Great video! Did you experiment with the placement of the transducer and pickups? Or maybe try something in between the transducer surface and the plate surface to reduce the “attack”. I definitely want to try something similar. Thanks again!
So, if you wanted to make a stereo plate reverb would you need two transducers and two plates? Or could you use a stereo amplifier (like you have) and use multiple piezo pickups...
This got me thinking. What about using a big ole cymbal for this purpose? The right one should have a more open and washy sound (which could then be tamed with moon-gel and whatnot). Plus it's really portable with stand and all.. Anyone tried anything like it?
Yes, larger cymbals mounted vertically with the studio monitor on one side and close miced on the other, cheap and dirty!!! But my favourite is a Bluetooth speaker in a stairwell and a portable recorder one or two flights away!
The beauty of this video is that if there's a nuclear holocaust and we need to rebuild society we at least now know how to recreate Motown - and that's no bad thing
@@trendingverge None of that will matter. There won't be electricity that we have relied on, and the music we make might as well be given to aliens as post-war generations will die of radiation exposure.
I’d like to hear what it would sound like to run a 2x speed signal through the plate reverb. Then, of course, you’d slow the recording back down. It would probably sound like a much bigger plate, but who knows.
Back in the 70s , a firm of architects used something like that to deduce the sound of real concert halls from using quite small models. Of course doing it whilst hitting your plate/spring with a small screwdriver gives rise to the whole gamut of Star Wars blaster sounds!
You actually already own the ideal piezo preamp... right there in your rack! The Great River preamp's Hi-Z input is a JFET buffered DI that feeds its input transformer. The input impedance is 1 MEG, and it's ideal for passive piezo pickups. I put piezo pickups in all kinds of things and it sounds great. I have long thought of building a plate similar to what you did. I'm glad to hear that it works so well. You should also play with the location of the plate support knobs. It will change the vibrational nodes of the plate. Great video!
Good eye! I got that MP2-NV maybe 10-12 years ago straight from the man himself, Dan Kennedy at Great River Electronics. It is glorious. Magnificent, even. It most certainly would work for me but I'm trying to do this project with lower-cost options that the average home gamer might have or can build. Good recommendation, though!
What would happen if you put rubber pads under the plate support knobs to further isolate the plate from the chassis? I would also put it on wheels so that you can wheel it around the studio to modulate the effect if you so wish?
I built a plate a few years ago. It will sound a little better if you use 26AWG sheet metal and suspend it with wire. It should be under tension and have a fair amount of distance between the sheet and the shelf below it. You may need to cut down the corners to make room for the suspension. Great experiment. Thanks for sharing! BTW, if you want to play with your current hardware more, sand off the paint, use longer spacers and use only three, placed randomly. Patterns are your enemy in acoustics.
You're absolutely right about using 3 spacers in random orientation to avoid regular patterns and acoustic nodes in the plate. That's a brilliant thought and I can't believe I didn't think of that. Your other observations are on point too.
@@LeoMakes Heh, I get lucky sometimes. I actually had a client ask if he could buy my plate off of me. Mine was 26AWG 3'X5' suspended in a wooden frame. I put a styrene board in the frame to act as a damper with a pull-string to control the spacing. I used piezo pickups at first but got quieter operation with a couple omni condensers later. Any way, keep experimenting. I would love to see what your final version is like!
Built 4×8' in wooden frame years ago. Suspended from ceiling.EQ'send/ returns,in a another room,as they (as u know)will pick-up ambient sounds. Thing sounded great,EQ send . frequencies that were "harsh",EQ return(and plate)shaped overall sound.Much tweaking to dial it all in. An engineer said that if the plate was isolated and properly suspended in airtight enclosure,and pumped out w/vacuum pump(obviously not a complete vacuum) that it wouldn't pick up any ambient sound,as sound can't travel through vacuum. The plate,heavy guage sheet metal, is now the floor in bed of old truck! I've fooled around w/smaller and thinner sheet steel w/good results. However plate needs to be under more tension that thicker steel. Using 2×4' thin guage (28-32g) suspended w/Multiple stiff springs, (at least 8)in oak frame sound really good.I need to install nylon grommets into plate to eliminate minor "buzz" from metal to metal contact. Then suspend that apparatus in an enclosure and pump it down to "near"vacuum. That being said,I've used some softer steel that sounds even better that the harder stuff. Then my friend suggested that since being in a near vacuum enclosure,why not 2,or 3,or MORE units in same box!Wow -good advice again,as u can't have to many reverbs! Don't have the spare cash to do this now,and don't have space for a studio either,so it goes on back burner for now. I use good 4"speaker,carefully cut out dust cap,glue in hollow cardboard tube(fits in cavity behind dust cap). Then trim to just touch plate,and glue using urethane sealant. Pick-ups?Acoustic instrument Pick-ups work great for this. 2×4 frame covered w/osb plywood seals unit up pretty good, although heavy,this also adds support to framework.Spings?short heavy springs w/hooked ends,2 on each corner,90 degree apart.Use eyebolts not screws as they will pull out. Suspend unit in another frame or from ceiling.This makes the unit Level,which is important. After hanging unit w/plywood on backside,then install speaker/tube on face of middle section of front plywood(front is in 3 sections). I've found that point of attachment of tube to plate to be 2-4" off center,to be ideal. Transducers in line w/each other at both ends of plate 4 to 6" from edge also ideal,as you don't want them to be out of phase. Cut the lows(100 and below) Cut the highs (3k and above) going to the plate as a good starting point.A cheap graphic or similar w/any old amp to drive plate is fine. Since transducers(pick-ups) are high-z, I soldered 1/4" Jack to them and plug into low-z transformers,and then to balanced Mic cables,then into mixing desk using EQ on board to make final tweaks. A drill and $200.00 bucks and you will have a Quality sounding plate reverb that can deliver astounding sound. If you want to "dampen"it(shorten decay) Install a t-nut on front panel w/ long bolt(1/4" diameter or so) attached to 3×3"or so cube of soft foam rubber. Use urethane sealant(calk) to fasten to end of bolt.Then simply adjust to shorten decay.Place this apparatus on either left or right panel so contact w/plate is 4" or so from a corner.This is not critical,but u want it close to the edge,not anywhere in Middle area.It will barely contact surface to dramatically shorten decay. This set-up will give 3 seconds or more decay,so this little thumb screw deal works great. After dust cap is trimmed off speaker then get appropriate diameter tube(hobbie supplies) Steel can be had from various suppliers,such as McMaster Carr, or sheet metal shop.Springs from M Carr or the like.Small flat "L brackets for corners at hardware store.Fasten one on each corner w/ thin rubber,or sealant under them to prevent "rattles".The springs hook into these,after mounted w/small bolts to plate and drilled. As mentioned,nylon grommets are highly recommended.Springs can be hooked right into plate, but Will tear metal after time,as we're talking about 50lb or more of spring tension(tension it takes to expand springs,and there will be over 400lb's pull on plate. Get steel,springs,eye bolts,washers, brackets first,then make frame,etc. An alternative is to use 8 small turnbuckels,and high grade ones. That's what I used on my first plate,and worked great,though 8 heavy coil springs are better and contribute to a better sound.The original plates we're hung in steel frames as they (most of them)had so much tension they would have collapsed a wood frame. I prefer wood frames/springs as they contribute to a smooth sound . The original plates were "tuned" (like an instrument!) to the users preference,and also very expensive. I felt it necessary to give these guidelines which yours truly learned from many,many hours of trial and error. An if I get into the right situation again,several of these units will be quickly put together and put into service. The sound to my ears surpasses their digital counterparts. They sound great on vocals, stringed instruments,etc,but really shine on percussion stuff. Analog tape and gear and good mic's can't be beat in my opinion.Digital stuff is best for mix-down and mastering. Analog tape has a natural compression when driven(and distortion!)and like plates,tube limiters and such cannot be equalled with algorithms and unlimited tracks.
@@robertgodhard3248 Tyvm for all those very sharp technical tips on the REAL thing (the ikea funny thing is nice too and easy, tho). Very interesting, keeping it all, if one of those days... Just one thing : wouldn't it be better to NOT enter xformer directly from piezo ? I've seen other designs doing so but ... Wouldn't it be better to first plug piezo (very short wires) to very hi-z ( 2M, 5M or even more) FET buffer ? This is usualy the way it's done for acoustic instruments, isn't it ? Piezo are so weak and prone to noise catching...
