I’ve been cleaning up clitches recently using Soundforge 7 (crap I know but Wavelab causes freeze problems with my PC).

When I use the pen to smooth out spikes and flat tops, it would be great if it could also average out the wave rather than just let me draw anything and make it worse and require undo. I’m wondering what can be done with other programs. How advanced are the actions for these kind of jobs?

Thanks

I've never really got on with Sound Forge. I'd suggest you take a look at Adobe Audition for decent de-clicking tools and a whole host of other features. If you want really high quality de-clicking and noise reduction then you could also take a look at Izotope's RX2 which is on special offer at the moment.

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

+1 for James' recommendation of izotope RX


Martin

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YewTreeMagic

Thanks. Are these just fancy equalisers really?

RX has a visual spectrum analyser where you can literally paint out offending noises etc - it's really rather impressive...

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Web Design ~
Drum Studio

I think any decent editor will have spectrum analysis and error correction.

Hmm... Shouldn't you just try to get Wavelab to work if you already have it? What kind of issues are you experiencing? How do you make it freeze?

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I'm All Ears.

Quote Josif A. Soterίou:

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I’ve been cleaning up clitches recently using Soundforge 7

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When it comes to editing out glitches, nothing works as well as Reaper. Izotope's NR packages are really good and even the budget priced ones are excellent.

Soundforge 7 is now so old (10 years? 8 Years?) that you will be amazed at what is on offer from just about everybody - even Soundforge 10 is sort of OK for some of this work.

Quote The Red Bladder:

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When it comes to editing out glitches, nothing works as well as Reaper for me.

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Fixed that for you.

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I'm All Ears.

Sony now have their own dedicated spectral editing package.

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/spectralayerspro

Quote Josif A. Soterίou:

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Thanks. Are these just fancy equalisers really?

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No, they're much smarter than than. Basically they look at the audio either side of the glitch and substitute something sensible instead of the glitch.

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

Quote ken long:

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Quote The Red Bladder:

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When it comes to editing out glitches, nothing works as well as CEDAR's bureau service, but Reaper works well enough for me.

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Fixed that for you.

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Ditto.

Quote Mixedup:

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Quote ken long:

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Quote The Red Bladder:

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When it comes to editing out glitches, nothing works as well as CEDAR's bureau service, but Reaper works well enough for me.

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Fixed that for you.

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Ditto.

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I get the distinct impression that someone is trying to jerk my chain. Well, let me tell you, I shall ignore you all and go back to rubbing Sudocream into my testicles.

I don't think CEDAR provide anything distinctly different anymore. What they do have is expertise. So yes, go ahead and pay them a fortune to remove clicks or use just about any decent editor and DIY and you will achieve the same results. As an aside, Sudocream is not meant to be rubbed into balls. You're supposed to work it into your pubes to prevent them from becoming angry shredded wheat.

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I'm All Ears.

Quote The Red Bladder:

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Quote Josif A. Soterίou:

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I’ve been cleaning up clitches recently using Soundforge 7

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When it comes to editing out glitches, nothing works as well as Reaper. Izotope's NR packages are really good and even the budget priced ones are excellent.

Soundforge 7 is now so old (10 years? 8 Years?) that you will be amazed at what is on offer from just about everybody - even Soundforge 10 is sort of OK for some of this work.

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Too many issues with 10 that they still haven't resolved. Mainly the Batch processor; has too many bugs and is flaky as hell.

Plugins don't always behave in dry/wet mode and result in only a wet output. I must have about 3 sets of manufacturers plugins that have been left redundant because of this. It's beat detection tool is not the best and it's lacking a decent pitch detector unlike Wavelab.

However, it does have some really good tools, envelope shaping being one of them along with Acid tools and cd authoring.

Shame though because it really does work nicely bar the bugs.....

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Samplecraze
Stretch That Note

Wavelab has a good feature set, and works well for most people most of the time. The problem with Steinberg is that their tech support veers between utterly unacceptable and completely non-existent. So if Wavelab isn't working for you, you are stuck with a very long fault-finding job. On your own. With no help from Steinberg. At all.

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Instant gratification is actually pretty good. It's fast as well.

Quote SecretSam:

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The problem with Steinberg is that their tech support veers between utterly unacceptable and completely non-existent. So if Wavelab isn't working for you, you are stuck with a very long fault-finding job. On your own. With no help from Steinberg. At all.

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Not very fair, Sam. Philippe, the WL developer, is on the forum all the time to answer questions and help troubleshoot.

http://www.steinberg.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=47

He goes by the handle PG and usually responds to threads within 24 hours.

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I'm All Ears.

He does indeed, and answers all these questions single-handedly.

A fine developer


Martin

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YewTreeMagic

I got Adobe Audition CS5 in the end …seems great so far.

I quite like the noise reduction features too, at least to knock back hum and hiss a bit (like reverse phase cancellation). But I hate that digital metallic sound you sometimes get from higher settings on these things. I’ve not tried the adaptive noise feature yet. How does AA compare with Izotope’s RX2?

