subtle but annoying noises

Is there a filter in FCP or Soundtrack to get rid of or minimize those noises without affecting the voice of the speaker? Thanks.

yeah, check the FAQ. its explained in detail.

<<<yeah, check the FAQ. its explained in detail.>>>

I get no hits. What exactly should we be searching for?

<<<minimize those noises >>>

It depends a great deal on what "those noises" are. If they're echos, they are a permanent part of your show.

Koz

Kind of little rustling noise of fabrics/wool/silks.papers , or paers rubbing on the mic badly attached or so. Thanks Koz.

I'll look to see if I find anything. let you know. Thanks.

You might be able to fix those by hand with STP2's new spectrum tools. You can select and delete a sound that's in a different frequency spectrum than the voice.

<<<You can select and delete a sound that's in a different frequency spectrum than the voice.>>>

That's always been true with more or less success as the sophistication of the tools increases. But it's also still true that if they're even close, the voice will start to sound funny. And it doesn't take much to get them close. If you can make the bad sound with your voice, then they're too close.

In the case of fabric rustling, I would expect the voice to become dull or flutter as the tools try their best to separate the valuable from the not. The classic problem is getting a underwater or gargling sound--but that was with the earlier tools.

The joke was you could change the track, but you couldn't make it better.

If you do get a hit in the FAQ search, let us know what you used as a search term. I don't like the instructions "It's in there somewhere. Have a happy day." That's not helpful.

Koz

I'll add another question to this (assuming for now the answer is in the same spot).

My mic (fine a week ago) turned to crap yesterday and I have a terrible hum. I haven't checked to see if it's consistant; I think it goes from bad to worse and back to bad as the shoot went on.

I'd love to minimize those.

I think I listed before that I have FCSP2, but I just have Studio Pro, so no "spectrum tools" for me.

Thanks,

Mike

"you could change the track, but you couldn't make it better." It's true, and that's the reason why I got on the forum for help. You are honest and helpful. I don't have Soundtrack pro2 right now. that's another reason why.

I could get rid of the noise, but I could not keep the voice. Natural, of course. FAQ didn't help. I ended up doing a search like any other search in the forum. It's all good though. The thought is what that counts.

youre going to have to have some tool like peak, soundsoap or soundtrack pro. you could do it by hand in FCP but MAN that would SUCK!

and like everyone says, depending on the degree of intrusion, you may ending up compromising the quality of the desired sound as well...

here is my process for noise red in soundtrack pro (BTW taken from the FAQ)

1. Open your movie with soundtrack pro
2. Locate and highlight a section of the clip that ONLY has the noise
3. Under PROCESS, pull down to SET NOISE PRINT
4. FILE > SELECT ALL (not sure if this is required, but i find it easier to judge the results)
5. Hit the spacebar to play the sound
6. Under PROCESS, pull down to REDUCE NOISE... and play with the values until you like what you hear. i generally find it sufficient to just adjust the top "noise threshold" slider.
7. Hit APPLY when you like what you hear

You know Sound Track Pro 1 will do this, right? STP2 and higher may be better at it, but the tools are there.

Hum and buzz generally means your connection betwen the mic and the equpment failed. Most times it's the connectors, but you can have an actual cable failure as well. I've cleaned up some problems with alcohol and paper towels--scrub and rub all connectors and dry them.

STP--as far as I know--doesn't have tools dedicated to hum. I'm still struggling with the program, so they may have hidden it somewhere I would never think of looking (Generate Tone isn't under either "Generate" or "Tone".). But I'm still looking.

Update:
The instructions insist the tools are there, but maybe you can find them. I'm still looking.

You need to know that as hum gets worse and worse, it turns into sharp buzz and that's fatal. Certain microphone amplifiers will also go into intermodulation distortion and that's fatal as well.

These tools all do stuff and sometimes they can be helpful, but they're usually used as a time interval where you figure out how to tell the client there is no show.

Koz

Wayne,
I did see the thread you copied from FAQ. Thanks for doing that. It's just that I didn't see any "select all" under "file", i know there's "Select All" under "Edit". And i didn't see "Process", "set noise print", "Reduce Noise" so I didn't take that post too seriously. I have Soundtrack 1.2 by the way.

So far, no filters semed to work miracles for me. The noises are subtle but because they're subtle yet noticeable enough to bug me. I hope mileage will help me to find something, some way. In the meantime, I just keep learning, searching and you guys are the hekova of a help.

<<<they're subtle yet noticeable enough to bug me. >>>

Just a note: You are the poster child for these tools. Most people approach them with the idea that the tools are going to rescue a completely destroyed show and make it sound like it was shot at Glen-Glenn Sound.

That's so not going to happen. You, on the other hand, have a minor but annoying sound problem that you would like to improve.

We can work with that.

Just to cover it. All the tools work in the same way. You let the program "sniff" the Room Tone--the room with nobody talking, and then the program uses that to try and subtract the room from the performance. The more Room Tone you can provide, the better. If you need to edit together "silent" segments of the performance to make the sniff sample long enough, you should do that. Do not include a sample with any voice at all in it. That will kill you.

The heavier programs have the ability to tune the Toom Tone Capture so make it as efficient as possible and then provide many controls for the actual patching process. Sound Track Pro tries to make this as painless and simple as possible and I hope to goodness they used best practice settings, because we can't tell what they're doing internally.

You should totally try and figure out that Noise Print thing. That's critical.

You can still get killed. If the Room Tone changes during the performance, you're dead. The process may work so well you can now hear other problems that you didn't hear before.

There is an up side to all this. Anybody who has been through an hour show with these tools becomes an expert on microphone use.

"Give me that microphone, doofus. I am not going through that again..."

Koz

If the noise is subtle, have you considered trying to cover it with ambience and sound design?


www.derekmok.com

I did try adding music but music won't fit in that clip conceptually and the consistency of the whole film. I am kind of new in the business so ambiance and sound design are other also new options for me. I can't even figure out the noise print yet, you see? But yes, I'll try the idea. Thank y'all.

Well, I wasn't suggesting music. I was suggesting tone and surrounding sound. But how successful that is would depend on how bad the noise is. Sound is a relative thing and sometimes it's better to dirty things up rather than attempt a cleanup that would annihilate your dialogue.


www.derekmok.com

I agree with you derek. I am looking into it and try to find ways to incoporate some sounds in there. It's kinda hard because the footage was shot overseas. I will spend some time to try though.

There's always that magic filter all audio technicians love, Overdub Loop, from ADR Technologies.


www.derekmok.com

Thanks, Derek. I wasted my time looking for Noise print/Process/Noise reduction when I don't have Soundtrack Pro. learned a lot however