Damn. Ya beat me, to the punch. Bravo! I'm a studio owner. I've had a pair of EMT plate reverbs over the years. And boy oh boy, do I miss them. No digital anything can compare. And so it had been my intention. To take a metal double frame bed frame. Weld it, solid. Add some, reinforcement braces. The piezoelectric buzzers are all right. Though I think a, Barcus Barry or a, FRAP, Might be more advantageous? And then a, 4 x 6 foot piece of, stainless steel sheet metal. Double reinforced at each one of the corners. Let it get me the extended reverb time and greater density that I desire. One other thing you missed. Is that, on the driver side. A rather large treble boost a.k.a. preemphasis of the high frequencies is added. Which, frequently kicks up this, sizzling sound. Which some people love. Like myself. Others hate it. Some scorn it. I embrace it and love it. It's definitely the audible clue. You got a real plate reverb. The problems EMT had, manufacturing their, 140 series plate reverb's. Was twofold. One is that of their, cold rolled steel. Having about a, 60% rejection ratio. I know. That's almost unbelievable. And if the Germans can't make decent, cold rolled sheet metal steel? Who the hell can? Which is one of the arguments for, stainless steel. Conversely. The cold rolled steel. When you opened up the EMT plate to properly tension it. Everyone found this horrible sticky stuff. All over the sheet metal on both sides. So nasty, sticky that it was. Many technicians cleaned it off. And that's a big whoops. As that was covered in, kneetsfoot, oil. To keep the cold rolled steel from rusting like an old car. And some were destroyed in that fashion. While others still sounded great. If they were lucky? Reverb time was varied with, basically, rigid fiberglass ceiling tiles. Glued,, to a backing. Suspended with, levers. That moved the ceiling tiles closer to or away from the plate. To vary the reverb time. Never making contact with the physical plate. And was truly an amazing invention created by Dr. Kuhl, in 1958. It changed the world. As today. All digitally synthesized reverbs. All try to imitate the plate. And really none can compare. Until you spend between $5000 and $15,000. So this was a great project you presented! I'm in love with you LOL. I mean a better sounding reverb than a, digital gizmo for $100. That's absolutely brilliant! And is quite usable sounding. I'm just spoiled having had the real things. So, I have to have a big one. Yes I am one of those kinds of girls. But that definitely is one great bargain! Mx. Remy Ann David TheTruckStudio.com
Thanks for the tip. I was thinking carbon steel would ring better than stainless but that rust would bodge up the reverberations, neets foot oil it is! Also knowing they used acoustic tile on the dampening- I've been trying to engineer how to keep a felt piece from touching the plate and rigid tile is a fabulous solution. Looking to start assembly in the near future. 😸
Very interesting observations--thanks for that. I didn't know about the oil coating on the plate, but it does make sense. It's incredible how quickly uncoated, ungalvanized, or otherwise unprocessed steel starts to rust. Part of the reason I went with the "tabletop" form factor was that I didn't have a good solution to the "ceiling tiles suspended with levers" thing that I would otherwise need to build. Plus it's fun to physically dampen the plate with your hands. But it is something I want to look into as a next step. Thanks for watching!
The result is really pleasing to listen to, especially on the synths. It really sounds kind of "physical". I'd love to hear it on saxophone or someone singing.
This is excellent! Loved it. Would love to see an update in the future as I imagine you'll be tweaking this a fair bit. Sounded great already almost resonator like, some EQ would be interesting to take that prominent hump out.
As with any instrument, I would shelve off with eq, another cool trick is frequency dependent compression, whereas, a 1/3 octave equalizer is side chained into compressor, trigger source optional......
@@userPrehistoricman your question is legit! that is the main goal about audio. Acoustic problems = Acoustic solutions / Electrical problems =Electrical solutions. But sometimes companies tend to hide those problems by any means.
Hey Joachim! I've captured them from this plate. I'll make them for the updated plate (which I'm working on now) and post them all so people can compare them.
immediately subscribed. This is absolutely brilliant. When you get around updating everything and optimise it an all in package of electronics would be amazing to straight up buy
I did something very similar recently with one of those stamped-steel CD towers you used to see everywhere - put a contact driver on the bottom of the tower and piezos at the top, and built a little box with an LM380 driver circuit and a pair of simple piezo preamps (FET into TL072) to run it all. Because it's a column it has some pretty prominent resonances but it's very fun to incorporate into complicated pedal setups with feedback and so on. I should really do a little video about it at some point.
Brilliant project. I wish there was a small piece of ready-made kit out there with a transducer and two piezo microphones that you could simply attach to any object! KickStarter anyone?
coolest video on UA-cam? Got my vote. Only way to improve this would be, use an angle grinder to cut the legs like a hot knife to butter bro. You can even round and clean the rough edges once you cut them and then spray them black with a nice paint like Belton Molotow craft paint. Other additional ideas for this project: You can also use aircraft paint stripper to get that black paint off the top plate so it can resonate properly. That Ikea paint is deadening the ability of the soundwaves to travel quite a bit. It will sound way better without that think coat of powedercoat on it and should be a very easy strip. You may need to lightly treat it to keep from flash rusting if its not stainless. thin coat of sprayable polyurethane or something is much better than hard paint. You can ALSO use an old snare dampener on the surface instead of a towel or whatever, with those old turn wheels to increase/decrease verb decay! I used to use EMT's at Electric Lady for years, this is an amazing hack. Thanks a ton man great vid! check out my similar stuff at www.CreativityNy.com
Excellent! Tho the background music is distracting.
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Interesting but don't those cables cause disturbance while resting on the plate? I would make a rod above it to mount the cables onto to prevent just that.
Love the idea and dirty, hands on prototyping. Awesome. "real" studio plates are normally a stiffer oversized frame and the plate is tensioned tightly in at least eight places. Often has gussets welded on corners to improve strength since sheet is so thin. And, of course, the plate is bigger. All that may be overkill on a cheap fast project like this. Depends how much effort you wanna throw at it. But the tensioned in-line, free floating concept would affect how the plate shakes vs. resting on four corners. If you feel like experimenting.
I'm also curious on specs, because plates were patented by EMT before the label was created and all through its heyday. There's no way they bought a commercial unit smaller than this vid example. It didn't exist. The old EMT units are about as big as a sheet of plywood. So while I won't say you're *wrong*, I will say if they had a smaller unit then they built it themselves...much like this video guy. And that has a fair possibility of being right. Many studio of that era were built by hand one piece at a time, often by hacking up old radio or telephone equipment. If they needed something then they made it. Idk if that's true in this case. But maybe.
Awesome - I'm totally building one of these. From my experiments with piezos - the bigger the better. The larger surface will pick up lower frequencies, which you can roll off in post if you want. Also - get some thin foam rubber and make little squares to put in the corners - try to float it off the frame instead of the lower shelf basically. Man and you could have multiple plates -- one with springs stretched across or sympathetic resonating strings or something... yeah I'm a make one of these.
I'm super intrigued by the outside possibilities coming from this. What other materials could you use in place of the plate? What would a piano sound board feel like? Or an acoustic guitar? Or other weird stuff like a basketball or a glass container of some sort. The possibilities have me drooling
I've wanted someone to do a video exactly like this for a while. I really needed a good recommendation for the output transducer and the amp build instructions. I'll find amp builds somewhere, but everything about this video was super helpful. Thank you.
This is super cool! I'd like to try this someday as I think it would be fascinating to experiment with different shapes and materials. And did you think about trying a vertical mounting of the plate? Too difficult for a prototype? I would think you'd get longer resonance from a plate suspended from two points... Either way, this is great work, very inspiring!
Hey Taiho! You're exactly right with the "too difficult for a prototype." It would be nice to get it turned sideways (or even mounted on a wall) to clear up some floor space, but I decided this was good enough as a proof-of-concept. Plus if it were on its side, I have to figure out how to mount the transducer (instead of just letting gravity do its job) and dealing with the damping would be another challenge. It would get better resonance, though. I'll tackle this at some point in the future, I think.
