JasonNthaJungle
New member
When getting audio from the performance versus ADR, do people usually use any dynamic processing to help eliminate noise and/or room reverb? If so, what kind of processing, ratios, etc... do you usually start with?
Dynamics Processing
- Thread starter JasonNthaJungle
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Humanwire
Active member
I sometimes use an expander to help tame the room reverb in the production sound. It requires a lot of fiddling to get it to sound good without cutting off the ends of your dialogue. The same goes for noise reduction; it requires a lot of work to get it to sound good without sounding too "watery" from overly reducing the noise. If find noise reduction is good for certain types of noise. The more it sounds like white noise (like radio static, or a water fall) the less effective I find noise reduction to be. I find it's best at reducing special types of noise such as camera noise, generator noise, etc etc. If it's a hum, I'll usually employ an EQ with a very narrow Q and just notch out the hum frequency (which sometimes takes a bit of searching). Hums are usually found at 60 hz or 120hz.
When doing ADR, I try to record dialogue for the entire scene. I will try to use both production dialogue takes and the adr takes to patch together a clean track, but if I can't get the ADR to blend in seamlessly, then I will try to just use all ADR (with the directors approval). One thing to make your ADR sound like it fits in the scene, is to (obviously) have some production sound presence looped in behind the ADR.
Also, when EQing your ADR to match the production, I find that top quality EQ plugins will just simply work better than the stock low quality plugins. For example, I was blending in ADR with the production sound, and I was EQing the crap out of the ADR with 4 of the stock Pro Tools "7 Band EQ" plugins, and I couldn't for the life of me get it to blend nicely. I instead tried out one of them new fangled, and very expensive Waves Q10 EQs, and I nailed it withing a few minutes. The Q10 EQ by Waves just sounds so much better that the stock Pro Tools plugins. Most of the time you can get away with the good 'ol "7 Band EQ", but for really delicate and detailed EQ work like matching ADR to production sound, a fancier plugin was the solution.
When doing ADR, I try to record dialogue for the entire scene. I will try to use both production dialogue takes and the adr takes to patch together a clean track, but if I can't get the ADR to blend in seamlessly, then I will try to just use all ADR (with the directors approval). One thing to make your ADR sound like it fits in the scene, is to (obviously) have some production sound presence looped in behind the ADR.
Also, when EQing your ADR to match the production, I find that top quality EQ plugins will just simply work better than the stock low quality plugins. For example, I was blending in ADR with the production sound, and I was EQing the crap out of the ADR with 4 of the stock Pro Tools "7 Band EQ" plugins, and I couldn't for the life of me get it to blend nicely. I instead tried out one of them new fangled, and very expensive Waves Q10 EQs, and I nailed it withing a few minutes. The Q10 EQ by Waves just sounds so much better that the stock Pro Tools plugins. Most of the time you can get away with the good 'ol "7 Band EQ", but for really delicate and detailed EQ work like matching ADR to production sound, a fancier plugin was the solution.
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Tim Joy
Veteran
You can Dirty-Up the ADR tracks to sound more like the production track by taking a pair of nice speakers to the location it was shot at, play the adr through the speakers and record it with the boom mic.
I would say that 99% of production audio has a noise gate and/or noise reduction on it throughout the movie. You can hear the gate kick in especially on beach scenes.
The biggest mistake I see (hear) people do with ADR is to record it with a mic right up close to the actor, and underneath, as if they are singing. You gotta use the SAME mic, at aproximately the SAME position, in a similarly-sized and acoustically similar room as it was shot in. The only difference is you have no BG noise this time. Then, hopefully you don't have to use any eq to get it to match. ADR for outdoor scences are the hardest, cause you need a dead room.
Noise gates are pretty trickey to get right, and you need a "bed" of ambiance underneath so you don't hear in come in and out. Hope this helps.
I would say that 99% of production audio has a noise gate and/or noise reduction on it throughout the movie. You can hear the gate kick in especially on beach scenes.
The biggest mistake I see (hear) people do with ADR is to record it with a mic right up close to the actor, and underneath, as if they are singing. You gotta use the SAME mic, at aproximately the SAME position, in a similarly-sized and acoustically similar room as it was shot in. The only difference is you have no BG noise this time. Then, hopefully you don't have to use any eq to get it to match. ADR for outdoor scences are the hardest, cause you need a dead room.
Noise gates are pretty trickey to get right, and you need a "bed" of ambiance underneath so you don't hear in come in and out. Hope this helps.