RMS Normalize seems to undo everything else

[kozikowski]

http://forum.audacityteam.org/viewtopic ... 03#p336703

Koz

[spearcarrier]

Well I have a pop glove on it.

Did you do that to solve a specific problem? That design is supposed to help with wind noise and give P pop suppression. It does it by restricting large movements of air. In English, it suppress bass notes.

I'm not a fan of doing that unless you're solving a problem. What's the sound difference with and without? Do you have that black tennis racket thing, too?

You do have your Sony MDR-7506 headphones, right? You're flying blind (deaf) without good monitoring. I do not have a pair of those. I don't particularly like them, but Hollywood adores them and they will tell you when you're doing something wrong.


Koz

Well, it would be nice if it stopped the plosives but no. No it does not. It's just there to be pretty. It's blue. My office is very colorful.

The tennis racket thing is there also, but that thing I hate. It never stays where I want it to.

Mic technique has been my answer in this. I have the mic to the side from my lips. It still records well, especially in mono, and there are less plosives that way. The smacks and wet sounds remain though.

My headphones are cheap logitech ones. Those other headphones look sweet, though!

[kozikowski]

I have the mic to the side from my lips.

That works for me, too. Off the corner of my mouth instead of straight in front of my nose. If I do that just right, I don't need the tennis racket.

P Popping and plosives work by sudden broad masses of air. The black tennis racket works by only stretching enough to pass the higher sounds but not the lower ones. That thing David Greene is using is different. That one is a stiff grid in front of the mic. The holes in the grid aren't big enough for P Popping.

Did you try the socks yet? Remember this is a forum. Users helping each other.

Koz

[kozikowski]

Since I'm sure you have loads of leisure time, do a clean recording (without the blue foam thing) and then two different socks, announcing as you go.

"Here's heaving skiing socks, here's casual wear."

Koz

[spearcarrier]

Since I'm sure you have loads of leisure time, do a clean recording (without the blue foam thing) and then two different socks, announcing as you go.

"Here's heaving skiing socks, here's casual wear."

Koz

LOL. Oh yeah, loads. But it's loads of laundry, not time.

I wasn't sure just how to do the sock method so I decided to look it up first - and found this neat video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GN03wwXiS3k

I realized... maybe... what I'm thinking are plosives aren't plosives. Maybe I'm just *really* noticing that p sound. Paranoid of the popping.

I know it's not a help desk - the reason why I'm usually so silent here is time. I was working anywhere from 12 to 16 hours a day for a while. I'm only just now signing off from clients and backing off from being a "good citizen" so I can make time to learn how to record better. You guys have always been great here. It's one of the first places I haunt when looking for answers, even if I rarely talk.

The past couple of days have been me trying to put together a new character demo reel, now that I was armed with your glorious information. And guess what. I got things reasonably level, although I'm still unsure about peaks.

[kozikowski]

and found this neat video.

Yes, but.

This isn't a Pop question. We know how to do that. Did you notice his overly crissssp ssssibilance went away with the sock? So that's the answer.

Did he ever tell you what kind of sock he used? Inquiring minds want to know.

We're not fond of YouTube videos. You've had really good luck, right?

Koz

[kozikowski]

I'm still unsure about peaks.

Theatrical peaks or blue soundwave peaks?

ACX has firm rules about that because they have to be able to transform your work into other platforms and formats with no hint of damage. Conversion in and out of MP3 can cause peak damage. That's why Effect > Limiter in the ACX Mastering Suite is set to -3.5 rather than -3. And that's also why you need to pay attention when you apply the tools.

A note here. Inside Audacity, peak rules don't apply. Audacity uses a weird data format that doesn't overload. That lets you do whatever you want without worrying about it. Outside of Audacity, the world comes to an end at 0. Once your sound goes up to 100% or 0dB, it's going to be audibly distorted and there's no way to recover. That means the microphone before Audacity has to be cool and your client export after Audacity has to be cool.

As a fuzzy rule, we recommend no peaks over -1dB for a client export. You can run Effect > Limiter (by itself this time) reset to -1 on any performance to make sure it doesn't go over. That should be one of the last things you do to the show.

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Did I hit it?

Have you figured out which socks you're going to use?

Koz

[spearcarrier]

Okay, I have to level with you here. I might go to -6db for this. But. M'kay, so.