@Leo Transducer mounting is the issue that has niggled my brain on this project (aside from the physical mounting which you solved on your prototype with Ikea pre-fabbing.) I reckon a dab of epoxy ought to hold for a couple years and could be engineered for renewal. I should have filmed my adventures with a Talkbox to ag hose project. Serious comedy wrassling that big snake around in the studio but I got a nice little reverb sound. Looking forward to further development on this. Thanks!
There may be less distortion if the transducer is stuck or clipped to the plate. You could also try a pre-emphasis filter before the plate and post-emphasis after to see how it sounds. It can be done in the DAW. I suggest to lower the lows and boost the highs with shelf filters, and the opposite after the reverb.
Leo, the piezo’s do sound mostly like a notch-filter around 2k or so. There are a few types out there. To get rid of the hum problem I recommend make m balanced using two Piezo’s per pickup. Google will find the pinout
I suppose I'm one of those few people with an actual plate (PTI Ecoplate II) in their at-home studio. I love the sound, though...on higher-pitched sounds with rapid transients (snares, toms, electronic percussion, blips and such) is where it really comes alive. But a couple of things came to mind watching this video that you might try. First of all, the Ecoplate (and most stereo plates) has a different configuration of transducer and pickups. Instead of the config shown, try this: place the transducer at one end of the rectangle, equidistant from the three edges of the plate. Then mount the pickups in a similar way at the other end, with the stereo pair an equal distance apart from their distances to the edges on that end in sort of an equal-sided trapezoidal configuration to the corners. What this does is it treats the plate as a 'room', with the 'player' at one end and the two ears of the 'listener' at the other. In fact, that's actually what's going on inside the plate; the edges of the plate act like walls in a room, allowing for a two-dimensional version of a space with very reflective walls, and the sound goes through the early and late reflections as it rebounds around within the edges. It'll have a much better stereo image this way, a longer undamped time, and will give you a lot more flexibility in time variation via mechanical damping. Another thing to keep in mind is that the 'plate' doesn't have to be flat. The Siemens studio for electronic music in Munich used steel mesh suspended inside a cabinet, but the mesh was coiled into a spiral which allowed a much larger amount of reverberant media to fit into a compact space. You can see this thing (the studio is now in the Deutsches Museum in Munich) at www.electricalaudio.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=28005 alongside some pics of other electronic studio gear of the 1950s and 60s from the same studio. One final thing you might also find interesting is this book: www.amazon.com/gp/product/0415996090/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_taft_p1_i0 Nicolas Collins was a student of Alvin Lucier's at Wesleyan, currently the chair of the sound department at the Chicago Art Institute. Both Lucier and Collins focussed heavily on electromechanical systems in music, and this book, Handmade Electronic Music: The Art of Hardware Hacking, is a great idea-book for all sorts of electroacoustic tinkering.
Fantastic tips and great book recommendation. I had never heard of the Siemens studio reverb before and it was very cool to read about it. I had to record some Lucier (and Helmut Lachenmann) pieces when I was in college and--at the time--the music made me want to punch the nearest contemporary/modern composer in the face. But as the years went by, I started to hate the music less and even appreciate it bits of it. It's weird and subversive. These days, I actually find myself enjoying some of those more "challenging" pieces of music, but only in small doses. Thanks for watching!
@@LeoMakes Can't blame you for wanting to do some 'five finger critique' on typical academic composers of that time. I suppose that growing up in Nashville tempered out a lot of the serialist wonk in my case, even though I did go through that same sort of thing. But my profs could see the handwriting on the wall and knew that the whole "New Tonality" thing was under way, so I got to experiment with both the academic wonk style and the post-modern (for lack of a better term) directions and see which worked better. And recalling Nashville, that brings up another truly wild reverb technique... Way back in the 1980s, Treasure Island Recorders had an adjustable _chamber_. Yep...you could change the T60 times in a free space! How this worked was really amazing: they'd taken a small room-sized space, lined that with glazed tile...in fact, you'd mistake it for a largish shower if it wasn't for the strange presence of a waterproof transducer and two hydrophones. These would dangle under the surface of the water, the level of which could be raised and lowered to adjust the time needed from a second-ish up to several seconds. The T60 response curve was really smooth, too; water can transfer sonic energy more effectively than air, and coupled with the faster speed of sound in water, this made for a chamber that could rival even the famous Capitol Studios chambers. Plus, the frequency response of both the transducer and hydrophones fell off greatly below about 200-300 Hz, which kept the boomier bass signals out by design. Might make for another interesting DIY reverb project later on!
This is a great project! I've been wanting to build a reverb of some type for a while, but spring seems a bit expensive for the quality of 'verb. Plate reverb emulations are my go-to anyway, and this one sounds fantastic!
I like this project! I may have to build something similar. Thanks for doing this video!!! I immediately had a couple ideas on improvements... #1 on the mics, shield them as close to the mics as possible to get rid of that hum - if you HAVE to have any unshielded wire, twist them together (twisted pair reduces noise). You also might try adding a ground wire to the plate to shield one side - OR you could attach the mic between the plates (on the under-side of the plate), and ground both the plate and the frame to add additional shielding. It won't get it all, but it should get some/most... #2 I would take a sander to the surface of that "plate" to get rid of the finish. You may get better high frequency without that black finish - the down side to that is that it may rust or oxidize, so you may have to replace the heavy finish with a really light lacquer or gun oil. #3 Speaking of frequencies, a tone setting or graphic EQ on that driver amp may be a good thing as well. #4 You probably already know that placement of the driver affects the sound, move it around to find the "sweet spots" and mark them. (do the same with the mics) #5 because the drive is held in place by gravity, this type of set up need not be "ferrous" (iron or steel) - plates of different materials may be interesting to try - Aluminum, brass, or even plastic Again, this was a wonderful video and a great idea, thanks for the inspiration!!!
Great video... I would EQ the reverb signal, there seems to be a dominant frequency in there, around 1 or 2 K ... while it is a characteristic of most spring and plate reverbs to have such resonant peaks smothing it down could give a much smoother reverd. Well props to you well done...
Very nice try on this. Very simple and clever. Can I suggest you to try some cheap passive DI boxes between the piezos and your preamps? They would offer a better match of the impedances and I think reduce the hum. You might also reduce the length of your asymmetrical wires and box your amp to shield it, for the same purpose. Please make some follow-ups on that project. Anyway, thanks for sharing.
I checked the video date due to that intro music bed, sounds like the facebook sad/happy story videos. I mean it made the presentation sound very dated. Props to an interesting video after that, though. The synth hackverb examples were by far the most interesting. More problem solving on the ground loop hum issues, I don't know anything about the transducer or the piezos.
You'd get better resonance out of it by hanging the plate vertically, rather than laying it horizontally. Letting the plate dangle will allow it to ring the way a bell does. Having it supported at all four corners is creating a built-in dampening.
Hello, can someone who understands cabling add some explanation about what cables I need (3x RCA to Jack ?) and what I need to do on both ends of the cable ? Thank you
Been doing something similar to this for a few years, just using a vibration speaker and contact mics (as well as other mics) to pass sounds through a selection of household objects (tables, tins, boxes, bathtubs, etc). I wasn't specifically aiming to create reverb so much as add some timbral variation in a nicely hands-on kinda way,. For me any reverb is just a bonus! Top tip; try covering the 'plate' with dried lentils to add distortion.
I mean, if you actually got a plate that sounds good, I bet this would sound just as nice as the nicest EMT 140's around. I've heard one being tapped by a finger in real life, and the sound of just that acoustic finger tap in the room with it not hooked up was BEAUTIFUL. Very full and complex. So if you can find a much bigger plate that sounds something like the real plates they used back in the day (should be possible to make or at least find cheaply), you should be getting the exact same sound, even though you wouldn't be able to tune it the way you did the old ones, unless you built a little mechanical system for that, or even did it manually.
Nice work! Nice to meet you. Liked, subbed. I always wanted to do this with a great-sounding car door or something. That shelf sounds great! Of course, you could stick the entire rig in an isolation booth or an anechoic chamber, but that defeats the whole guerilla ethic behind the project. Great work here, sand a great demo! Thanks for sharing. The machining device looks fascinating too!
I keep seeing in the comments "you need to do this" "you need to make sure that" "it would be better if." Honestly, when it comes to cool effects, you don't have to do anything but what is available to you. The effect from this plate is really really cool on its own and is something I could totally see in a couple of mixes I'm working on right now.
