Two Are Gathered

Wherever two or more are gathered so too is the divine. While we are not quite presumptuous enough to claim we have achieved divinity with B2, we do attest that there is something undeniably magical that happens when its dual-engine architecture is put to use. The results are more than double the fun; there is a synergy that occurs that adds an extra level of hyper-realism and unprecedented detail. B2's dual engine design augments its modularity by allowing both engines to have completely independent settings and be configured in a vast number of possible structures. B2 can be configured in the classic Early Reflections plus Late Reflections model to achieve results similar to Aether. Alternatively, Engine A can be Cascaded into the Engine B to achieve incredibly dense impulse responses with arbitrary envelopes. Dynamics processing can be used to automatically crossfade between two different parallel spaces. Yet another possibility is to use B2 as a discrete four-engine device to achieve unparalleled control over the behavior of inter-channel stereo cross-talk to achieve precise spatialization in classical sound-stage and scoring applications. These are but a few examples. The possibilities are enough to make your head explode, but fret not, as you need only to learn to master one set of controls. After that you can think about how to make them work together as a pair by following the examples provided in our immense collection of well organized presets.

No Straight Lines

Straight lines are boring. Even exponential growth and decay is old-fashion. We live in a non-linear world. Most interesting musical and acoustic systems exhibit various non-linearities and inconsistencies that give them unique character and interesting attributes and this is oftentimes why we tend to fall in love with them. A non-linear reverb can be non-linear in many different ways technically. It may have an abruptly gated or otherwise altered decay envelope as we discuss below in the Fluid Dynamics section. It may exhibit various harmonic distortions as we discuss in the Maximum Attitude section. Extreme modulation settings may induce their own non-linearities as is also possible with B2.

In the context of this section however, when we speak of non-linear design we are talking specifically about the time distribution of the delays within the reverb and their relative amplitudes. These aspects contribute to the overall character of the reverb both in the time domain and in the spectral domain. B2's Geometry controls define the nature of these relationships and give it part of its unique character. Other developers tend to choose static settings for these types of parameters and do not expose them to the user. Sometimes a small set of these parameters are marketed as different "algorithms" where one configuration may be labeled a hall, and other may be a chamber or a plate. B2 is not confined to such limitations. Instead its Range, Random, and Curve controls define it's delay distribution, and it's Contour control defines the relative amplitude of these delays using any of twelve different methods.

The various combinations of these parameters together with B2's density mode options allow an incredibly diverse set of possible geometries. For all intents and purposes, the range of possibilities is effectively infinite. When combined with B2's Cascade function in its dual-engine mode the results are even more diverse and powerful. Instead of wasting more words in an attempt to explain the possibilities, take a look above at a random sampling of delay distributions from 30 or so B2 presets. A picture truly is worth a thousand words. This begs the obvious question: so how does this all sound? Well that is for you to decide. We know what we think about it.

Full Body

Many inferior reverb designs suffer from insufficient density both in the time domain and in the spectral domain. Insufficient density in the time domain leads to uncontrollable and undesirable granularization of the early reflections and reverb tail. In other words, discrete delays are able to be perceived instead of a smooth flow of energy as generally occurs in real-world acoustic space. This leads to problems like chatter and fluttering and can be strongly objectionable on material with fast transients. In the spectral domain insufficient density leads to an uneven frequency response and irregular decay times which can be perceived as sounding metallic. Paradoxically these two goals are often opposed to one another: sparse delays in the time domain can often lead to flatter frequency responses in many reverb designs. In some regards the ideal impulse response for an artificial reverb is similar to exponentially enveloped white noise. This has its applications but generally speaking is a rather plain-vanilla solution and gets boring quite quickly.

The ultimate goal is to achieve a full-bodied response that has just the right amount of density to suit the needs of the source material while at the same time maintaining some unique character to add interest. B2's four Density options and Cascade control are designed to achieve these goals. B2's new Nano Density mode is not sufficient to achieve high quality reverberation on its own, but it can be quite interesting for granular and delay-based special effects when using large sizes. B2's new Extreme Density mode produces maximum density almost instantaneously with an unmatched convergence towards white noise. Cascading one engine into another using various settings can achieve a virtually limitless range of novel responses that cover the needs of any conceivable sound source.

