Hey Guys,
I'm starting to do some audio post tests for work on my new film. I've been learning alot of different stuff lately, but I do have a few questions I was hoping some of you might be able to help me out on.
Let me give you some background. I'm working with a couple of software packages right now. I own Pro Tools, which I use for all my music tracking. However, I don't have Digitranslator, so getting audio into Pro Tools from Final Cut is a bit difficult. Since I don't have an option to do that right now, I've been doing most of my audio work in Soundtrack Pro. Now I'm not going to ask any application specific questions, because I might wind up back in Pro Tools, or perhaps even Logic Express for certain tasks.
The film is a Sci-Fi Musical set in a high school in the 1950's. We recorded all our audio to an M-Audio MicroTrack using the Oktava for interiors and the Rode NTG-2 for our exteriors. Tried to keep the mic as close to the actors as possible. Wish we would have had LAV's but we couldn't afford to buy them, and our schedule kept changing so I never knew when we would need them, so it made renting difficult.
Our soundguy got pretty clean sound throughout the shoot, however, a consistent problem has been that the audio was recorded too low. So I've looked into a number of techniques to fix this, and I'm sure there are specific situations where one might be better than another, but since I'm a bit inexperienced, if some of you might be able to offer up some advice I'd appreciate it. I know one option is to normalize the audio, although I've heard this frowned upon. Another thing I can do is apply an Adaptive Limiter, which will allow me to push the gain up significantly, but limit it to not going above -6 db. Lastly, I could use a compressor, which again will allow me to play with the dynamic range, while boosting the gain and avoiding peaks.
I'm sure there are some other options for this as well, but it's also a question of what to use and when. For example, I have a scene I posted a sample from a while back, which featured three actors speaking in a field. The audio was recorded a bit too low, and also have a large number of crickets on the tracket. The crickets aren't necessarily a problem, as they fit the scene. However, if I use the limiter or the compressor and boost the gain on this, wouldn't it make the crickets the same level as the actors voices? Maybe I'm answering my own question here, so I'll be playing with this a bit, but any suggestions are most appreciated.
Thanks guys.
-Steve
I'm starting to do some audio post tests for work on my new film. I've been learning alot of different stuff lately, but I do have a few questions I was hoping some of you might be able to help me out on.
Let me give you some background. I'm working with a couple of software packages right now. I own Pro Tools, which I use for all my music tracking. However, I don't have Digitranslator, so getting audio into Pro Tools from Final Cut is a bit difficult. Since I don't have an option to do that right now, I've been doing most of my audio work in Soundtrack Pro. Now I'm not going to ask any application specific questions, because I might wind up back in Pro Tools, or perhaps even Logic Express for certain tasks.
The film is a Sci-Fi Musical set in a high school in the 1950's. We recorded all our audio to an M-Audio MicroTrack using the Oktava for interiors and the Rode NTG-2 for our exteriors. Tried to keep the mic as close to the actors as possible. Wish we would have had LAV's but we couldn't afford to buy them, and our schedule kept changing so I never knew when we would need them, so it made renting difficult.
Our soundguy got pretty clean sound throughout the shoot, however, a consistent problem has been that the audio was recorded too low. So I've looked into a number of techniques to fix this, and I'm sure there are specific situations where one might be better than another, but since I'm a bit inexperienced, if some of you might be able to offer up some advice I'd appreciate it. I know one option is to normalize the audio, although I've heard this frowned upon. Another thing I can do is apply an Adaptive Limiter, which will allow me to push the gain up significantly, but limit it to not going above -6 db. Lastly, I could use a compressor, which again will allow me to play with the dynamic range, while boosting the gain and avoiding peaks.
I'm sure there are some other options for this as well, but it's also a question of what to use and when. For example, I have a scene I posted a sample from a while back, which featured three actors speaking in a field. The audio was recorded a bit too low, and also have a large number of crickets on the tracket. The crickets aren't necessarily a problem, as they fit the scene. However, if I use the limiter or the compressor and boost the gain on this, wouldn't it make the crickets the same level as the actors voices? Maybe I'm answering my own question here, so I'll be playing with this a bit, but any suggestions are most appreciated.
Thanks guys.
-Steve