I don't wear socks.

As a matter of fact, I will go *days in a row* without wearing shoes. Not even my fox slippers the other half got me to encourage me to, well, wear shoes.

There are FANTASTIC perks to working at home, and to be brutally honest: not wearing those leather shackles of modern mundanity except once in a while is one of the best of them.

I was fully prepared to steal my husband's ... icky... socks for the experiment. I really was. If I could find a pair he hadn't been wearing for days in a row, but then I began to question if I were to slip the sock over the mic like a ... sock or perhaps I would wrap it around and secure it in order to get the maximum sock thickness in place. That's why I found the youtube video. I was too embarrassed to ask. :-p

Usually I actually do get lucky with youtube videos, but then again I am known to search carefully for a long long time on odd days.

That being said I'll steal a couple of socks when they come out of the dryer and give it a try. When I DID have socks the other half stuck his over sized feet into them and ruined them, so let's see how he likes the shoe on the other foot. These will be black no-brand-name socks.

No I didn't notice where he was aiming the puffs - it looked to me like it was dead on. As for his crispness, I noticed right away his voice seemed to get fuzzier and fuzzier the more fuzziness he added. I thought to myself that I wouldn't like that at all.

Peaks: What I was told was "peaking,static,Your audio is still way too loud. Try bringing it down a bit. (denied)"

Now I understand a little of what was still too loud, although they didn't say it was loud to begin with. This was not my first submission.
The static wasn't static. It was a seltzer sound effect in the scene I had chosen to use for the demo.
Peaks were also a new one on me, as the other times no one had complained of peaks. Looking at demos that passed, well... they have the same "shape" with what could be peaks. So I've been going in circles trying to understand that ever since.

[spearcarrier]

Just random experimentation at this point: No one uses leveler anymore according to this forum. But all of the voice over information says the same thing: even out your file sound.

I've also been reading on the benefits of using a noise gate over noise reduction. I tried it and really do like how it cleaned things up without messing with the overall tone.

So I added two steps: 1. noisegate set to work at the very bottom where I saw the needle moving in the quiet parts. 2. Leveller, set on the heaviest setting under manage. It was the only one that actually leveled things out, as it were. Then I went through the rest of the motions.

The result is I have a file that sounds, well, more level. I've got my headphones on and I *think* it sounds good. Very importantly: I hope it doesn't have any sound peaks. And it passes ACX.

For the record, I did try using the compressor for it but I am so bad at this that leveler was easier for me to understand. LOL

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[kozikowski]

Whatever works for you.

Yes, there are some serious problems if your voice wanders in volume over the course of a chapter. The standard suite can withstand a little of that, but any "heavy theatrical wandering" is going to be a problem. This is one reason you're wearing good quality headphones during the performance. It tends to even out your voice as you read. And the admonishment widely ignored, you're supposed to keep and eye on the Audacity sound meters like the recording engineer would be doing.

I'm sure you noticed Leveler is still included in the standard Audacity package. It's under Effect > Distortion. It was going to be left by the side of the road bleeding in a past version update, but we rose up as one to say it's hands-down the best way to made Taxicab, 2-Way Radio and Airline Pilot voices. So it was retained as a special effect.

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It was a seltzer sound effect in the scene I had chosen to use for the demo.

They are fond of saying this isn't radio theater. We're not brought to you this week by Chesterfield Cigarettes. Dum Dum Dummmmmm. It's a plain reading. I think the most exciting thing you're supposed to do is voices so the client can follow the characters.

So that's why your submission failed. It may have had volume and peaking problems as well. Did it pass ACX Check, or was this before you got your hand in. Once Human Quality Control starts seriously analyzing, they're going to find all kinds of odd things wrong.

Theater is what you do for your podcast. You are going to do a weekly podcast, right? You switch your microphone to bi-directional and put two actors on each side.

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Simon Whistler does a podcast I like. Turns out he does three podcasts—that I know of. I counted the production requirements and it's around 30 hours...a day. [Puzzled Spaniel Look]

Oh, the sock. That's the metaphor. Do you have Railroad Engineer Bandannas? That works. How about Ikea "Tekla" dish towels? That would work. The tradeoff of slightly muffled voice is not having to constantly go through and stomp out sibilants and lip clicking.

There was a phrase here.... "Wet Mouth Noises."

Koz