Audacity Forum

Hello, I'm brand new here but whatever lol... Alright, I currently only use Audacity to bass boost and remove clipping (70hz and lower) in certain music. I'am wondering if it is possible to make a config/plugin or something that does a series of steps that I have to do manually. For example, to remove clipping, I do not use the "remove clipping" tool that is already integrated in the program because it simply doesn't work for such low frequencies... Watch the video to see what steps I take to remove clipping.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZvuPetbjj4

To clarify, you're not actually repairing clipping. If the audio was clipped before the process it will still be clipped after the process.
Compressed audio files (notably MP3 files) may produce sample values above 0 dB when they are decoded to 32 bit float PCM (when you import them into Audacity). These sample values will produce red "clip" lines when "Show Clipping" is selected in the View menu. If there are enough of these red lines it will appear as a solid red block.

These clip lines are not necessarily due to the audio data being "clipped" (the top / bottom of the waveform chopped off), but indicate that the sound will be clipped when you play it.

Here's a picture that I hope will illustrate the distinction that I'm trying to make between "clipped audio data" (first track) and sample values (not clipped, but will clip when played) that exceed 0 dB. I've zoomed out vertically (right click on vertical track scale) and zoomed in very close horizontally.
The clipped audio data in the first track will not be repaired by your method.
The "clipping" indicated in the second track will be fixed by your method, but could be fixed more easily by simply amplifying by a small negative amount.

Your method essentially applies a different amount of amplification to frequencies above 80 Hz and below 80 Hz.
In your video,
the net amplification to frequencies below 80 Hz is (-6.0 + 6.0) = 0 dB
the net amplification to frequencies above 80 Hz is (-6.0 + 4.1) = -1.9 dB

You can achieve exactly the same effect in one step using these Equalizer settings (note that I adjusted the sliders on the left to zoom in on the vertical scale of the graph)

WOW! Didn't expect someone to go so indepth for a simple post! The method i use was taught to me by someone on a car audio forum, so i didn't come up with it...

And so you're saying I can just do that one step you showed me and it'll give me the same effect that i'm getting with my method?

And is there a way to actually "remove/fix" clipping?

austincgardner wrote:And is there a way to actually "remove/fix" clipping?

I presume that you mean "real clipping" (as in the upper track).

If there are only occasional clipped peaks, the ClipFix (Effect menu) may be able to fix it.
The problem with fixing clipped audio is that the peaks are missing. Any method to repair the peaks must guess what the peaks are supposed to look like, but it is only a guess.

A badly clipped (flat top/bottom) sine wave can be repaired almost perfectly with ClipFix, but real world audio is more complex and clipping may not be completely flat at the top/bottom, in which case the repair will be less good, or not work at all. The only real solution to clipping is to avoid clipping in the first place. If music sounds distorted, then it is probably too badly damaged to repair satisfactorily.

By the way, I'm regularly given MP3s to work with that show lots of red clip lines. The first thing that I do after importing them is to Amplify by -1 dB (that brings the peak level to below 0 dB) then listen to it. If it sounds OK, then nothing else needs to be done.