Thanks for the kind words, Beau! I really don't mind the suggestions, though. I think it's kinda cool that people are engaging with the video so much. I was worried it was going to be crickets in the comments section... :)
I really love this. I have some old telephones that I've been thinking of making into a reverb. I was wondering about springs but this is a much better idea.
The impedance problem is fairly simple to fix. Using either a FET, and output transformer or a D.I. box. Check documents on 'Contact Mics;. knowledge.lom.audio/research/contact_mics
Nice idea. Maybe it can be even simpler. As far as I understand you don't really need the table only the plate (actually the plate is just a hassle as you try to avoid any contact with it). So why not just hang the plate from the ceiling with some fishing line sort of thing. I have similar setup with a transducer and resonant foam plates hanging...
So... just out of curiosity, why not use an actual speaker and mics? Why piezo? ..and the transducer? Again...just curious about the specific choices. I may actually build one of these. Cool video! Thanks!
MAKE US IMPULSE RESPONSES WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! sweeps and spikes here: www.audioease.com/altiverb/sampling.php place lots of weird objects on it, bath tub chain, rice, scarf etc
Hi Leo ! I have another idea ...maybe stupid but who knows !! .... Can you replicate this project but instead of metal ikea, use a big bass drum head like standard ones or maybe those huge ones used on Football School bands ??? Sound could be good but darker I guess or how about using a very large thin old XRAY film stretched over a wood rectangle or a big 4x8 galvanized metal sheet stretched over a 4x8 wood rectangle ?? ...and that definitely won't weigh 600 pounds more or less 95 pounds is my guess !!! Please do this other DIY plate reverb or could it be called Drum skin reverb ?? and lastly ....How about using a Timpani drum as a surface drum reverb ?? Cool maybe ??
Great video! I'm curious about the amp between the interface and the transducer - anywhere you would recommend looking for instructions on how to make one? Or would something like this product -- (www.adafruit.com/product/987) -- get the job done? The one in the link is a 3.7W class D stereo amplifier based on the LM386 amps
Brilliant idea! You just gave me my next weekend build! Also, thought this simple preamp could come in handy to anyone working with piezos like these: www.stompville.co.uk/shop/34-phantom-piezo-preamp-v2.html . Works like a charm and the difference it makes to these cheap components is unbelievable.
living in a huge iron-like building ( I think it is alluminium) with a recording space down below.... I imagine how to make this a huge plate since I have 6 18" inch speakers... learned a lot about the 2 plates connection. I usually got my effect from resonating one plate. I will need another whole life for only mess around with this analogue plug-in. thanks for the godspeed push
I'm partial to a good spring-reverb tank myself. Plate 'verb just sounds too "vintage" for my liking, considering that I only use reverb to spice up leads and clean lines. Plate reverbs are good for that Dick Dale type Surf sound, but for metal, it's all but useless. Too many clashing transients and whatnot... It doesn't help that I hate how mushy and warbly plate reverb sounds to my ears.
I'm wondering ... Do you hear sound fron the transducer onto the plate? If so will it be loud? 2x speed is a great idea and slow it down... I noticed the cloth to change the plate sound and i was thinking. Why not put an extra solid plate on top and add some kind of piston you can push down with a rotary handle ( knob ) . . Just turn the knob to change sound... 😂🤣 Very nice project ... Well done 👍
Cheaper still, just buy one plate, some wire, and screw in hooks. Screw the hooks into the ceiling, and glue the transducer and pickups to the plate. This _might_ even resonate better. Never know. You could even hang that up in your attic and run some lines to it. Fantastic video though. Really well done.
It sounds really terrible, if you're going to go to the trouble of DIYing it, why not get a much bigger and better piece of metal as your plate? But as a proof of concept, it's cool, now go to v2 and try to get it sounding decent!
wonder what would happen to the sustain if the plate was suspended rather than coupled or rubber feet isolating the unit from the ground in a vibrational sense. also wonder what the difference between a contact mic and a guitar pickup would make, aside from the guitar pickup probably needing an amp.
It would be interesting if architects would start working more with sound, ambience and soundscapes. Imagine a room where everything sounds like you're in a wide open space and which uses microphones and speakers to convert the room. And uses light and maybe smells too.
What i heard is that placing the inducers not a at the half mark, but at 2/5 (in both directions) it will vibrate better making the volume on low and high piches more equal. The chanel "Tech Ingredients:" has an awesome video about this topic.
Very cool build. You could experiment by putting some keys, grains of rice, screws or bits of cutlery on top of the plate to see how that affects the sound. Maybe give it some shimmer or sound terrible. Just a thought.
I am not into music at all, but I think this is very interesting. Wouldn't it be better to hang the plate just from 2 strings? It would swing and vibrate freely and you could hang weights off of that to dampen it, or lower the resonance frequency.
Wonder if the woo crowd of audiophiles could latch on to this and start to deride people who use plates that aren't either titanium stripped off of an ex-spacecraft or gold plated brass.
What are your reverb settings? Two towels and a box.
Nah two rolls and some kleenex during the pandemic :D
Great video!
Did you experiment with the placement of the transducer and pickups? Or maybe try something in between the transducer surface and the plate surface to reduce the “attack”. I definitely want to try something similar. Thanks again!
Complete side note, but I really liked the background music for the first few minutes of the vid.
So, if you wanted to make a stereo plate reverb would you need two transducers and two plates? Or could you use a stereo amplifier (like you have) and use multiple piezo pickups...
This got me thinking. What about using a big ole cymbal for this purpose? The right one should have a more open and washy sound (which could then be tamed with moon-gel and whatnot). Plus it's really portable with stand and all.. Anyone tried anything like it?
Or a wooden one, with a thin sheet of ply stretched across a frame. To add resonance to guitars, or give a woody tone to a bass guitar?
Excismos oh crap i love that idea 🙆♂️
Yes, larger cymbals mounted vertically with the studio monitor on one side and close miced on the other, cheap and dirty!!! But my favourite is a Bluetooth speaker in a stairwell and a portable recorder one or two flights away!
@@excismos8056 There are speakers made much like that. Very feasible.
ua-cam.com/video/HWSceZkbVeQ/v-deo.html good idea xd
The beauty of this video is that if there's a nuclear holocaust and we need to rebuild society we at least now know how to recreate Motown - and that's no bad thing
Lol
Lol whelp...
Only that everything will be noisy from the radiation..
@@AndreasDelleske ever heard of a Radiation blanket.
@@trendingverge None of that will matter. There won't be electricity that we have relied on, and the music we make might as well be given to aliens as post-war generations will die of radiation exposure.
Not only a cool project to do but teaches what plate reverb is, more or less. Nice one.
I’d like to hear what it would sound like to run a 2x speed signal through the plate reverb. Then, of course, you’d slow the recording back down. It would probably sound like a much bigger plate, but who knows.
Joseph Yarzebinski That’s a really creative idea!!
Thanks for giving me some hope un the human race :-)
Back in the 70s , a firm of architects used something like that to deduce the sound of real concert halls from using quite small models. Of course doing it whilst hitting your plate/spring with a small screwdriver gives rise to the whole gamut of Star Wars blaster sounds!
i think so. My impulse reverb has that option for sounding longer and works well (add a hipass though)
@@ianbaxter8299 unrelated, but if you take a metal slinky, and put the ends over yours ears and shake it it sounds just like the star wars blasters.
@@javiceres *species
4:28 oh...it's Ulrich's snare in St. Anger!
Nice! Your channel is like look mum no computer on sedative))
Ha! I love that guy's channel (and his experiments) but I have no idea how he gets that much energy.
haha
@@LeoMakes I get tired of channels with too much energy lol. Your magic snap is wonderful as well!
Ahahah
77advanced sedatives. fuk dat
You actually already own the ideal piezo preamp... right there in your rack! The Great River preamp's Hi-Z input is a JFET buffered DI that feeds its input transformer. The input impedance is 1 MEG, and it's ideal for passive piezo pickups. I put piezo pickups in all kinds of things and it sounds great. I have long thought of building a plate similar to what you did. I'm glad to hear that it works so well. You should also play with the location of the plate support knobs. It will change the vibrational nodes of the plate. Great video!
Good eye! I got that MP2-NV maybe 10-12 years ago straight from the man himself, Dan Kennedy at Great River Electronics. It is glorious. Magnificent, even. It most certainly would work for me but I'm trying to do this project with lower-cost options that the average home gamer might have or can build. Good recommendation, though!