Thanks

(P.S. Installing Wavelab seemed to cause my PC to freeze (not the program) even when it was not running. When I uninstalled it, the problem stopped. I can't really mess about with it, and I got it bundled free anyway.

These kinds of noise reduction work best if you take several small bites at the cherry instead of one whopping big one! And be sensible about the amount of noise reduction you can achieve without damaging the wanted audio. Think noise 'reduction' rather than noise 'removal'!

H

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Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

I'd echo Hugh's suggestion to do several passes of noise reduction. I'll usually aim for 10-12dB for each pass although I've gone as low as 6dB per pass when artefacts have been a problem.

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

I agree. I also record just the noise itself (e.g. dry amp & dry electric static noise from pickups). I process a copy>pasted version of the track with noise reduction while keeping the original track. Then when I come to mixing, I can fade out the noise-reduced track during the parts where the noise is adequately masked by the level of wanted sound (or other instruments).

I really worry about what is being lost much more than non-intrusive noise. The more I listen, the more my mind plays tricks (e.g. exaggerates). That’s why I put everything into quarantine for a while before any final decisions.

Quote Josif A. Soterίou:

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Then when I come to mixing, I can fade out the noise-reduced track during the parts where the noise is adequately masked by the level of wanted sound (or other instruments).

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That's exactly what properly set up noise reduction should be doing so you shouldn't need to worry about using two tracks if you're using the right noise reduction settings.

Quote Josif A. Soterίou:

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I really worry about what is being lost much more than non-intrusive noise. The more I listen, the more my mind plays tricks (e.g. exaggerates). That’s why I put everything into quarantine for a while before any final decisions.

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The great thing with Audition is that it lets you listen to the noise that it is removing. It should sound like random noise - if you hear something that sounds too much like the wanted sound you know that you're removing too much.

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

Quote James Perrett:

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The great thing with Audition is that it lets you listen to the noise that it is removing. It should sound like random noise - if you hear something that sounds too much like the wanted sound you know that you're removing too much.

James.

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Great tip! Thanks

Many noise reduction plug-ins provide this feature, and I agree that it's invaluable.

Just turn up the amount of noise reduction until it changes from noise to a little bit of music, and then turn it back down a little to make sure you're not throwing out any baby with the bathwater


Martin

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YewTreeMagic

or just re-record with a better SNR...

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I'm All Ears.

Surely you mean the chipmunk Martin?

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Samplecraze
Stretch That Note

Quote ken long:

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or just re-record with a better SNR...

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Thanks... but if I wasn't capable of thinking up that solution I wouldn't be able to tie my own shoelaces, let alone write a forum post.

In practice, I'd choose a Take 2 with more musical spontaneity and passion -but a bit of unfortunate noise- than a Take 20 with no noise but less spontaneity. Sometimes it is better to deal with it as it is.

Quote ken long:

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Quote SecretSam:

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The problem with Steinberg is that their tech support veers between utterly unacceptable and completely non-existent. So if Wavelab isn't working for you, you are stuck with a very long fault-finding job. On your own. With no help from Steinberg. At all.

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Not very fair, Sam. Philippe, the WL developer, is on the forum all the time to answer questions and help troubleshoot.

http://www.steinberg.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=47

He goes by the handle PG and usually responds to threads within 24 hours.

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+++1 = 3!

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C.LYDE
http://soundcloud.com/c-lyde

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YewTreeMagic

Quote James Perrett:

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The great thing with Audition is that it lets you listen to the noise that it is removing. It should sound like random noise - if you hear something that sounds too much like the wanted sound you know that you're removing too much.

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Is this being used for creative purposes as well as quality control? For example, imagine if you needed a didgeridoodar but only had a crappy cardboard tube. What if you recorded your didge part through that, then recorded just air flowing through the tube and cut that sound from your 'didge' recording using noise reduction... then processed that deleted sound through an IR taken from a good didgeridoo (so that it reasonable fits the length of the tube), then mixed it back with the (noise reducted) audio... wouldn't that get closer to a real didge? There might be countless other applications of this kind too. Cutting certain frequences and processing these, or the remaining frequencies that are chosen for effect rather than because they're noise-free. Just a thought.

help a learner here, why would you use noise reduction programs over a gate?
I have two Juno so I'm pretty much using a gate on everything for the chorus hiss, but lately forgetting and just eqing it out.

would I be alright in what I'm doing, I'm managing to get the hiss removed with little difference to the orig recorded synth patch

Others can probably explain better, but... modern noise reduction enables you to target and remove specific frequencies across all frequency bands, whilst wanted frequencies can remain more or less intact. EQ means you have to shop the head or legs off, or cut a frequency range that might include wanted sounds.

Noise reduction is most useful if you are using a synth patch with long tails as it splits the noise into narrow frequency bands and gates each band separately. With a gate, you could end up cutting the tails suddenly while noise reduction might give you more natural sounding tails as the frequency bands containing only noise would close before the frequency bands that contain wanted sound.

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net