Syntrillium Backup Forums :: View topic - normalizing - compressing

Divy · Posts: 59

Hi! In the CE-Forum, Synthrillium MD wrote this about normalizing:

"Normalizing will only raise your audio from the 'highest peak'...So, imagine you have a voice-over that has an average volume of -7dB, but at one point you hit a hard consonant and this causes your audio to spike up to -2dB. By normalizing, you'll only have a maximum headroom of 2dB. So, what you can do (to take advantage of what would theoretically be 7dB of headroom) would be to compress the vocal to tame that peak and THEN normalize. You can also use the compressor itself to act as a gain-staging device (I know, starting to get a little technical here...but it's all part of the learning process)"

Fine, now, in radio, that's exactly my little problem. I usually record just voice, frequently my own voice. If I normalize the pops and klicks from the consonants are very loud, and the rest is not loud enough. What I do than is select the loudest parts, amplify them to 75 per cent and normalize again. Is there a better way to do that? I don't want to c:???:ompress too much, in my public radio-station they don't like this effects of voice compressing. Any sugestion?

Thanks!

Divy · Posts: 59

Sorry, I wanted to say:

"What I do than is select the loudest parts, amplify them to 75 per cent and normalize then the whole track again."

ozpeter · Location: Australia Posts: 3200

I'd use the hard limiter effect (if present in your CE version) in this situation.

- Ozpeter

Craig Jackman · Location: Canada Posts: 909

First suggestion - better mic technique. Always solve your audio problems at the source. Learn to use the mic diaphram as a target, and those sounds that pop and click you want to move off the target. Don't work close to get the proximity effect to boost the low end of your voice. I have one jock on staff here, and he's got a high energy delivery, removes all windsocks or pop screens. He knows his delivery, he knows how to move his head or twist his lips so that he never ever pops anything ... on air or in production.

2nd suggestion - compression. You record just voice for a public radio station. That doesn't mean that you can't use compression. Heck I'd bet that your transmitter chain has compressors and limiters in it, so why can't you use appropriate compression in the production studio? They don't like the sound of compression? Don't be so blatant with it. A gentle 2 or 3:1 at -10 or -12, fast attack and release, if you don't tell anyone nobody will know but your dynamics will be under better control. Don't use the hard limiter. This is a not very sublte blatant squash effect on voice.

3rd suggestion - high pass filter/lo cut filter. On a waveform, most pops show up as a big slow wave modulating your voice wave. If you run it through some EQ eliminating everything below 80Hz and rolling off at 120Hz, these pops dissappear. Play with the settings so that it doesn't sound like you are chopping the bottom end off. If it's an AM station chop away, nobody's going to hear it anyway. If there is a roll off switch on your mic, try that too.

Bob K · Location: USA Posts: 165

Craig, I'm popping well after the fact on this one (I rarely have time to get to this forum).

Divy, he has said it well. I constantly have clients and announcers to record, and I have to remind them all not to talk directly to the microphone. I set the mike just off to one side of the speaker's mouth, where I can get all the good voice sounds and no pops. Clicks, on the other hand, show up in everyone's voice now and again. My mike positioning reduces their volume, but I sometimes still have to isolate and eliminate them. Fortunately, I fiddled with the FFT filter a while back and found a good pop drop setting, for those occasions when I can't convince the client to do it my way.