What would happen if you put rubber pads under the plate support knobs to further isolate the plate from the chassis? I would also put it on wheels so that you can wheel it around the studio to modulate the effect if you so wish?
1 Meg is not "ideal for Piezo's". It is too low.
I built a plate a few years ago. It will sound a little better if you use 26AWG sheet metal and suspend it with wire. It should be under tension and have a fair amount of distance between the sheet and the shelf below it. You may need to cut down the corners to make room for the suspension. Great experiment. Thanks for sharing! BTW, if you want to play with your current hardware more, sand off the paint, use longer spacers and use only three, placed randomly. Patterns are your enemy in acoustics.
You're absolutely right about using 3 spacers in random orientation to avoid regular patterns and acoustic nodes in the plate. That's a brilliant thought and I can't believe I didn't think of that. Your other observations are on point too.
@@LeoMakes Heh, I get lucky sometimes. I actually had a client ask if he could buy my plate off of me. Mine was 26AWG 3'X5' suspended in a wooden frame. I put a styrene board in the frame to act as a damper with a pull-string to control the spacing. I used piezo pickups at first but got quieter operation with a couple omni condensers later. Any way, keep experimenting. I would love to see what your final version is like!
BTW, your video inspired a huge discussion within the AMPEX E-mail group!
Built 4×8' in wooden frame years ago.
Suspended from ceiling.EQ'send/
returns,in a another room,as they
(as u know)will pick-up ambient
sounds.
Thing sounded great,EQ send .
frequencies that were "harsh",EQ
return(and plate)shaped overall
sound.Much tweaking to dial it
all in.
An engineer said that if the plate
was isolated and properly suspended
in airtight enclosure,and pumped
out w/vacuum pump(obviously not
a complete vacuum) that it wouldn't
pick up any ambient sound,as sound
can't travel through vacuum.
The plate,heavy guage sheet metal,
is now the floor in bed of old truck!
I've fooled around w/smaller and
thinner sheet steel w/good results.
However plate needs to be under
more tension that thicker steel.
Using 2×4' thin guage (28-32g)
suspended w/Multiple stiff springs,
(at least 8)in oak frame sound really
good.I need to install nylon grommets
into plate to eliminate minor "buzz"
from metal to metal contact.
Then suspend that apparatus
in an enclosure and pump it
down to "near"vacuum.
That being said,I've used some
softer steel that sounds even
better that the harder stuff.
Then my friend suggested that
since being in a near vacuum
enclosure,why not 2,or 3,or MORE
units in same box!Wow -good advice
again,as u can't have to many
reverbs!
Don't have the spare cash to do
this now,and don't have space
for a studio either,so it goes
on back burner for now.
I use good 4"speaker,carefully cut
out dust cap,glue in hollow cardboard
tube(fits in cavity behind dust cap).
Then trim to just touch plate,and
glue using urethane sealant.
Pick-ups?Acoustic instrument
Pick-ups work great for this.
2×4 frame covered w/osb
plywood seals unit up pretty good,
although heavy,this also adds support
to framework.Spings?short heavy
springs w/hooked ends,2 on each
corner,90 degree apart.Use eyebolts
not screws as they will pull out.
Suspend unit in another frame or
from ceiling.This makes the unit
Level,which is important.
After hanging unit w/plywood on
backside,then install speaker/tube
on face of middle section of front
plywood(front is in 3 sections).
I've found that point of attachment
of tube to plate to be 2-4" off center,to
be ideal.
Transducers in line w/each other at both ends of plate 4 to 6" from edge also ideal,as you don't want them
to be out of phase.
Cut the lows(100 and below)
Cut the highs (3k and above)
going to the plate as a good
starting point.A cheap graphic
or similar w/any old amp to
drive plate is fine.
Since transducers(pick-ups)
are high-z, I soldered 1/4"
Jack to them and plug into low-z
transformers,and then to
balanced Mic cables,then
into mixing desk using
EQ on board to make
final tweaks.
A drill and $200.00 bucks and
you will have a Quality sounding
plate reverb that can deliver
astounding sound.
If you want to "dampen"it(shorten
decay) Install a t-nut on front panel w/
long bolt(1/4" diameter or so) attached
to 3×3"or so cube of soft foam rubber.
Use urethane sealant(calk) to fasten
to end of bolt.Then simply adjust
to shorten decay.Place this
apparatus on either left or right
panel so contact w/plate is 4"
or so from a corner.This is not
critical,but u want it close to
the edge,not anywhere in Middle
area.It will barely contact surface
to dramatically shorten decay.
This set-up will give 3 seconds
or more decay,so this little
thumb screw deal works
great.
After dust cap is trimmed off
speaker then get appropriate
diameter tube(hobbie supplies)
Steel can be had from various
suppliers,such as McMaster Carr,
or sheet metal shop.Springs
from M Carr or the like.Small
flat "L brackets for corners
at hardware store.Fasten
one on each corner w/ thin
rubber,or sealant under them
to prevent "rattles".The springs
hook into these,after mounted
w/small bolts to plate and drilled.
As mentioned,nylon grommets
are highly recommended.Springs
can be hooked right into plate, but
Will tear metal after time,as we're
talking about 50lb or more of
spring tension(tension it takes
to expand springs,and there will
be over 400lb's pull on plate.
Get steel,springs,eye bolts,washers,
brackets first,then make frame,etc.
An alternative is to use 8 small
turnbuckels,and high grade ones.
That's what I used on my first
plate,and worked great,though
8 heavy coil springs are better
and contribute to a better
sound.The original plates
we're hung in steel frames
as they (most of them)had
so much tension they would
have collapsed a wood frame.
I prefer wood frames/springs as
they contribute to a smooth sound .
The original plates were "tuned"
(like an instrument!) to the users
preference,and also very expensive.
I felt it necessary to give these
guidelines which yours truly
learned from many,many hours
of trial and error.
An if I get into the right situation
again,several of these units will
be quickly put together and put
into service.
The sound to my ears surpasses
their digital counterparts.
They sound great on vocals,
stringed instruments,etc,but
really shine on percussion
stuff.
Analog tape and gear and
good mic's can't be beat in my
opinion.Digital stuff is best
for mix-down and mastering.
Analog tape has a natural compression
when driven(and distortion!)and like
plates,tube limiters and such cannot
be equalled with algorithms
and unlimited tracks.
@@robertgodhard3248 Tyvm for all those very sharp technical tips on the REAL thing (the ikea funny thing is nice too and easy, tho).
Very interesting, keeping it all, if one of those days...
Just one thing : wouldn't it be better to NOT enter xformer directly from piezo ? I've seen other designs doing so but ... Wouldn't it be better to first plug piezo (very short wires) to very hi-z ( 2M, 5M or even more) FET buffer ? This is usualy the way it's done for acoustic instruments, isn't it ?
Piezo are so weak and prone to noise catching...
This was so cool to watch! As a DIY'r, CNC'r and musician this spoke to me on many levels. Looking forward to more!
Your channel and craftsmanship are incredible. Thank you!
Damn. Ya beat me, to the punch. Bravo!
I'm a studio owner. I've had a pair of EMT plate reverbs over the years. And boy oh boy, do I miss them. No digital anything can compare.
And so it had been my intention. To take a metal double frame bed frame. Weld it, solid. Add some, reinforcement braces. The piezoelectric buzzers are all right. Though I think a, Barcus Barry or a, FRAP, Might be more advantageous?
And then a, 4 x 6 foot piece of, stainless steel sheet metal. Double reinforced at each one of the corners. Let it get me the extended reverb time and greater density that I desire.
One other thing you missed. Is that, on the driver side. A rather large treble boost a.k.a. preemphasis of the high frequencies is added. Which, frequently kicks up this, sizzling sound. Which some people love. Like myself. Others hate it. Some scorn it. I embrace it and love it. It's definitely the audible clue. You got a real plate reverb.
The problems EMT had, manufacturing their, 140 series plate reverb's. Was twofold. One is that of their, cold rolled steel. Having about a, 60% rejection ratio. I know. That's almost unbelievable. And if the Germans can't make decent, cold rolled sheet metal steel? Who the hell can? Which is one of the arguments for, stainless steel.
