Removing Echo from 2trk recording made by SoundRecorder

[aballiett]

Hi!

I make a lot of interview recordings with SoundRecorder and Skype through my Mac.

Everyonce in a while someone remote, who is supposedly wearing headphones, isn't.

That means I record my voice in my own track and then it gets recorded again in the remote track. (make sense? It comes out the interviewees speakers and goes into his mike)

If I listen to my recording track solo, it can sound very good but when I listen in stereo, my voice sounds like hell. Really tiny and distorted. Back to a single track, it sounds good. Of course, my voice in the 2nd track isn't clear enough to 'just use'

Is it possible to clear my voice from the remote track without doing a lot of hand work? I HOPE SO! (also, if you can point me to the best training for Noise Gate, I'd appreciate it. I get a lot of lip smacks, heavy breathing, etc, in my own track. I've heard noise gate can remove that without me spengin days with comand-l on a 1 hr podcast. )

Thanks

-Allan in WV

[aballiett]

I should have said that it's ok with me if the final recording is MONO

If there's some way to go from 2 tracks to 1 track and specify that sound in the 2nd track will overlay sound in the 1st track, that would most likely take care of my problem (however, there's got to be SOME time delay before my voice shows up in the interviewees recording...)

Thanks

-Allan

[kozikowski]

I'm about to dip into this because of podcast equipment design. And yes, that's one thing you can't control...or help...or fix.

This is no "hook" or identifying mark you can use to tell software what you want and what you don't. I know You know what's going on, but to the software it's just all blue waves. I think I would try reversing the phase of one of the two tracks. Effect > Invert.

You can also try the Time Shift Tool (sideways black arrows) in an effort to restore the coherence between the two tracks. This isn't likely to work on Skype, but it's worth a try.

There is a desperation method of using Effect > Auto Duck so that every time you talk, the foreign track goes away. That will sound more like a badly controlled cell call, but it's far better than sounding like a cartoon character.

Isn't Skype supposed to have automatic Echo Suppression. I know they keep insisting you wear headphones, but it's supposed to work half-way well even if you don't.

I've been known to record a bad transmission and send them a copy. Most people have no idea they sound like crap at the other end.

Koz