiple reverbs with different pre's on each, or use as inserts on each sound (massive CPU hog). Maybe it would need to be built into DAWs, but like an added delay on the send buss, which can be added to the send amount. So it would be a "Send - Pre-Delay" amount. Might have some nice impacts on other send effects as well.

 

Either this got lost in (my) translation, or your question doesn't make sense (to me).

If you change the reverb's predelay, all sound which are sent into this reverb will be affected in the same way. If you change the delay with which you send the sounds to the reverb, this won't have any impact on the perceived depth of the sounds.

Maybe this is what you're looking for, but I don't know how it sounds and if it can be automated the way you want to.
https://www.parallax-audio.com/

 

Last edited: May 13, 2018

Predelay is the time before the reverb kicks in. So if you send a snare to a reverb and you gradually adjust the predelay, you will hear the snare 2 times eventually.

Delaying just the send path, while the direct path keeps it's timing (see picture above) is basically creating a predelay for a reverb that does not have predelay option.

 

Last edited by a moderator: May 13, 2018

, never done this before, but it looks convincing. I will test this.

 

You can make eg. 5 aux busses, insert delay on them, with different delay times (100% wet, feedback 0) and route all these busses to aux buss which has inserted reverb (without pre-delay). This way you can make one reverb with 5 different pre-delay times.

 

You can automate the position within the reverb with FF, IQ and Alt Verbs, and probs a whole lot more that I don't use

 

Sorry @jayxflash I didn't see your picture on my phone. That's it.

 

(Just) been there, done that, works! @jayxflash

I addition to that, you can, for instance, make two delays with the same ms value and automate the pan of one of them. This way you can move the sound around in the reverb, while other sounds maintain their pan with the same delay.

EDIT: hey, reziduchamp for me that jayxflash post deserves "best answer".

 

Last edited: May 13, 2018

Yep. That's pretty much what I was looking for but as in inbuilt effect, preferably on a channel. Your explanation looks really confusing at first glance but it makes sense. Thanks. Ableton is a bit limited for doing this with only 12 sends but it should work. I'll test it now.

Should be easy enough for Developers to add into DAWs if there was enough interest in it. Should be just adding latency into the send as an option.

Any Ableton users out there who know how to create Max effects and is this possible to add latency into a channel send? I think its kind of like Delay Compensation but on the send instead of the track. There's a Track Delay option already in Ableton, which I think cuts out the need for Jayxflash's delay effect (I'm new to Ableton so I'm assuming that's what this is - delay compensation) and it even goes in reverse (-ms), which could be interesting. I'll test that out...

 

Do you mean that Hofa/Pro R etc have options like multiple inputs and you can set each input's delay inside those?

 

Great explanation, since mine didn't make sense. I did think it was a bit confusing and I often am. Good to see you understood what I was getting at. Thanks for explaining. :D

 

This works amazingly well. Ableton's latency creates some whacky effects that I don't think are possible any other way (not with a simple delay for sure). Its kind of other-worldly. I have sends with no delay (direct), 30ms, 60ms, 90ms and -40ms (as a test out of interest) and the -40 is crazy. Its tripping all over itself. The new Dubstep effect for 2018 probably ;) ... lets give the Genre a name before everyone jumps on it... "PreDelayStep". Haha.

I suppose it would make sense to add EQ in this send stage to add to the positioning and probably width. Any ideas?

 

as already mentioned: Abletons -Track delay- function should get you covered

btw if you hoover over the title bar of a device, (the plugin container in device view, not the plugin GUI itself)
it will show you the estimated delay in the status bar at the very bottom.

there are ways to bypass the 12 return limit in Ableton, usually not needed, grouping devices or even single devices opens up a whole new world of possibilities including "fake" sends


as far as i know, Studio one is the only DAW out there that handles delay compensation 100% perfect all the time, they really nailed that one.

 

Thanks. Really useful. Interesting that Decapitator has a delay of 1.4ms and Saturn has 0ms.

 

The same option exists in Logic too. But this affects the delay of the track in relation to the project. But you need a delay on the send bus - a delay of the send path in relation with the track itself (the direct path) - that’s what predelay does. In any daw, you need a delay on the send path.
In Ableton just make a new audio track select "Input from..." put the clap, then put the delay on this audio track, mute the output to master (but make sure the sends are still working) and send it to the delay on send A.

 

Last edited by a moderator: May 13, 2018

Tweaking ONLY the delay might not give you a good impression of close/far, cuz delay is not the only thing that gives this. Instead, have 2 reverbs. One with short delay AND short tail, etc settings, and one with long delay & long tail, etc settings. This is much easier to implement and would give better results imo.

If you insist on ONE verb only, i'd say tweaking the send amount would be a better option than delay amount.

 

Awesome. This is the fake send Saltwater mentioned. Makes sense. I'll try that.

I'll try changing to delays tomorrow as well instead of track delays. Probably more appropriate than messing things up with compensation. There seems to be a bit of phasing at times when switching to compare tracks. I'm guessing the whole timing is getting a bit screwed up. Interesting effect though. It feels like the effect moves kind of backwards, something like what you get with the 400% stereo width, but it works in mono as well.

Whole thing looks like something I'll work with for the future. Thanks for the help.

 

Wasn't about just using one reverb. That's the example and the reason why 12 sends is pretty limiting if I want to use 3-4 delay times plus a reverb at least twice, plus parallel EQ sends, parallel compression and any other send fx. Using the Saltwater/Jayxflash 'Input From'/Audio Channel hack removes that limitation. Its a great hack and from early experiments it should be great in practice.

I said earlier, I'm wondering if its best to add in some EQ at the delay stage to assist in the positioning, so cutting the EQ on the distant sounds (bigger delays) to help push them further away and enhancing the highs on the closer EQ. That also cuts out the need to EQ the reverb itself, which then compromises the overall sound of the verb. I'll experiment with that later...

 

This is how you go parallel in Live - spare the send busses for the FX that really need that specific usage. You get the rack by right clicking any plugin and selecting the "Group" option in the menu.