Recording in spaces that are less than ideal? Up until now, this scenario has very quickly shown up the shortcomings of traditional reverbs. Is it possible to fake a real space using a plugin? Luke Goddard investigates.
There’s a lot of buzz around the post world about Cinematic Rooms for creating real spaces. Some music producers, including producer Dave Eringa (Manic Street Preachers) are now using Cinematic Rooms for music production. We decided to take it for a spin to see if it lives up to the hype.
What Is LiquidSonics Cinematic Rooms?
Cinematic Rooms is a unique plugin reverb that was originally developed to provide film and TV mixers and composers with surround-ready room ambiences and reverbs that transcend the artifacts of traditional reverb using LiquidSonics’ “modulated constant-density” reverb technology. It has since become a go-to reverb in the toolboxes of a stellar list of users which is testament to its elegant workflow and superlative realism.
While the Professional edition satisfies advanced editing of surround ambiences, the Standard edition sees a slightly reduced feature set that further speeds workflow and allows Cinematic Rooms Standard to also grace music with its trademark naturalism. This can be invaluable when it comes to sparse arrangements which afford instruments the time and space to breathe.
Cinematic Rooms Standard Edition Features And Sound
With a wide selection of 80 expertly designed presets and intuitive controls, at the heart of Cinematic Rooms Standard Edition is exactly the same reverb engine as the Professional edition as heard on countless films and TV mixes. In addition to those, Standard still has a concise surround feature set for when you get that indie film mix job or big sync project commission, with channel widths of Stereo, LCR, Quad, 5.1, 7.1 – 7.1.6 supported.
The UI has LiquidSonics’ trademark elegance that makes all controls easy to find and comprehend, with three ‘go-to’ time controls for decay, flanked by early reflection and reverberation sections either side. Levels, metering and mix parameters finish off the control set at the bottom of an intuitive left-right-top-to-bottom signal flow throughout the plugin.
The frequency curves allow the user to tailor the reverb at the top, bottom, and everywhere in between, with the ability to simulate the amount of high-end roll-off especially useful when you’re selling a space to the listener. The plugin also boasts pre-delay that is syncable to your project tempo and even decay times extending out to infinity for when you have your sound design head on.
You can hear Liquidsonics Cinematic Rooms’ clarity, realism, and uncoloured richness for yourself in the video.
Final Thoughts
Most of us at some point will have found ourselves recording in spaces that are less than ideal, trying to use plugin reverbs to place our sounds into spaces that are unobtainable. Up until now, this scenario has very quickly shown up the shortcomings of traditional reverb solutions being pushed beyond their natural limits. Not only does Liquidsonics Cinematic Rooms pick up your source and envelop it in spaces with uncanny realism, but also it kicks out and locks the door on the dubious ringiness and colouration of our old reverbs forever.
For more info on LiquidSonics’ Cinematic Rooms, head over to the LiquidSonics site