Hi Everyone. I’m using Audacity 2.2.2 on Windows and I need help, please!
I recorded a 45 minute interview with a guest and the entire interview sounds like the attached file. You can barely hear what is being said because of some sort of echo/feedback. Does anyone have any advice on what I can do in audacity to edit this so it is usable?
Sincerely thank you to anyone who can help!
I recorded a 45 minute interview with a guest
How?
This was a cellphone interview, right? Was your voice OK?
That’s not the guest voice. That’s the cellphone echo and noise cancellation errors. Most cell recorders will not record the far side.
Audacity can’t take that kind of sound error out of a voice.
Koz
It was not a cell phone interview. There were three of us in one room together recording with a Blue Yeti microphone plugged in via USB to my laptop. This is the same way we always record with the exception that there was a third person and we were in a different room (the room had a little bit of echo because of hardwood floors so we put down a blanket).
Any suggestions on ways I can edit to get it at least a little better?
The short answer is no. We can’t remove that talking-into-a-milk-jug distortion.
The Yeti doesn’t try to process audio and Audacity doesn’t either, but the Windows machine has a list of different places where it can try to “help you.”
Do you leave Skype running in the background while you record? Skype is famous for creating sound problems like this.
Windows has is own sound processing.
https://manual.audacityteam.org/man/faq_recording_troubleshooting.html#enhancements
What’s chances you were recording from the laptop built-in microphone instead of the Yeti? If you connect the Yeti after you start Audacity, Audacity won’t automatically see it.
Did you spot-check the recording before everybody went home? Did you shoot a sound test before you started?
Now you know why an increasingly popular option is stop using the computer to record production sound.
Koz
This was an important broadcast production sound show I shot.
That’s Audacity on the left. On the right is the second recorder used as a backup in case of troubles. In your case, I would launch and leave running your cellphone voice recorder as backup.
Koz