Why does the selected area change to the entire timeline?!

Hi,

Audacity 2.0.6 - from the .dmg installer
OSX 10.8.5

First post, and first use of Audacity. I have about six talks, with too much ambient noise. I just want to clean them up a little bit, trim the ends, and boost the volume.

If I select and area of the timeline using the “[” and “]” keys and choose Noise Reduction with the intention of Getting the Noise Profile (for example - this also happens when I click Edit to try to delete a short section of audio!) the selection switches to the entire timeline. How can I maintain the selected area of the timeline?

Thanks!

Mitch

Ensure that you actually do have a portion of an audio track “selected” (highlighted darker). You may find it helps to click on the audio track before you do the “” thing.
If there is no actual audio selected, then by default, Audacity will select everything when you call up an effect.

Hi Steve,

Thank you!

I finished my project except for one more problem. I have about eight talks each in a separate audio file. Two of the files are so full of dialog that I want to keep that there is no place to grab a Noise Profile. There are many places on the other files with similar, if not identical noise.

What is the easiest way to use a Noise Profile from a different file?

Thanks Again!

Best Wishes,

Mitch

Audacity cannot currently choose noise profiles from files, so to be clear, I think you mean from a different audio track.

Can you zoom in (COMMAND + 1) and select about 50 to 100 milliseconds of noise on the full tracks? Like a pause between sentences? 100 milliseconds would be better. This assumes you have 44100 Hz or higher project rate (bottom left).

Use Selection Toolbar at the bottom to judge the length of the selection (choose the “Length” radio button).


Gale

Hi Gale,



I didn’t know that. I was hoping for files.

But I assumed I would need six or seven seconds. I think I can find at least one, one second gap (22050 Hz sample rate).

Thanks!

Best Wishes,

Mitch

100 - 200 milliseconds should be fine in that case.


Gale

Thanks Gale!

Best Wishes,

Mitch