AAVA Review
Viiri Audio sent me a copy of their Aava reverb plugin and asked me to make some presets. Aava is a convolution reverb that allows you to actually modulate the start and end points of the reverb IR. On most convolution reverbs this control isn’t even able to be automated, let alone modulated, so being able to modulate these settings is quite unique. Aava also allows for up to four IRs at the same time so you can mix and match different characteristics.
It’s rare for me to review reverbs, but Aava finds its self in a fairly unrivaled category being a “creative-reverb”. I’m using the “creative” labelling to denote that a plugin goes beyond the typical controls of the given effect category and adds things like modulation and other modifiers that push it into more experimental sound designer territories. I really dig the UI, it has a weird older feel with the grey orange and teal, but it oddly works and feels modern. It looks like something Logic would use for a factory plugin.
Automating convolution reverb controls is the obvious selling point of this reverb, but it comes at a bit of a catch. The “refresh rate” control determines how fast the engine updates. This means you will end up with stepped audio changes as the engine updates. However, you can set this to a really fast rate, up to 1ms, which basically smooths things out, but this can be taxing on your CPU. Aava allows you to set this refresh rate yourself and even use modulation up into audio rate range for some very unique effects, but again, it will eat up a lot of CPU. I don’t normally comment on CPU, but you will definitely want to resample this for some of the crazier experiments.
The reverb engines are pretty simple, you get control over the pitch, tone, and stereo width of each IR, and of course the start and end points of the IR as well. There is also key tracking and tempo sync for each IR which opens up a few more uses that you don’t really find in other reverbs. The four modulators can be mapped to any control, they have options for LFOs, sample hold randomizers, and envelope followers. The LFOs can go into audio rate territory, but this does rely on faster refresh rates. Audio rate modulation of the pitch and start time lead to some really neat tones.
Finally there’s an “explore” window that lets you play around with morphing presets. if you move the cursor to a new location, and adjust any control, that control setting will be recorded to a new node at that location. The settings between each node are interpolated allowing you to morph between various settings. I found this system can be great for creating landscapes of different reverb qualities, but it kind of becomes a hinderance if you’re looking to adjust a control universally across all nodes. For example, lets say you map out a few nodes that are fun, but then you want to adjust the wet/dry balance of the whole plugin, this new wet dry balance will be recorded to a new node instead. It’s not the worst workflow issue, but I do think some way to lock out certain controls could be useful.
That said, being able to create a variety of preset states and just blend between them is really fun. I tried to utilize this in most of my presets, giving users something to play with when exploring the factory content. I’m always a bit frustrated when plugins include a fun “play” function like this, but don’t utilize it in the factory content.
While I don’t use a variety of reverbs all that often, I can definitely see myself breaking out Aava for creative space design. Using rhythms and odd sounds as impulse responses has been a long standing sound design technique. Being that this technique requires the use of reverbs as well as special samples designed for this use, I tend to avoid exploring it as much as I’d like. The creative nature of Aava inspires me to play around with this technique more often, especially considering all the available modulation that allows you to explore this method further. As with all first time plugin developers, I’m curious to see what Viiri audio works on next.
You can pick up Aava from Viiri Audio’s website here: https://viiri-audio.com/