Time based effects - Posted on 2015-04-01 by Alexander Schug

The most obvious time based effect is delay. Delay is playing back an audio signal at desired intervals giving off an echo like effect. There are several different kinds of delays. Tape delays is an earlier style of the effect which works with the difference in space between the play and the record head on the tape machine. Another type of delay is circuit delay which works by slowing the signal down using electronic circuits. There are DSP delays which helped not take up as much room in your computer. DSP was installed into early digital systems. Now you can simply just get a delay plugin of any sort and simply get the effect straight out of your DAW that contains the plugins. You can get a plugin for anything. Delays of course have perameters so you can adjust how the delay sounds. Delay time is a perameter that allows you to put how much time is between the original sound and the delayed copy. You can determine that with miliseconds or musical subdivisions. Feedback nob intensifies the effect by sending the delayed signal back to the input. Depth pretty much allows you to choose how much the LFO is working and the Speed nob tells you how fast the LFO is. Mix fader allows you to choose how much the overall effect is taking place on your sound. Another based time effect is Reverberation which is just a whole bunch of differently spaced delays taking place giving off a wider more ambient effect. Reverb can give your sound depth and just the ambience of it is very pleasant to hear if used correctly. Reverb use to be created in these rooms called echo chambers which consisted of giant medal plates bouncing sound out and back in. This type of reverb is called Plated reverb. Plated reverb has a very metallic sound to it. There is another kind of reverb called spring reverb which works just like plated reverb where vibrations are transmitted through metal but using metal springs. There are also Hall reverbs and room reverbs which work just by simply using the acoustics of the space itself.  Of course there are digital reverbs. All different kinds of reverb plugins exist. There are perameters for reverb in order for you to acheive the sound you like. Roomtype is where the sound is moving around in. Density is how saturated the reverb is. Predelay is how much time goes by before the effect takes place. Decay is how much time it takes for the reverb to stop. You can have spread which controls the stereo spread of the effect and you can also EQ the effect. There are all sorts of time based effects like Flanging which gives you this whispy swirling effect. Chorus is another effect which is pretty much doubling the signal and there is also phasing which can give this airy whispy feel. I tend to use reverb and delays alot when i make music to give of a certain vibe.