trying to do "aux sends" from a few tracks

This is my first try in trying to optimize my system by making several tracks go through the same reverb by doing the auxiliary send thing.

I made an Send 1 bus in the console and then put a reverb plugin in the Send bus. I then assigned a few tracks to this bus. I managed to get the reverb effect, but i was also getting some sort of echo. I even tried turning the Send on and off and the echo still continued. I closed up the session without saving and tried again. Same results.
Any ideas. I am sure i am doing something wrong.

Thanks
Kristen

I then assigned a few tracks to this bus.

If you are trying to use a true aux "send", and not just a bus with reverb on it, the outputs of the audio tracks should NOT be routed to the send bus. Instead, the reverb wet/dry mix should be set to 100% wet (no dry at all). You should see a "send" widget with bus assignment, pre/post button, send level and panning controls. If you don't have this in your track pane, right click and "Insert Send>"Bus_Name". Then use the send level to determine how much signal is sent to the bus (i.e., how much reverb you hear on each track). HTH.

Sometimes when you enable o bus while the project is playing it will cause this echo. If you just stop the project and play it again, it will be gone
Cj

Thanks for the tips. Will work on it. I don't remember which reverb plugins i used. I tried a few with the same results. BUT I am pretty sure that when I put the same reverb plug-in in the effects bin of the track (without doing the send stuff) it worked fine. I will check the predelay settings and try doing it again in the tracks effect bin and then try doing it in the send effects bin.


<<<<If you are trying to use a true aux "send", and not just a bus with reverb on it, the outputs of the audio tracks should NOT be routed to the send bus. Instead, the reverb wet/dry mix should be set to 100% wet (no dry at all). You should see a "send" widget with bus assignment, pre/post button, send level and panning controls. If you don't have this in your track pane, right click and "Insert Send>"Bus_Name". Then use the send level to determine how much signal is sent to the bus (i.e., how much reverb you hear on each track). >>>>>

This above part I am confused about, but I'll bet it has something to do with the problem. Whats the difference between a bus and a true aux "send".



Thanks
Kristen

Jim, thanks for the explanation. But I don't understand why someone would want to apply reverb (or any effect) in the "pre" stage before there is any volume. You wouldn't be able to hear it, right? It seems to me that if I did the "pre" fader setting I would have the normal dry output mixed with the reverb from a bus that has no volume at all. Post makes more sense since it would apply reverb to what i am hearing already. But it ("post") can also be why i am hearing an echo. Does that make sense? I will try working on this again this evening.

Would it be possible for someone to send me a small working sonar file that has, for example, three audio tracks with maybe 1 sec of audio and one midi track (optional) which are all sending to the same bus with a reverb on it (like the basic cakewalk reverb). From that I should be able to get the basic idea, and also figure out what I am doing wrong.
There doesn’t even have to be any audio on the track, I can just drag audio clips onto it.
If it works, I can use it as an example or a template.

Thanks
Kristen

Hi Kristen-

I wrote an article on my blog about using Sonar's buses and one section has instructions on how to set up an effects bus for reverb like you are trying to do. It's got some screenshots and flow charts, which may help clarify things. There's also some discussion about pre/post fader and different situations where you would want to use each. Take a look and let me know if you've got more questions.

Dave

I looked at the diagrams and the pictures and was able to set it up. Oddly I didn't get any echoes at all while trying to do this (with the same effects I tried other day). The flow diagrams and pictures helped a lot. All the explanations I received make more sense. Now that i have some kind of working baseline, I can try and duplicate the echo problem so I really understand what i did wrong.

I see now how the sound will go through the effect with the pre setting and not be affected at all by the volume fader, whereas the post worked well with the fader. Since I had big changes in volume in one track, the pre setting would never work, because when the volume level was set to be barely audible, the "pre" volume level was still heard above this. Switching to post made all the difference. So I suppose the question would now be "Since the pre setting doesn't work well for a channel with big swings in volume, under what circumstances would someone want to use the pre setting at all"?

Thanks To everyone who has helped. I am finally starting to "get it". Hopefully I can also remember it.

Kristen

I tries this ducking with a vocal and guitar track. I experimented to get a drastic change with guitar volume almost dropping to zero when the singing came in. Then tweaked the guitar volume so that only a very volume subtle change was heard.

VERY NICE FEATURE!

How would you work it so that several instruments would become lower (very subtle) in volume when the singing come in? Put a separate compressor in each of the tracks you want to be affected and sidechain the vocal into each one? I don't think you could just use one compressor on a bus and link everything to it, could you?

Thanks for the tip. I like it.
Kristen