Newbie Questions for polishing sound -Sound Forge - PC

Subject:Newbie Questions for polishing sound Posted by: raku Date:11/20/2003 7:03:41 PM Hi, I have made some field recordings of singing and instrumental music in outdoor settings while travelling using a minidisc recorder and a decent stereo mic system. I am in the process of transfering the recordings to my hard drive using 96,000 Hz and 24 bit stereo settings. Eventually I will remaster them to 44/16 for burning cds. So far, I have just put in fade ins/outs and edited down to the stuff I really like. What I would like to do is polish the recordings so the sound sounds as good as possible. I have a few questions: Are there any effects or remastering tips which I might find really valuable for these types of recordings? Is there any way to edit out the occasional truck going by, the cough or the diesel generator?! There are a couple of instances where volume exceeded the recording level potential so the sound becomes slightly distorted -- any thing i can do to fix this? Finally, after setting up SF6 for recording, it usually takes about 15 seconds or so for the mouse to unfreeze and the red recoding indicator to start blinking (then there is no problem after this and never any problem with the recording but it won't begin recording the sound right away) -- any suggestions? I am using a Creative Extigy and line-in from my MiniDisc. Thanks a lot for any tips in advance. -Raku
Subject:RE: Newbie Questions for polishing sound Reply by: jumbuk Date:11/20/2003 10:03:19 PM The Sonic Foundry Noise reduction plugin contains several very good applications to help you with this. IMO, the SF Noise Reduction plugin is as good as some of the more expensive ones available through Steinberg etc. SF 7 has a couple of options for dealing with overload distortion and crackle removal. You can also use the SF noise gate. You can usually manually edit out coughs etc if they are on their own in between the music. If they are simultaneous with the music - good luck! You might try to copy in a small piece of audio from another part of the song which is clean, and crossfade the edges. One thing to watch - don't drop all of the background noise to zero between the audio you want to keep. The ear will notice when the noise disappears and returns - probably better to keep a bit of "room noise" to maintain the ambience. You can try judicious EQ, an expander or multi-band compression, but it's pretty hard to get rid of the noise without ruining the feel of the recording. I find that EQing below about 50 Hz with a very sharp rolloff (ie a high-pass filter) will get rid of a lot of rumble and traffic noise. Hope this helps!
Subject:RE: Newbie Questions for polishing sound Reply by: Rednroll Date:11/21/2003 6:08:14 AM Why are you recording at 24bit 96Khz? Have extra hard drive and processing power to waste? Been told 24/96 is the best from the litature on the creative box? What did the mini disc record at? Most I've seen record at 32Khz/16bit or newer ones at 44.1Khz. In other words using 24/96 at this point is reaaly pointless. You might want to read up on "The Nyquist Theorem" and "Quantization error", so you can better understand what those numbers mean.
Subject:RE: Newbie Questions for polishing sound Reply by: rraud Date:11/21/2003 5:23:29 PM In addition to Jumbuk and Red's remarks. I would be concerned with your transfer to PC. Most portable MDs do not have a digital out. If you have to convert though a sound card, get one made specifically for pro-audio.

Subject:Newbie Questions for polishing sound

Posted by: raku

Date:11/20/2003 7:03:41 PM

Hi, I have made some field recordings of singing and instrumental music in outdoor settings while travelling using a minidisc recorder and a decent stereo mic system.

I am in the process of transfering the recordings to my hard drive using 96,000 Hz and 24 bit stereo settings. Eventually I will remaster them to 44/16 for burning cds. So far, I have just put in fade ins/outs and edited down to the stuff I really like.

What I would like to do is polish the recordings so the sound sounds as good as possible.
I have a few questions:

Are there any effects or remastering tips which I might find really valuable for these types of recordings?

Is there any way to edit out the occasional truck going by, the cough or the diesel generator?!

There are a couple of instances where volume exceeded the recording level potential so the sound becomes slightly distorted -- any thing i can do to fix this?

Finally, after setting up SF6 for recording, it usually takes about 15 seconds or so for the mouse to unfreeze and the red recoding indicator to start blinking (then there is no problem after this and never any problem with the recording but it won't begin recording the sound right away) -- any suggestions?

I am using a Creative Extigy and line-in from my MiniDisc.
Thanks a lot for any tips in advance.
-Raku

Subject:RE: Newbie Questions for polishing sound

Reply by: jumbuk

Date:11/20/2003 10:03:19 PM

The Sonic Foundry Noise reduction plugin contains several very good applications to help you with this. IMO, the SF Noise Reduction plugin is as good as some of the more expensive ones available through Steinberg etc.

SF 7 has a couple of options for dealing with overload distortion and crackle removal. You can also use the SF noise gate.

You can usually manually edit out coughs etc if they are on their own in between the music. If they are simultaneous with the music - good luck! You might try to copy in a small piece of audio from another part of the song which is clean, and crossfade the edges.

One thing to watch - don't drop all of the background noise to zero between the audio you want to keep. The ear will notice when the noise disappears and returns - probably better to keep a bit of "room noise" to maintain the ambience.

You can try judicious EQ, an expander or multi-band compression, but it's pretty hard to get rid of the noise without ruining the feel of the recording. I find that EQing below about 50 Hz with a very sharp rolloff (ie a high-pass filter) will get rid of a lot of rumble and traffic noise.

Hope this helps!

Subject:RE: Newbie Questions for polishing sound

Reply by: Rednroll

Date:11/21/2003 6:08:14 AM

Why are you recording at 24bit 96Khz? Have extra hard drive and processing power to waste? Been told 24/96 is the best from the litature on the creative box? What did the mini disc record at? Most I've seen record at 32Khz/16bit or newer ones at 44.1Khz. In other words using 24/96 at this point is reaaly pointless. You might want to read up on "The Nyquist Theorem" and "Quantization error", so you can better understand what those numbers mean.

Subject:RE: Newbie Questions for polishing sound

Reply by: rraud

Date:11/21/2003 5:23:29 PM

In addition to Jumbuk and Red's remarks.
I would be concerned with your transfer to PC. Most portable MDs do not have a digital out. If you have to convert though a sound card, get one made specifically for pro-audio.