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Old 12-22-2014, 06:12 PM   #1
caesura
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Default Is there any way to improve this audio in terms of clarity and reverb removal?

Hi guys,

I've an almost impossible job to do on a documentary trailer I'm editing at the moment in terms of the talking heads/voice overs.

Basically somewhere along the way the original Zoom & AT recordings of the audio for almost all of the interviews disappeared and I was left with only what the mic on the camcorders picked up in what were already very reverby environments...you can hear from the results below that the audio is pretty awful and although I've tried cleaning it up in both Reaper and Adobe Audition it still ended up sounding pretty bad (instead of the muddy and reverby combination the mic originally caught, the fixed up version just sounds boomy and reverby.)

I've attached a link to some samples of the original recordings and can attach a link to the ones I treated with Reaper and Audition.

Are these rescuable at all?

Normally with audio this compromised I'd just organise a bit of ADR but it's not an option on this as this was a documentary.

Anyway i'd appreciate any and all tips advice and pointers on this as nothing I've done so far seems to be working.
Thanks!

https://soundcloud.com/modestmagnet/...ilwav1/s-LLzYI
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Old 12-22-2014, 08:04 PM   #2
clepsydrae
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I think the hiss and hum/buzz would actually be pretty easy to get rid of, if you have a pile of cash to spend on something like iZotope RX (or another modern denoiser -- there are doubtless cheaper ones out there.)

With ReaFIR you could probably get about half the hiss out (in my experience) before artifacts from the removal would appear. The hum on the first sounds like it moves around a bit, but you might be able to notch it out. The buzz in the second might be tougher.

I can't recall if RX 4 can de-reverb as well, but it might, and the fact that you're talking about dialog in an otherwise quiet space makes that easier. Oh, yes, it does, in the even-more-expensive "advanced" edition: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwZgFoowu2U

With this kind of stuff it's sometimes just a matter of spending the $ to get the tool to get the job done.

I'm not aware of free tools that come close, but i bet you could get halfway there if you researched a bunch and carefully tweaked. See http://bedroomproducersblog.com/ and/or http://kvraudio.com/.

Last edited by clepsydrae; 12-23-2014 at 12:55 AM.
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Old 12-22-2014, 08:06 PM   #3
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You also could make the audio downloadable and make a contest out of it and see if forum users will do it for you. :-)

Or offer someone US$50 to run it through RX 4. (I don't have RX 4, myself.)
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Old 12-23-2014, 02:49 AM   #4
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Maybe download NI`s TRansient Master demo and check it out.
It is also able to fix muddy recordings or reduce reverb

http://www.native-instruments.com/en...nsient-master/

Well, ReaFir can indeed cause too artificial results, IMHO.
Best gate/noise surpressor I know was Waves X-Noise as for hum/noise reduction,
we used it in PT, but PT is past.
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Old 12-23-2014, 02:53 AM   #5
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Acon deverberate would be cheaper than IzotopeRX.
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Old 12-23-2014, 06:25 PM   #6
caesura
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Thanks a million for the pointers guys!

I'm absolutely potless at the moment so I'm hoping either something already available in Reaper or Adobe Audition will do the job (or as well as possible), or that I can source some free software.

I've tried a couple of the noise removal options in Audition (i'm subscribing to Adobe CC hence the lack of funds) but to be honest I've only been using it for a while but from what I've researched, the tweeking I've done there is pretty much what everyone suggests in relation to Audition for this fix.

I'll give ReaFIR shot and see how I get on with that but if as you all say it's likely to cause artifacts half-way through then it's probably going to be less powerful than the one I've used in Audition.

I've seen De-Verb from SPL mentioned a lot have any of you heard any good things about it.

I'll check out for Demo versions of IzotopeRX4 and Transient Master and Acon Deverberate as well as those links for possible free options.

If you have any other thoughts I'd be grateful to hear them.
Thanks again
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Old 12-23-2014, 09:59 PM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by caesura View Post
I'll check out for Demo versions of IzotopeRX4 and Transient Master and Acon Deverberate as well as those links for possible free options.
Oh, yeah, right! IIRC, the demo version of RX process normally, and is just time limited (meaning, it expires after X days but doesn't inject noise or whatever into the output), so I think you can use the program fully featured for your project. See if you can get the demo of RX 4 Advanced, so you'd have access to the de-reverb... if you can, you're golden.

That demo ploy works; I now lust after RX, after the demo saved some of my audio.
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Old 12-26-2014, 08:29 PM   #8
caesura
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Quote:
Originally Posted by clepsydrae View Post
Oh, yeah, right! IIRC, the demo version of RX process normally, and is just time limited (meaning, it expires after X days but doesn't inject noise or whatever into the output), so I think you can use the program fully featured for your project. See if you can get the demo of RX 4 Advanced, so you'd have access to the de-reverb... if you can, you're golden.

That demo ploy works; I now lust after RX, after the demo saved some of my audio.
Great will do...did you just try it there yourself? I'll def try it out if it saved some audio for you...hopefully it'll do the same for me!
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Old 12-26-2014, 10:35 PM   #9
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Quote:
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Great will do...did you just try it there yourself? I'll def try it out if it saved some audio for you...hopefully it'll do the same for me!
It was a year or so ago, but my memory is that I had to rescue a recording of myself playing solo piano that had a lot of buzz in the background (from a bad cable or laptop power supply or something), and that I DL'ed the demo of RX 3, and that it worked great and had no restrictions other than the fact that it expired in X number of days.
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