Fledgling voice artist seeking counsel.

[Robert J. H.]

A really stupid question, but are you sure you didn't record the internal Laptop mic instead of the Snowball?
Firstly, it sounds exactly as with mine, device noise and all. Secondly, the forth example (extern) sounds as if you've recorded behind the door.
My second guess would be that the audio comes in over line-in instead of mic line, but it is actually over USB, so there's naught to this assumption. I wonder if there is any setting we haven't set up properly yet. The main hum (60/120 Hz etc) is very prominent.
My Usb does not suffer from this problem, instead it has a constant DC offset, therefore, I somehow doubt that this cable is the source.
Does running on battery/plugging in the laptop change anything?
I think the clapping won't give us much information as long as we are not able to get rid of the buzz.
However, the booth itself seems to be very good. There are some spectral peaks at 6, 20, 60 113 120 and 157 Hertz but I don't know if they are all due to the interference. It seems that the place will be perfectly suited for your narrations eventually.

[Robert J. H.]

I guess, you are not performing Flamenco accompaniment as a rule?
Your hand claps are what a Spanish would call "Sorda", i.e. dark. But we need a tight sound. This "Clara" is produced by clapping 3 or more fingers on the palm of the other hand. It is like praying but with one hand shifted down.
Here comes a comparison between your clap and mine.

clap-comparison.flac

(590.04 KiB) Downloaded 53 times

After normal time , the claps are repeated and stretched by the factor 10.

Take especially note of the frequency development of the two claps.
My sitting room colours the spectrum towards the highs, whereas your clap stays practically in the same (low) region.
This is actually good since we don't want coloration. However, as I said, the impulse has to be tight or "bright" to include all frequencies equally.

In the next file, I've applied my impulse response to one of Koz recordings. The goal would eventually be to get the first spectrum by eliminating the room characteristics from the second sample and thus to give more presence to the voice.
It is of course not a proper before/after comparison since there are two room impulses that clash. Also, my recording isn't high quality and there are a lot of noise sources around me (the roaring of the fire for instance).
But I hope you'll get the idea.

Koz-in-my-sitting-room.mp3

(84.3 KiB) Downloaded 97 times

[MichloIW]

Robert!

There are no stupid questions, there ARE however, fledgling voice engineers / actors who forget amidst all the moving about and switching to a whole new room to re-disable the built-in microphone!

That is exactly what it was! The built in was also recording. Wow.

I'll still use the Choke since it arrives tomorrow and wasn't expensive but please have a listen to the new test I uploaded to the same folder. I think Robert has squished the buzzing insects!

https://onedrive.live.com/?cid=ff725192 ... A0m-UdA7V4

Cheers.

[Robert J. H.]

Ahh, what a relief.
There fit whole worlds inbetween those recordings.

I think you're ready to go and to record the "real thing".

There are some frequencies I would cut (remember the boominess I complained about weeks ago?).
It is now really near to perfection and you might only notice the difference in direct comparison.
I'll pick the 1 kHz/1.25 kHz region as an example, how I would search for offending frequencies.
I open the equalizer and boost some frequency under suspicion extremely high. You'll immediately hear the resonance in the preview.
You decrease the dB value until the resonance disappears (and a little bit further).
This real time recording shows how I do it (in the equalization dialog)

equalization.mp3

cutting 1/1.25 kHz

(892.69 KiB) Downloaded 64 times

The A/B comparison is at the very end.
You can try it yourself, for example with 315 Hz.
The highpass filter would of course be applied first (at about 100 Hz, 6 to 12 dB roll-off).
I'm looking forward to listening to your first chapter.

Ciao
Robert

(and yes, you've guessed my second name right enough...)

[kozikowski]

Your hand claps are what a Spanish would call "Sorda", i.e. dark. But we need a tight sound.

Are we up to two pencils yet? Easily repeatable sharp impact with common objects that doesn't overload the microphone or amplifiers.

The earlier problem was caused by an incompletely damped microphone enclosure causing the "talking in a box" sound. That should be nearly completely gone with the new configuration.

Probably the most discouraging thing I found was frying mosquito noises from an interface that doesn't use a USB cable.
http://kozco.com/tech/audacity/pix/olym ... Blowup.jpg
That's not good news. That's where I got my sound sample from.

We should be careful not to "tune out" Fledgling Voice Artist's natural vocal tones.

The comparison might be between a free-air snowball which will accumulate sloppy room echoes, but probably no tonal problems, and The Studio.

I have a non-sound project I need to pay attention to.

Koz

[MichloIW]

Greetings,

well, my friend has returned to England and I have finally recorded some real work.

https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=F ... der%2c.wav

I still need to do more work on my own glottal pops but otherwise, I think the only problem I have is how fast the room warms up. Heh. I have to step out rather often.

As always, I look forward to your expert feedback.

Cheers.

[kozikowski]

Oh, that is coming along, isn't it?

The second Chapter 1 still has that hum in it, but it responds perfectly to Steve's equalization filter.

Even better. It sounds like you and perfectly natural. No honk or other environment problems.

I think it's submission ready (given the hum filter). The peaks are at -3, the background level is -60 (by my measurement), etc. etc.

Oddly, I didn't write down the location of that filter. [email protected]#$%

Searching....

~~

Oh, and welcome to the LA heat wave. Those of us without air conditioning usually end up at The Mall, Public Library or McDonalds. My west-facing bedroom stays cool for a while, so it's late afternoon before I have to escape.

Koz

[kozikowski]

Anyway. Here it is attached.

Launch the show and then Effect > Equalization: Save-Manage-Curves. Import.

"LF rolloff for speech."

Koz

[MichloIW]

Thanks, Koz!

I'm so excited now. I'll be auditioning on Voices.com like mad and continuing with the book in between.

And yes, the bloody heat wave. My mate was here for 10 days so he, unfortunately, had to suffer some of it too. He almost melted.

Thankfully it has cooled off again for the moment.

I have A/C in three rooms (including the home theatre room) so please, feel free to come by. I'd love for you to see the actual audio room anyway. There might be things which spring to mind that I could make even better. Plus I'd be able to put a face to the name.

Cheers.

[MichloIW]

Greetings,

I have added a new processed version and I have also sent it off to ACX for their opinion.

These are the steps I took:

• Record in mono.
• Normalize to 0.
• High pass filter.
  80 Hz
  12 dB
• Noise reduction:
  12
  0.00
  200
  0.00
• EQ base boost
• Add Steve's Limiter
  -3
  10
• Amplify to -3 dB.
• EQ LQ Rolloff for speech import
• Export as WAV.
• Export as MP3.
  192 kbps CBR.

Are these still the steps all would agree on now that I have the room sorted and the angry insect buzz annihilated?

I know the EQ base boost isn't technically needed but I feel it gives my voice a little more warmth (what do you think?).

Cheers.