Monitor Volume during recording PRIORITY:HIGH

[kozikowski]

I would stay far away from Noise Removal. It's not for beginners and it's not a one-click tool. You can cause sound damage that's annoying and irreversible.

You need to be careful with Normalize, too. Almost guaranteed it doesn't do what you think. Normalize and Amplify are close cousins. If left to their default settings, they find the loudest sharp sound or peak in the show and change the volume of the whole show until that one peak strikes 0 dB.

Amplify performs the same correction to left and right. Normalize picks two peaks, one left and one right and changes tracks individually. Normalize is the one that can cause presentation damage in a show. Both of these tools are arithmetic functions, not loudness management tools.

The AUP file and Data folder are wherever you put them during the save step. I almost always use the desktop. I don't know where Audacity default is in Windows. You might follow the pathway in Audacity Preferences > Directories.

It's particularly important that you save Project files somewhere where they're not moved. You can move a simple show by moving the AUP file and the _DATA folder always to the same directory but complex shows can't be moved.

Koz

[billw58]

I always create a new folder to store my AUP and _data folders in. That way I can move them together if I need to. It is a good reminder that those two items need to remain together.

-- Bill

[ralph007]

Much appreciated...I'm still learning about Audacity...navigating. The features, etc...

It all started off quite innocently as I was trying to convert "(one)" cassette message into a CD that I could share. The cassette/message was put into archives and no longer available in any format. I happened to have had a copy in cassette.

The church has a small staff in this depatrment and were in the process of putting hundreds of other messages into CD format and didn't know when or if they would ever be able to get to it. So...

I may end trying to move some LP's to CD at some point. As you must be well aware it's a time consuming process and Life is short.

God Bless

Sincerely, Ralph

PS: If you have any further thoughts or suggestions? Please feel free to pass them along.

In Hosea 4:6 it says that "my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge." That is right kind of knowledge from the correct sources. And that is not a Dave Letterman show and the likes of.
The world is packed full of voices and opinions and we certainly have more than enough technology...So what is the problem? We are looking in the wrong places many of us...there is a divine order and purpose and universal laws that apply to ALL of us...No-one escapes these...Amen

[ralph007]

Koz,

I wanted to mention this minor annoyance that I just noticed with a slightly increased listener volume.

And this is it...In the background behind the actual message/speech you can hear as best as I can explain/express it. A tinkling/sparkling type circulating sound. It is very very subtle, BUT I can notice it. Not sure anyone else would but I tend to be a perfectionist.

I wonder if it has something to do with the "normalize or Noise removal process?"

As I stated earlier I had to set the slider all the way to the left (removing less) in order to get the message to sound flat and not synthesized.

Let me know your thoughts and if I can do anything to totally remove this noise? Short of re-recording the message again with different settings?!!?

Sincerely, Ralph
PS: _data and aup files currently are in My documents for this message

[kozikowski]

Tinkling, gargling, bubbling and honking are all symptoms of Noise Removal damage and they're cousins of MP3 compression damage for the same reasons. There is no way to "back out" of the damage unless you Saved A Project or exported a WAV file before you applied the correction.

You should be using Audacity 1.3.12 and not 1.2.

http://audacityteam.org/download/

You can install both versions, but only use one at a time. Audacity 1.3 Projects will not open in 1.2.

The noise reduction in Audacity 1.2 is useless as in Free of Benefit. There is a small subset of users that claim it's better at phonograph records than 1.3, but I'm not convinced. The times I tried to use 1.2 noise reduction, I had the same problem you did. There is no setting of the correction knob that is desirable.

Koz

[kozikowski]

To be very clear. Noise Reduction always affects the whole show, not just the work you're trying to remove and it always creates some damage. It is to be avoided as much as possible. The other, vaguely similar tool is Noise Gate, which tries to suppress sounds below a certain loudness (like tape hiss). Both tools have to be tuned carefully for each performance. They're violins.

They always cause damage, but the trick is to make the damage sound acceptable.

As earlier, Normalize can cause production damage because of its ability to change Left and Right independent of each other. Use Amplify and my personal preference is not use 0dB as a normalize point but something slightly lower like -0.5dB. Magic things happen at 0dB.

Most people can't hear a 3dB loudness change, so a half-dB is irrelevant.

Koz

[ralph007]

Koz,


I just sent another email with some more comments...

For the Audacity downloaded it clearly says: Windows 7 and Vista. I'm running Windows XP...

Hopefully you've got my last recent posting which was less than an hour ago by now?!?

Thanks so much...
Ralph

[steve]

For the Audacity downloaded it clearly says: Windows 7 and Vista.

Yes, we know, and most of the regulars on this forum wish it was a bit more enthusiastic about Audacity 1.3.12
I use Audacity 1.3.12 on Windows XP all the time and find it to be vastly superior to Audacity 1.2.6 in just about every way.

[ralph007]

Dear Friends:

As I mentioned before. I may need to re-do the Project. Due to the fact that I did not export it to a WAV file as I was thinking that due to the volume of it and it was primarily speech. Utmost quality was not as important.

However, I need to do the process correctly for future Projects...There also has been a misunderstanding on my part as to the use/necessity of the Normalize and Noise removal tools.

When I previewed the Project it appeared to excess amounts of hiss. I presume cassette hiss that would be very annoying once it was converted to a CD as an mp3 in this case.

I was hoping you could guide me through the correct steps so that I don't make the same mistakes. This would be from the point that the total Project is recorded and now needs to be I presume sent/saved as a WAV file. It then could be retrieved and converted or made in to an mp3/WAV so that I could make CD's to share.

I believe the last _data and aup/is it aud files are in My Documents and cans be accessed from there. I also have the mp3 version on my Desktop that could be easily dragged and dropped into WMP for another burning of the current version if needed.

I'm NOT satisfied with that version though and need to do it correctly...

Please send me whatever steps/info that I'll need to proceed from here to make and Save and produce a better quality "final" copy of this message/Project. Titled: Miracles of Grace"

Sincerely and Humbly, Ralph

[ralph007]

So my friends I need to do this Project over...What about the use of the Normalize and Noise removal tools?
Please read this Post carefully and Respond as simply and completely as possible so that I "we" can bring closure to this before next year.
Sincerely, Ralph
What STEPS should I follow? Should I use the

Dear Friends:

As I mentioned before. I may need to re-do the Project. Due to the fact that I did not export it to a WAV file as I was thinking that due to the volume of it and it was primarily speech. Utmost quality was not as important.

However, I need to do the process correctly for future Projects...There also has been a misunderstanding on my part as to the use/necessity of the Normalize and Noise removal tools.

When I previewed the Project it appeared to excess amounts of hiss. I presume cassette hiss that would be very annoying once it was converted to a CD as an mp3 in this case.

I was hoping you could guide me through the correct steps so that I don't make the same mistakes. This would be from the point that the total Project is recorded and now needs to be I presume sent/saved as a WAV file. It then could be retrieved and converted or made in to an mp3/WAV so that I could make CD's to share.

I believe the last _data and aup/is it aud files are in My Documents and cans be accessed from there. I also have the mp3 version on my Desktop that could be easily dragged and dropped into WMP for another burning of the current version if needed.

I'm NOT satisfied with that version though and need to do it correctly...

Please send me whatever steps/info that I'll need to proceed from here to make and Save and produce a better quality "final" copy of this message/Project. Titled: Miracles of Grace"

Sincerely and Humbly, Ralph