Adobe Audion - Noise Reduction Tips

V

vrbhu

Active member
Hi,
I am trying to bring down my noise level of my dialogues of a short using adobe audition.
The problem is that the overall loudness of the actor is low so when I normalise the clip tp -1db everything including the niose beefs up and its gets difficult for me to do a noise reduction. i am also not sure wheather my workflow is correct..please have a look and let me know what else do I need to do...

In premiere pro click 'edit in audition'...-> go to audition with that file opened...-> normalize it to -1db..then capture the noise profile -> then go to noise reduction option and try to tweak with the setings there...how so every I am trying I am not getting the exact sound...
My recording is indoor and it mainly consists of fridge and other appliances noise...

-Also I would like to know what is the best approach to do this. Is it done per dailogue basis or take the audio of the whole scene and then try to clean it as a single file?

-please reply ..

-thanks much..
-vivek
 
My experience with doing automatic noise reduction is -- the quality is always a problem.

I think most of us try to reduce the noise too much -- we want it gone, not just a small reduction. The fact is, you can't reduce noise in dialogue effectively without impacting the quality of the audio in the dialogue -- making it muffled or tinny or giving it that electronic 'burbly' sound.

The best results with automatic noise reduction probably occur when the level of the dialogue is louder by a good bit than the level of the noise. But it sounds like your situation might be the reverse of that -- with the noise drowning out the dialogue. That's bad.

The best results I've been able to obtain so far involve one of two approaches. The first is to just reduce the noise a little bit, making it a bit less distracting. The less reduction, the less impact it will have on the quality of the dialogue.

The second approach is to forget automatic noise reduction, and instead opt for manual noise reduction. In essence, what I do is go into the clip and drop the volume level everywhere except where the actual words of the dialogue are, using the rubber bands. I don't do a drastic drop -- if I do, the alteration is too noticeable and distracting to the viewer. It's a judgement call.

Worst case scenario -- ADR. Good luck!
 
David,
you got my scenario perfectly...and your advice is so very valuable..thanks much for this...i will follow as you have said....

-Vivek
 
Hi Joe,
Not much..still dabbling...but I am trying to understand the basics behind all this instead of s/w in general..since I myself is a computer engineer so for me application learning is not a great deal but if I can make myself understand the basics behind the scene then I believe I can do a good job in future..

btw, do you have any suggestions/advise for me..
any specific reason you asked my knowledge about audition for?

-Vivek
 
Vivek,

The best advice for the future is always do everything in your power to get absolutely excellent sound during the shoot itself. The more you have to fix in post, the less likely you are to have quality audio in the end. There are things that can be fixed in post without too much detriment -- things like color correcting. But sound isn't one of them.

Good luck!

David
 
Well stated David; I would just split the hair that although sound cannot be "fixed" in post, it can be improved. And that is where the misconception comes from. You can make good audio better and sometimes make bad audio a tad "less bad" but you can't make bad audio good.

Of course, ultimately you can ADR which is why on productions from big to small audio always gets last consideration.

Cheers
 
Yes Wabbit, I've had some experience with ADR. It's a real lifesaver, if done well. And that's probably the best route for Vivek to take.

And you're right, good sound can be improved. Best illustration that comes to mind is adding echo/reverb. I have a scene in 'Tangled Web' where someone off-camera is calling out from another part of the house. A little reverb gives it distance. I also balanced it heavily to the left speaker, which is the general direction the voice is coming from. Tonal quality can also be adjusted -- less bass, more treble, etc.

Those kinds of things can make good sound even better. Noise reduction, on the other hand, almost never results in good sound, in my experience -- only less-bad sound, as you say.
 
I re-read my post and feel I should clarify; my statement was not meant as an endorsement of ADR and a "fix it in post" attitude. It is a difficult and time consuming process which in a world where time=money means good ADR is expen$ive.

99 out of 100 the extra 5 or 10 minutes it takes to get the sound right on set much better then the hours in post to ADR the lines. YMMV

Cheers
 
Yeah I believe I have learned my lessons..better be very very careful from now onwards...thanks much all of you ..you people are simply great..I appreciate the time you took to help me out...

-regards
Vivek
 
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