Maximum Attitude

Cleanliness is next to godliness and we go much further than anyone else currently on the market to achieve obsessively pristine signal fidelity in our algorithms as explained in the quality tab above. That being said, sometimes it's just down right fun to get dirty, and being the extremists that we are, if we are going to go there you can bet we are not going to pull any punches. B2 offers 33 different ways to saturate, squeeze, spectrally shift, mangle, strangle, torment, decimate, destroy, warp, shred, bit-crush, and generally mess up your audio. Sometimes in order to create, you must first destroy.

The Attitude module may be placed in four different routing positions within the signal chain. Output positions generally give more severe results as they also cause intermodulation distortion in the reverb tail. Gentle saturation modes can give a sonic character similar to the imperfections of various classical hardware devices that had to deal with electrical engineering issues such as poor power supplies and other real-world things we don't claim to fully understand all the details of. Extreme Attitude settings work best on drums, basses, monophonic leads, and synth pads with few transients. They offer some uniquely twisted timbres suitable for aggressive styles of modern music production and we offer several preset folders dedicated to this end. They are unlikely to find application in your latest string quartet, but fear not, because if you simply disable the Attitude control or substantially reduce the knob value and accept humility, you will quickly ascend through the nine levels of the inferno and return to paradise.

Fluid Dynamics

When many people think of the classic non-linear reverb designs of the 80s, the first thing that comes to mind is the now infamous gated reverb sound that was much lauded at the time as an instant ticket to percussive greatness. Gating the output of the reverb allowed producers to use huge size and RT60 time settings to make snare drums and other percussive elements larger than life while at the same time not cluttering the entire mix with an omnipresent layer of damped white noise. The gated reverb sound of the 80s defined the decade almost as much as the haircuts and muscle-cars. B2 offers a world class dynamics section that is more than capable of reveling in this nostalgia while at the same time offering a large grab-bag of novel tricks and treats that may be destined to one day become equally as lauded, then despised, and eventually born anew in the decades to come.

The B2 dynamics section is competitive with industry-leading 3rd party stand-alone dynamics processors and is capable of achieving gating, downward expansion, compression, ducking, envelope manipulation, and transient processing all with extreme precision and clarity. Moreover, due to the extreme, 10-second maximum attack and release times, B2 is capable of achieving auto-gain-riding behavior that can achieve dynamic changes in the wet-dry mix as well as the A/B engine balance. Additionally B2 offers an advanced relative dynamics mode that allows the dynamics processing to follow micro level changes within musical phrases instead of being limited to a static threshold. Finally all modes may be applied to the input signal, the output signal, or may be applied to the output while listening to the input side-chain to achieve more precise behavior for percussive material to achieve rhythmic based effects such as pumping and ducking.

Modular Me

Did you ever wonder what a narrow band-pass filter sent into non-linear distortion would sound like inside a feedback loop? How about applying a relative gate to the input signal which cuts out softer notes followed by a side-chained output gate that abruptly chops off the reverb tails? An oversampled one-zero comb filter used to achieve a very gentle linear-phase damping characteristic running in parallel with a more drastically low-passed setting that also uses a different modulation method to add additional perceived depth? Well, we did -- along with many other freaky things that may or may not be just what you need to stand out from the crowd in your next project.

B2's anything-goes, science-experiment-esque modus operandi is in some ways more in line with the design of the great modular analog synthesizers of the past than it is with more traditional reverb designs such as Aether. We implore those curious at heart to try everything and anything. Advanced preset designers can achieve complex routings that are made even more interesting by B2's various non-linear behaviors.

Of course the modular design also offers opportunities to improve efficiency and save CPU cycles. CPU usage in B2 varies drastically depending on the various modes selected as well as which modules are enabled, and current quality settings. When a given module is disabled, it does not consume any CPU cycles. Furthermore, oversampling in B2 can optionally be defined per-preset, in which case multiple instances can run at different oversampling ratios. This allows a bunch of instances to run as track inserts without any oversampling, while using one or two on send busses with higher oversampling to be used as the main reverbs for the project. This leads to a very intelligent design in terms of CPU usage where efficiency is maximized and you pay for only what you use.

Miscellaneous Magic

B2's bag of tricks does not end there. It offers several other interesting design features including:

• • Diverse, unique, and bountiful filter options
• • An advanced "Conservation Of Energy" scheme
• • Special extreme stereo modes
• • Distortion, Dynamics, and EQ-only modes
• • Optional global saturation and soft-limiting
• • Novel FX presets such as diffusing delays