"Animating Tracks with the Haas Effect"

[Boffinry]

Hi All,

 

Trying to muck around with this tip feaured in the Sept 2000 issue of Keyboard mag, written by one Michael Cooper. Widening mono parts by using a modulated delay with fine control over delay times.

 

Problem is it doesn't appear that Logic Pro 7 has a stock delay plug in with quite the right combination of features. My Lexi MPX1 does, but does not appear to be able to modulate delay times smoothly enough, and given the small amount of I/O latency doing the round trip via S/PDIF through my interface may be enough to muck the effect up anyhow.

 

The article is saying a delay initially of 7ms, and modulating that between 7ms and 9ms. So I'm after an AU plug in (ideally) that can do this.

 

Any suggestions or ideas would be great - p'raps there's a free AU plug in that will do the trick that someone knows of?

[blue2blue]

What about simply nudging or shifting the track 7-9 ms in the desired "direction"?

 

 

I'll go on to give my sidebar opinion on playing with the Haas Effect... you muck around with this type of psychoacoustic cue at some risk of unnatural, awkward, or fatiguing effects. Yes, you can accomplish some interesting effects but interesting can be problematic, as well.

[TBush]

Maybe the old MDA "stereo" plug would work- it uses the HAAS formula for what it does- it might be a bit noisy though...

 

It's VST but you could use a wrapper in Logic 7.

 

http://www.kvraudio.com/get/797.html

[Lee Knight]

Try automating the delay time of a stock delay plugin?

[Boffinry]

Hi All, thanks for all that info - awesome. Will give those links and automation advice a crack and see (and might even post back my findings).

[alphajerk]

yeah, just put a sine auto on the delay time for a 2ms range.

[GZsound]

I agree with blue2blue, what's wrong with simply delaying the track by cutting out a few ms?

[Phil O'Keefe]

I agree with blue2blue, what's wrong with simply delaying the track by cutting out a few ms?

 

If I'm understanding the original question correctly, that wouldn't work, because nudging or delaying the audio track is going to be static in nature, whereas what he's looking for is a modulated - constantly changing - delay time that fluctuates between 7 - 9 ms.

 

You can always use two seperate plug ins - the first one for the short delay, and the second one to modulate the output of the delay. It's not quite the same thing either though.

 

I've been thinking about a specific delay I'd like to have for years... I'd want it to have modulated delay times, as well as random delay times within a user specified range available, among other things.

[alphajerk]

yeah, its the modulation. a delay alone would delay the track by a few ms on its own if set up that way.... although the Haas effect as i understand it IS that small [usually] delay between two events of the same source [unmodulated]

 

the psp42/84 does delay modulation built in... however changing the delay time within repeats does alter the pitch of the delayed sound as it travels in and out. the digitech multiplay also does this... it creates that 'and the gods made love' sound off electric ladyland. i have used both of these for quite some time over straight delays, although i vary quite a bit more than a few ms.

[blue2blue]

Yeah... Phil's right. I was simply focused on the Haas effect, rather than focusing on what the writer was actually asking about (and I don't think I saw the Keyboard article, though I think I was still getting that mag, then). I get up to close on the screen sometimes...

[GZsound]

If I'm understanding the original question correctly, that wouldn't work, because nudging or delaying the audio track is going to be static in nature, whereas what he's looking for is a modulated - constantly changing - delay time that fluctuates between 7 - 9 ms. You can always use two seperate plug ins - the first one for the short delay, and the second one to modulate the output of the delay. It's not quite the same thing either though. I've been thinking about a specific delay I'd like to have for years... I'd want it to have modulated delay times, as well as random delay times within a user specified range available, among other things.

 

So the delay time would vary slightly throughout the track? And modulating the delay would create different volume levels of the delayed track also...right?

 

I am trying to grasp the effect this would have on a track.. It seems that doing this would add some "life" or "movement" to a track that might be lifeless or static.

 

Interesting idea... I'm gonna play with my plug ins to see if I can create such a thing...

[Keithrt99]

couldn't you use 2 delay plug ins, one at 7 ms, the other at 9ms, then automate when each one is on?

[mrbobo]

I recently started using this effect on mono recorded lead guitar lines. I'm ITB, so I use Lexicon PSP42 delay. I havn't read this article, but to my ears 4- 8ms sounds best.http://www.pspaudioware.com/indexen.html?url=http://www.pspaudioware.com/plugins/psp42.html;

 

Here's a clip, be gentle.. I did this all in my modest home studio. The PSP42, modulating from 4-8ms is on the lead guitar :http://www.mrbobo.com/music/clips/bobo-k2m-middle.mp3

I guess I should mention, there's another stereo delay on the lead guitar bus. But that PSP42 is definately responsible for the majority of the stereo effect on the lead.

[alphajerk]

isnt this what a chorus pedal is?

[Zooey]

 

isnt this what a chorus pedal is?

 

 

Yeah, I think chorus is basically modulated delay at very short delay times. Flanger is the same with slightly longer delay times.

 

There are assloads of modulated delays out there. A Deltalab Effectron can be had for cheap (I got one with a BIN price of $40 on eBay about a year ago). Many delay plug-ins also have an option for moduation. The stock delay in Pro Tools has modulation, and that one's free.

[Boffinry]

I am trying to grasp the effect this would have on a track.. It seems that doing this would add some "life" or "movement" to a track that might be lifeless or static. Interesting idea... I'm gonna play with my plug ins to see if I can create such a thing...

 

Hey, post what you find if you can! The results as outlined in the article sound intriguing:

 

"If you're looking for a dynamic stereo effect to turn a so-so monaural track into an ear catcher, and autopan sounds too corny, a modified Haas effect is an excellent (and uncommon) choice. Far less obvious than autopan and chorus, the effect we explain here will animate lifeless keyboard tracks by creating a subtle impression of shimmering stereo ambience between the speakers. The effect is so elusive, you'll have people wondering 'how did they do that?!

 

" ...Congratulations, you should now be hearing the Haas effect! Now for a slight variation, set the rate parameter to around 20% of its full value and the depth parameter to about 40%. If you've set it up correctly, the keyboard should now have a fairly wide stereo spread, and the image should be continuously and rapidly (but very subtly) shifting from speaker to speaker.

 

"The movement is very different from what's created with autopan and is impossible for your brain to track. Rather, it's more like a shimmering effect..."

 

Mr. Cooper goes into quite some detail about this, how to refine the effect so it doesn't resemble a flanger or phaser, and the article is a full page and a half. September 2000, p82, if anyone wants to follow it up.

 

Thx for the link to the PSP42 Mrbobo BTW. Cheers everyone

[alphajerk]

still sounds like a chorus to me... speaking of weird stereo stuff, anyone tried the anarchy effects? pan via freq and all kinds of other twists. thinking outside the box on some of those, i got to try them out.