Conversely. The cold rolled steel. When you opened up the EMT plate to properly tension it. Everyone found this horrible sticky stuff. All over the sheet metal on both sides. So nasty, sticky that it was. Many technicians cleaned it off. And that's a big whoops. As that was covered in, kneetsfoot, oil. To keep the cold rolled steel from rusting like an old car. And some were destroyed in that fashion. While others still sounded great. If they were lucky?
Reverb time was varied with, basically, rigid fiberglass ceiling tiles. Glued,, to a backing. Suspended with, levers. That moved the ceiling tiles closer to or away from the plate. To vary the reverb time. Never making contact with the physical plate. And was truly an amazing invention created by Dr. Kuhl, in 1958. It changed the world. As today. All digitally synthesized reverbs. All try to imitate the plate. And really none can compare. Until you spend between $5000 and $15,000.
So this was a great project you presented! I'm in love with you LOL. I mean a better sounding reverb than a, digital gizmo for $100. That's absolutely brilliant! And is quite usable sounding. I'm just spoiled having had the real things. So, I have to have a big one. Yes I am one of those kinds of girls. But that definitely is one great bargain!
Mx. Remy Ann David
TheTruckStudio.com
Thanks for the tip. I was thinking carbon steel would ring better than stainless but that rust would bodge up the reverberations, neets foot oil it is! Also knowing they used acoustic tile on the dampening- I've been trying to engineer how to keep a felt piece from touching the plate and rigid tile is a fabulous solution. Looking to start assembly in the near future. 😸
Very interesting observations--thanks for that. I didn't know about the oil coating on the plate, but it does make sense. It's incredible how quickly uncoated, ungalvanized, or otherwise unprocessed steel starts to rust. Part of the reason I went with the "tabletop" form factor was that I didn't have a good solution to the "ceiling tiles suspended with levers" thing that I would otherwise need to build. Plus it's fun to physically dampen the plate with your hands. But it is something I want to look into as a next step.
Thanks for watching!
Dude what punctuation language are you using?! Cos it sure ain't English!
The result is really pleasing to listen to, especially on the synths. It really sounds kind of "physical". I'd love to hear it on saxophone or someone singing.
synths and drums are a lot more forgiving for lofi reverbs
This is excellent! Loved it. Would love to see an update in the future as I imagine you'll be tweaking this a fair bit. Sounded great already almost resonator like, some EQ would be interesting to take that prominent hump out.
Thanks Ben! Yeah, I'll definitely be improving things and updating viewers when I am on to something good...
DivKidVideo hey I like your appearances on Sonic Talk. Funny to see you here.
Do real plate reverbs take out the resonance with EQ? I thought it was more of a mechanical thing
As with any instrument, I would shelve off with eq, another cool trick is frequency dependent compression, whereas, a 1/3 octave equalizer is side chained into compressor, trigger source optional......
@@userPrehistoricman your question is legit! that is the main goal about audio. Acoustic problems = Acoustic solutions / Electrical problems =Electrical solutions. But sometimes companies tend to hide those problems by any means.
Wow, how cool is that? We need some IRs :D
Hey Joachim! I've captured them from this plate. I'll make them for the updated plate (which I'm working on now) and post them all so people can compare them.
immediately subscribed. This is absolutely brilliant. When you get around updating everything and optimise it an all in package of electronics would be amazing to straight up buy
Reminds me of when I was a kid and I used to sing in front of the wall heater in the bathroom. The electric one with the spring coils.
I did something very similar recently with one of those stamped-steel CD towers you used to see everywhere - put a contact driver on the bottom of the tower and piezos at the top, and built a little box with an LM380 driver circuit and a pair of simple piezo preamps (FET into TL072) to run it all. Because it's a column it has some pretty prominent resonances but it's very fun to incorporate into complicated pedal setups with feedback and so on. I should really do a little video about it at some point.
Please do, that sounds great
Brilliant project. I wish there was a small piece of ready-made kit out there with a transducer and two piezo microphones that you could simply attach to any object! KickStarter anyone?
I would guess you can find all of those things on an electronics supply website and order them all together.
Rik MaxSpeed That’d be really nice. I’try with car hoods and big traffic signs to start with...
Javig * I think you just gave me an idea for the stop sign in my yard
coolest video on UA-cam? Got my vote. Only way to improve this would be, use an angle grinder to cut the legs like a hot knife to butter bro. You can even round and clean the rough edges once you cut them and then spray them black with a nice paint like Belton Molotow craft paint. Other additional ideas for this project: You can also use aircraft paint stripper to get that black paint off the top plate so it can resonate properly. That Ikea paint is deadening the ability of the soundwaves to travel quite a bit. It will sound way better without that think coat of powedercoat on it and should be a very easy strip. You may need to lightly treat it to keep from flash rusting if its not stainless. thin coat of sprayable polyurethane or something is much better than hard paint. You can ALSO use an old snare dampener on the surface instead of a towel or whatever, with those old turn wheels to increase/decrease verb decay! I used to use EMT's at Electric Lady for years, this is an amazing hack. Thanks a ton man great vid! check out my similar stuff at www.CreativityNy.com
Rise the plate so it sits at the top of the legs, stick the mics to the back of the plate, and you have a coffee table when not using the reverb :D
Agreeing with the comments I'll just add that the googly eyes on the vacuum tube are also a nice touch :)
Cheers
Awesome :) I never really knew how a plate reverb works! :)
Excellent! Tho the background music is distracting.
Interesting but don't those cables cause disturbance while resting on the plate? I would make a rod above it to mount the cables onto to prevent just that.
Love the idea and dirty, hands on prototyping. Awesome.
"real" studio plates are normally a stiffer oversized frame and the plate is tensioned tightly in at least eight places. Often has gussets welded on corners to improve strength since sheet is so thin. And, of course, the plate is bigger.
All that may be overkill on a cheap fast project like this. Depends how much effort you wanna throw at it.
But the tensioned in-line, free floating concept would affect how the plate shakes vs. resting on four corners. If you feel like experimenting.
Tell us more detroitfunk!!
I'm also curious on specs, because plates were patented by EMT before the label was created and all through its heyday.
There's no way they bought a commercial unit smaller than this vid example. It didn't exist. The old EMT units are about as big as a sheet of plywood.
So while I won't say you're *wrong*, I will say if they had a smaller unit then they built it themselves...much like this video guy. And that has a fair possibility of being right. Many studio of that era were built by hand one piece at a time, often by hacking up old radio or telephone equipment. If they needed something then they made it.
Idk if that's true in this case. But maybe.
To me those recordings definitely sound like a regular EMT.
Wow Leo.. great idea! It sounds amazing!
I love plate reverbs. Looking forward to the refined or perfected version. You might have a product to sell.
@user Got it!
Awesome - I'm totally building one of these. From my experiments with piezos - the bigger the better. The larger surface will pick up lower frequencies, which you can roll off in post if you want. Also - get some thin foam rubber and make little squares to put in the corners - try to float it off the frame instead of the lower shelf basically.
Man and you could have multiple plates -- one with springs stretched across or sympathetic resonating strings or something... yeah I'm a make one of these.
Sounds terrible on drums but its amazing!
Yeah it isn't the best reverb sound. Still cool.
First time I've seen your channel. Very cool! Subscribed.
Very good video ... btw, a file is the really good for deburring. 12:45 ( A demel can shoot sparks and grit in you eye , lol )
Good point. Of course I use eye protection, but a file would produce a better and faster result.
I'm super intrigued by the outside possibilities coming from this. What other materials could you use in place of the plate? What would a piano sound board feel like? Or an acoustic guitar? Or other weird stuff like a basketball or a glass container of some sort. The possibilities have me drooling
I've wanted someone to do a video exactly like this for a while. I really needed a good recommendation for the output transducer and the amp build instructions. I'll find amp builds somewhere, but everything about this video was super helpful. Thank you.
Would it be simpler to hang the plate?
Edit, nvm, I see this issue has been addressed. There are some great comments down there!
This is super cool! I'd like to try this someday as I think it would be fascinating to experiment with different shapes and materials. And did you think about trying a vertical mounting of the plate? Too difficult for a prototype? I would think you'd get longer resonance from a plate suspended from two points... Either way, this is great work, very inspiring!
