Dry versus Wet

Have you heard of those silent rooms, where they test speakers and microphones ? They're great if you don't happen to be inside of one. After a few minutes you hear the blood in your ears roar like an ocean. You hear only your inner voice when you speak. The room swallows almost everything else. Most people can't stand being in a room like this for more than 10-15 minutes. I am told that this is very different to wearing ear plugs. Those only attenuate sound from the outside. A silent room kills it completly.

This room is horrible to listen to, because it basically features no room reverberation, i.e. it doesn't reflect anything at all. It doesn't reveal any information about its size or surface composition.

You may be surprised to know that many vocals are actually recorded in similar enviroments. Vocal booths are little rooms, in which the walls reflect sound as little as possible. During mixing, digital reverbs are used to create a virtual space.

Digital Reverbs

Audacity for Windows and MacOS8&X includes the VST plugin Freeverb, which is one fine reverb, and idealy suited to take your first steps with digital reverbs. It features simple controls that require little explanation.

For details about Freeverb, check out the effects menu page. For information on how digital reverbs work and what reverb is, check out this page of this manual.

Keeping effects on seperate tracks

You shouldn't use reverbs on original audio tracks. First duplicate the audio and use the reverb on that duplicate. The reverb should be set to output 100% WET (i.e. 100% effect signal and 0% of the original signal). That way, you can control how much reverb should make it in to the final mix, right up until the last minute.