Audio levels when recording

[kozikowski]

I am not sure if it is loud enough or will it need enhancing ?

No and yes. It sounds like you’re presenting in a room with a hundred small window fans. Reducing the gain on the Focusrite only appears to hide the noise. The first step in correction is to boost the volume and the noise just comes right back again.

I got the clip to pass ACX AudioBook compliance, but I had to use very aggressive Noise Reduction to do it. It will never pass Human Quality Control because of the noise that’s left. If I bump up to higher reduction, it will start to damage the voice. There are limits to what can be done.

ACX-Check is a tool you can add to Audacity. It tests for the three sound qualities I wrote about here.

ACX Sound Specifications

Measure between -23dB and -18dB RMS.

English version of the ACX readings. Peak. Look at the blue waves on the timeline. The very tips of the waves are never allowed to go all the way up or down. That’s overload (1.0 on the timeline – 0dB on the bouncing sound meters). That can cause audible crunching and distortion. ACX doesn’t even want you to get close, so that’s their -3dB (70%) limit. RMS. Loudness. Root Mean Square is a standard electrical measurement which, when applied to audio, happens to work out to loudness. RMS s…

ACX-Check

Missing features

Download and Drag Acx-check.ny to the Audacity plugins folder. Restart Audacity. ACX Check appears under Analyze and will tell you if your sample is going to make it past the automated testing robot at ACX AudioBook. It requires 3/4 second or more of quiet to tell you the background noise value. That’s what the two seconds of silence in the forum format does.

ACX AudioBook minimum requirements are also Broadcast values and not a bad place to start if you plan on hiring out. You need to figure out where those noises are coming from. At first pass, I would say your computer fans.

Koz