Hey Taiho! You're exactly right with the "too difficult for a prototype." It would be nice to get it turned sideways (or even mounted on a wall) to clear up some floor space, but I decided this was good enough as a proof-of-concept. Plus if it were on its side, I have to figure out how to mount the transducer (instead of just letting gravity do its job) and dealing with the damping would be another challenge. It would get better resonance, though.
I'll tackle this at some point in the future, I think.
@Leo Transducer mounting is the issue that has niggled my brain on this project (aside from the physical mounting which you solved on your prototype with Ikea pre-fabbing.) I reckon a dab of epoxy ought to hold for a couple years and could be engineered for renewal. I should have filmed my adventures with a Talkbox to ag hose project. Serious comedy wrassling that big snake around in the studio but I got a nice little reverb sound. Looking forward to further development on this. Thanks!
There may be less distortion if the transducer is stuck or clipped to the plate.
You could also try a pre-emphasis filter before the plate and post-emphasis after to see how it sounds. It can be done in the DAW. I suggest to lower the lows and boost the highs with shelf filters, and the opposite after the reverb.
I was expecting this to sound very bad, but it actually sounded pretty good!
Excellent stuff thanks!
also shout out to the googley eyes on your vacuum cleaner lol
Thanks for watching!
Leo, the piezo’s do sound mostly like a notch-filter around 2k or so. There are a few types out there. To get rid of the hum problem I recommend make m balanced using two Piezo’s per pickup. Google will find the pinout
Clamp the piezoelectric a little to change its frequency coupling
I suppose I'm one of those few people with an actual plate (PTI Ecoplate II) in their at-home studio. I love the sound, though...on higher-pitched sounds with rapid transients (snares, toms, electronic percussion, blips and such) is where it really comes alive. But a couple of things came to mind watching this video that you might try. First of all, the Ecoplate (and most stereo plates) has a different configuration of transducer and pickups. Instead of the config shown, try this: place the transducer at one end of the rectangle, equidistant from the three edges of the plate. Then mount the pickups in a similar way at the other end, with the stereo pair an equal distance apart from their distances to the edges on that end in sort of an equal-sided trapezoidal configuration to the corners. What this does is it treats the plate as a 'room', with the 'player' at one end and the two ears of the 'listener' at the other. In fact, that's actually what's going on inside the plate; the edges of the plate act like walls in a room, allowing for a two-dimensional version of a space with very reflective walls, and the sound goes through the early and late reflections as it rebounds around within the edges. It'll have a much better stereo image this way, a longer undamped time, and will give you a lot more flexibility in time variation via mechanical damping.
Another thing to keep in mind is that the 'plate' doesn't have to be flat. The Siemens studio for electronic music in Munich used steel mesh suspended inside a cabinet, but the mesh was coiled into a spiral which allowed a much larger amount of reverberant media to fit into a compact space. You can see this thing (the studio is now in the Deutsches Museum in Munich) at www.electricalaudio.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=28005 alongside some pics of other electronic studio gear of the 1950s and 60s from the same studio.
One final thing you might also find interesting is this book: www.amazon.com/gp/product/0415996090/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_taft_p1_i0 Nicolas Collins was a student of Alvin Lucier's at Wesleyan, currently the chair of the sound department at the Chicago Art Institute. Both Lucier and Collins focussed heavily on electromechanical systems in music, and this book, Handmade Electronic Music: The Art of Hardware Hacking, is a great idea-book for all sorts of electroacoustic tinkering.
Fantastic tips and great book recommendation. I had never heard of the Siemens studio reverb before and it was very cool to read about it.
I had to record some Lucier (and Helmut Lachenmann) pieces when I was in college and--at the time--the music made me want to punch the nearest contemporary/modern composer in the face. But as the years went by, I started to hate the music less and even appreciate it bits of it. It's weird and subversive. These days, I actually find myself enjoying some of those more "challenging" pieces of music, but only in small doses.
Thanks for watching!
@@LeoMakes Can't blame you for wanting to do some 'five finger critique' on typical academic composers of that time. I suppose that growing up in Nashville tempered out a lot of the serialist wonk in my case, even though I did go through that same sort of thing. But my profs could see the handwriting on the wall and knew that the whole "New Tonality" thing was under way, so I got to experiment with both the academic wonk style and the post-modern (for lack of a better term) directions and see which worked better. And recalling Nashville, that brings up another truly wild reverb technique...
Way back in the 1980s, Treasure Island Recorders had an adjustable _chamber_. Yep...you could change the T60 times in a free space! How this worked was really amazing: they'd taken a small room-sized space, lined that with glazed tile...in fact, you'd mistake it for a largish shower if it wasn't for the strange presence of a waterproof transducer and two hydrophones. These would dangle under the surface of the water, the level of which could be raised and lowered to adjust the time needed from a second-ish up to several seconds. The T60 response curve was really smooth, too; water can transfer sonic energy more effectively than air, and coupled with the faster speed of sound in water, this made for a chamber that could rival even the famous Capitol Studios chambers. Plus, the frequency response of both the transducer and hydrophones fell off greatly below about 200-300 Hz, which kept the boomier bass signals out by design. Might make for another interesting DIY reverb project later on!
This is a great project! I've been wanting to build a reverb of some type for a while, but spring seems a bit expensive for the quality of 'verb. Plate reverb emulations are my go-to anyway, and this one sounds fantastic!
Came for the reverb, stayed because you use Cubase. Cubase users are like the skater punks of the audio world. Nice verbage dude.
I assumed that was Reaper. But I am a Cubase user and I am all for your analogy lol.
Sungeon Dynth
Awesome, what version are you running? I'm still on 6.5 haha!
I like this project! I may have to build something similar. Thanks for doing this video!!!
I immediately had a couple ideas on improvements...
#1 on the mics, shield them as close to the mics as possible to get rid of that hum - if you HAVE to have any unshielded wire, twist them together (twisted pair reduces noise). You also might try adding a ground wire to the plate to shield one side - OR you could attach the mic between the plates (on the under-side of the plate), and ground both the plate and the frame to add additional shielding. It won't get it all, but it should get some/most...
#2 I would take a sander to the surface of that "plate" to get rid of the finish. You may get better high frequency without that black finish - the down side to that is that it may rust or oxidize, so you may have to replace the heavy finish with a really light lacquer or gun oil.
#3 Speaking of frequencies, a tone setting or graphic EQ on that driver amp may be a good thing as well.
#4 You probably already know that placement of the driver affects the sound, move it around to find the "sweet spots" and mark them. (do the same with the mics)
#5 because the drive is held in place by gravity, this type of set up need not be "ferrous" (iron or steel) - plates of different materials may be interesting to try - Aluminum, brass, or even plastic
Again, this was a wonderful video and a great idea, thanks for the inspiration!!!
Did you know that your voice kinda sounds like John Krasinski's? (He's Jim in The Office.) BTW very cool vid!
Great video... I would EQ the reverb signal, there seems to be a dominant frequency in there, around 1 or 2 K ... while it is a characteristic of most spring and plate reverbs to have such resonant peaks smothing it down could give a much smoother reverd. Well props to you well done...
Very nice try on this. Very simple and clever. Can I suggest you to try some cheap passive DI boxes between the piezos and your preamps? They would offer a better match of the impedances and I think reduce the hum. You might also reduce the length of your asymmetrical wires and box your amp to shield it, for the same purpose. Please make some follow-ups on that project.
Anyway, thanks for sharing.
The music sounds like what you're going through is a very sad story. If someone adds sighs to your narration, it would make it really sad.
I checked the video date due to that intro music bed, sounds like the facebook sad/happy story videos. I mean it made the presentation sound very dated. Props to an interesting video after that, though. The synth hackverb examples were by far the most interesting. More problem solving on the ground loop hum issues, I don't know anything about the transducer or the piezos.
You'd get better resonance out of it by hanging the plate vertically, rather than laying it horizontally. Letting the plate dangle will allow it to ring the way a bell does. Having it supported at all four corners is creating a built-in dampening.
Hello,
can someone who understands cabling add some explanation about what cables I need (3x RCA to Jack ?) and what I need to do on both ends of the cable ?
Thank you
Subscribed! /,,/
Wanna do this to my guitar tracks now
Awesome stuff Leo. I work for Tape Op magazine and saw this featured last year but I didn't remember to watch it until now.
I love Tape Op! Both the magazine and podcast are amazing. It's an honor for me to be mentioned there!
This is amazing!
Been doing something similar to this for a few years, just using a vibration speaker and contact mics (as well as other mics) to pass sounds through a selection of household objects (tables, tins, boxes, bathtubs, etc). I wasn't specifically aiming to create reverb so much as add some timbral variation in a nicely hands-on kinda way,. For me any reverb is just a bonus! Top tip; try covering the 'plate' with dried lentils to add distortion.
I mean, if you actually got a plate that sounds good, I bet this would sound just as nice as the nicest EMT 140's around. I've heard one being tapped by a finger in real life, and the sound of just that acoustic finger tap in the room with it not hooked up was BEAUTIFUL. Very full and complex. So if you can find a much bigger plate that sounds something like the real plates they used back in the day (should be possible to make or at least find cheaply), you should be getting the exact same sound, even though you wouldn't be able to tune it the way you did the old ones, unless you built a little mechanical system for that, or even did it manually.
Check my frieds cupboard hack, absolutely worth it: ua-cam.com/video/BxmNC15Lgio/v-deo.html
Nice work! Nice to meet you. Liked, subbed. I always wanted to do this with a great-sounding car door or something. That shelf sounds great! Of course, you could stick the entire rig in an isolation booth or an anechoic chamber, but that defeats the whole guerilla ethic behind the project. Great work here, sand a great demo! Thanks for sharing. The machining device looks fascinating too!
Well paced, excellent scripting and explanatory images, great audio -- WELL DONE!
Subscribed. A sound engineer with a CNC, you have my attention :)
UA-cam recommend me this and I dunno why. But this is one of the best recommendation hands down!
I keep seeing in the comments "you need to do this" "you need to make sure that" "it would be better if." Honestly, when it comes to cool effects, you don't have to do anything but what is available to you. The effect from this plate is really really cool on its own and is something I could totally see in a couple of mixes I'm working on right now.
Thanks for the kind words, Beau! I really don't mind the suggestions, though. I think it's kinda cool that people are engaging with the video so much. I was worried it was going to be crickets in the comments section... :)
5:44 beware of trademark infringements! 😄
Glad this was randomly suggested to me, super interesting video.
I really love this. I have some old telephones that I've been thinking of making into a reverb. I was wondering about springs but this is a much better idea.
How would you use telephones to make a reverb? Using the bells for the ringer?
The impedance problem is fairly simple to fix. Using either a FET, and output transformer or a D.I. box. Check documents on 'Contact Mics;. knowledge.lom.audio/research/contact_mics
Awesome video, dude!! Please make a IKEA Springverb too. I do prefer a spring reverb over plate reverbs
Nice idea. Maybe it can be even simpler. As far as I understand you don't really need the table only the plate (actually the plate is just a hassle as you try to avoid any contact with it). So why not just hang the plate from the ceiling with some fishing line sort of thing. I have similar setup with a transducer and resonant foam plates hanging...
WHERE ARE YOUR OTHER VIDEOS MAN? This one was truly fucking inspiring. I need your other eurorack videos if they exist... vimeo link or something?
This is awesome! Thanks for sharing cool stuff.
Awesome
So... just out of curiosity, why not use an actual speaker and mics?
Why piezo? ..and the transducer?
Again...just curious about the specific choices. I may actually build one of these.
Cool video! Thanks!
MAKE US IMPULSE RESPONSES WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
sweeps and spikes here: www.audioease.com/altiverb/sampling.php
place lots of weird objects on it, bath tub chain, rice, scarf etc
Man! I really thought IKEA was selling DIY plate reverb kits. They confirmed there was no such product.
Hi Leo !
I have another idea ...maybe stupid but who knows !! ....
Can you replicate this project but instead of metal ikea, use a big bass drum head like standard ones or maybe those huge ones used on Football School
bands ???
Sound could be good but darker I guess or how about using a very large thin old XRAY film stretched over a wood rectangle or a big 4x8 galvanized metal sheet stretched over a 4x8 wood rectangle ?? ...and that definitely won't weigh 600 pounds more or less 95 pounds is my guess !!!
Please do this other DIY plate reverb or could it be called Drum skin reverb ??
and lastly ....How about using a Timpani drum as a surface drum reverb ??
Cool maybe ??
It's funny, that it's actually that simple & companies ask you for hundreds of dollars for plug-ins & even more for hardware:D
just found out your channel, very clean and enjoyable. keep the good work going
Great video! I'm curious about the amp between the interface and the transducer - anywhere you would recommend looking for instructions on how to make one? Or would something like this product -- (www.adafruit.com/product/987) -- get the job done? The one in the link is a 3.7W class D stereo amplifier based on the LM386 amps
Brilliant idea! You just gave me my next weekend build! Also, thought this simple preamp could come in handy to anyone working with piezos like these: www.stompville.co.uk/shop/34-phantom-piezo-preamp-v2.html . Works like a charm and the difference it makes to these cheap components is unbelievable.
living in a huge iron-like building ( I think it is alluminium) with a recording space down below.... I imagine how to make this a huge plate since I have 6 18" inch speakers... learned a lot about the 2 plates connection. I usually got my effect from resonating one plate. I will need another whole life for only mess around with this analogue plug-in. thanks for the
godspeed push
innovative and fun...huge potential for development as you say...the original plug in reverb ahem.
Would there have been enough tension on the plate for it to function if you cut along the frame of the plate but left a bit of the corners intact?
What's the name of thr music you are using for the first half of the video? Does Anyone know? I have been searching since may 2018- please help
I'm partial to a good spring-reverb tank myself. Plate 'verb just sounds too "vintage" for my liking, considering that I only use reverb to spice up leads and clean lines. Plate reverbs are good for that Dick Dale type Surf sound, but for metal, it's all but useless. Too many clashing transients and whatnot... It doesn't help that I hate how mushy and warbly plate reverb sounds to my ears.
I'm wondering ... Do you hear sound fron the transducer onto the plate? If so will it be loud?
2x speed is a great idea and slow it down...
I noticed the cloth to change the plate sound and i was thinking.
Why not put an extra solid plate on top and add some kind of piston you can push down with a rotary handle ( knob ) . . Just turn the knob to change sound... 😂🤣
Very nice project ... Well done 👍
Found your video on Reddit today. Instant sub from me!! Any chance you’re gonna make a tutorial on how to make good pickup mics? For noobs mind you :D
I’m going to build one, it’s fun and interesting, also i’m subscribing to your chanel, hope more fascinating projects
Cheaper still, just buy one plate, some wire, and screw in hooks. Screw the hooks into the ceiling, and glue the transducer and pickups to the plate. This _might_ even resonate better. Never know. You could even hang that up in your attic and run some lines to it.
Fantastic video though. Really well done.
Cool. But the snare reverb sounds like your just smacking the table 😂
6:24 starting to get into some of the earlier The Crystal Method sound!
It sounds really terrible, if you're going to go to the trouble of DIYing it, why not get a much bigger and better piece of metal as your plate? But as a proof of concept, it's cool, now go to v2 and try to get it sounding decent!
wonder what would happen to the sustain if the plate was suspended rather than coupled or rubber feet isolating the unit from the ground in a vibrational sense. also wonder what the difference between a contact mic and a guitar pickup would make, aside from the guitar pickup probably needing an amp.
It would be interesting if architects would start working more with sound, ambience and soundscapes. Imagine a room where everything sounds like you're in a wide open space and which uses microphones and speakers to convert the room. And uses light and maybe smells too.
Removing the powder coating might get a brighter sound.
Sounds pretty good. But to me it's a little dark sounding.
Might even get a longer delay time.
What i heard is that placing the inducers not a at the half mark, but at 2/5 (in both directions) it will vibrate better making the volume on low and high piches more equal. The chanel "Tech Ingredients:" has an awesome video about this topic.
Very cool build. You could experiment by putting some keys, grains of rice, screws or bits of cutlery on top of the plate to see how that affects the sound. Maybe give it some shimmer or sound terrible. Just a thought.
I am not into music at all, but I think this is very interesting. Wouldn't it be better to hang the plate just from 2 strings? It would swing and vibrate freely and you could hang weights off of that to dampen it, or lower the resonance frequency.
Wonder if the woo crowd of audiophiles could latch on to this and start to deride people who use plates that aren't either titanium stripped off of an ex-spacecraft or gold plated brass.