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Gear / Technical Help => Ask The Tapers => Topic started by: George on March 23, 2004, 09:43:22 PM

Title: Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: George on March 23, 2004, 09:43:22 PM
As some of you may have read, my Neil Young tape from this past weekend has some static in it due to excessive bass and vocals, partly my fault for running the volume a little high (not bleeding high, but close to).  So, i have Adobe Audition and was wondering (praying) if there's a sure fire way (yeah right) to get rid of this crap and have my tape back the way i wanted it ( :'().  LOL...ok, i'm overreacting, but man, this tape could be pretty sweet without the static (yeah i know, big lesson learned on setting volume up at a show that didn't seem too loud...at first).

I tried declipping and all it appeared to do was lower the volume to a point where the harshest of the clipping was "lowered" in volume...am i doing it right?

So, i want to post a mp3 sample so you guys can hear what i'm referring to and let me know if it sounds like shyte or if its possible to clean up, where can i host a file that may be a few MB's in size so you guys (and gals( can hear it?  Let me know and i'll get to it.   If you guys think it sounds tolerable the way it is, then i'll go ahead and spread it out to the newsgroup.

Thanks in advance for your comments   ;D
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: Chanher on March 24, 2004, 12:30:04 AM
is the actual feature you used called "declipping"?  if so, then that is probably you're best bet. play around with it, I usually like to make a bunch 15 sec. comparitve samples (including an original unedited clip) that I listen to on my best playback system.
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: mgleason007 on March 24, 2004, 01:22:18 AM
As some of you may have read, my Neil Young tape from this past weekend has some static in it due to excessive bass and vocals, partly my fault for running the volume a little high (not bleeding high, but close to).  So, i have Adobe Audition and was wondering (praying) if there's a sure fire way (yeah right) to get rid of this crap and have my tape back the way i wanted it ( :'().  LOL...ok, i'm overreacting, but man, this tape could be pretty sweet without the static (yeah i know, big lesson learned on setting volume up at a show that didn't seem too loud...at first).

I tried declipping and all it appeared to do was lower the volume to a point where the harshest of the clipping was "lowered" in volume...am i doing it right?

So, i want to post a mp3 sample so you guys can hear what i'm referring to and let me know if it sounds like shyte or if its possible to clean up, where can i host a file that may be a few MB's in size so you guys (and gals( can hear it?  Let me know and i'll get to it.   If you guys think it sounds tolerable the way it is, then i'll go ahead and spread it out to the newsgroup.

Thanks in advance for your comments   ;D

PM me and I'll let you host it on my site.
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: Sean Gallemore on March 24, 2004, 01:43:57 AM
gloco, are you running mic-in or line-in on the M1?  If you are running mic-in for the preamp, it is wise to keep the M1 under -6 dB unless you have had Oade mod the preamp.
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: Brian Skalinder on March 24, 2004, 07:42:48 AM
If you are running mic-in for the preamp, it is wise to keep the M1 under -6 dB unless you have had Oade mod the preamp.

Huh?
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: George on March 24, 2004, 08:24:45 AM
gloco, are you running mic-in or line-in on the M1?  If you are running mic-in for the preamp, it is wise to keep the M1 under -6 dB unless you have had Oade mod the preamp.

Line in as always, i kept the meters on the M1 about -2db and it still clipped...what didn't help the situation was that the volume in the venue was turned up about 90 minutes into the venue, i had earplugs on so i didn't notice it was as big a raise as it came out on the recording.

Chris, yep, it's called declipping iirc, when i used it it knocked the overall volume down about 12db so the clipping wasn't too bad anymore...but i was under the impression it did a more thorough job of removing the clipping...guess that's what its meant to do.

Thanks for the comments guys.   :)

mgleason, i'll shoot you a pm this evening, thanks!
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: nickgregory on March 24, 2004, 08:53:53 AM
In my case, it was not clipping....it was the mics overloading (when you post the MP3 I will let you know if it sounds the same).  And when that happened to me, I played with every plugin made in WAVES and there was nothing that would fix it, which is not suprising, since the distortion is on the tape....I realized I was asking the editor to be a miracle worker and enhance something that was not there.
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: George on March 24, 2004, 12:12:30 PM
In my case, it was not clipping....it was the mics overloading (when you post the MP3 I will let you know if it sounds the same).  And when that happened to me, I played with every plugin made in WAVES and there was nothing that would fix it, which is not suprising, since the distortion is on the tape....I realized I was asking the editor to be a miracle worker and enhance something that was not there.

Ok, hopefully i'll get some clarification on what i;m hearing, i bet the mics were overloading because on the M1 the meter's didn't hit OVER once.  Say, where does brickwalling fit into this mess?
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: George on March 24, 2004, 06:35:27 PM
url for two samples, the first one is 1.86MB and the second is: 2.12, encoded to 256Kb mp3's with mkw:

http://www.geocities.com/gdloco/Main_Page.html?1080171143296

My rig that night was: at853 (hypers)>soundpro batt box (bass rolloff set to 160Hz), preamp +29db>M1.

Feel free to jump in and voice your opinions, thanks!

George
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: leegeddy on March 24, 2004, 06:46:02 PM
url for two samples, the first one is 1.86MB and the second is: 2.12, encoded to 256Kb mp3's with mkw:

http://www.geocities.com/gdloco/Main_Page.html?1080171143296

My rig that night was: at853 (hypers)>soundpro batt box (bass rolloff set to 160Hz), preamp +29db>M1.

Feel free to jump in and voice your opinions, thanks!

George

georg;

i gave the RitfW a listen.  it's distorted, and i don't think there's nothing you can do to remove it.  you may want to lower the bass a tad and leave it be.

marc
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: nickgregory on March 24, 2004, 06:48:01 PM
this is exactly the problem I had.  Running higher bass rolloff, or levels lower on the DAT would not have helped.  The powering that the mics are receiving from the batt box are not sufficient for the SPLs and it is distorting at the mic as a result.

Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: George on March 24, 2004, 06:56:47 PM
:(  

stinky, do you guys think its worth spreading out even with that bloody distortion?  
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: nickgregory on March 24, 2004, 06:59:25 PM
your call, but I didnt spread any of mine that had this problem...and hated it when I downloaded a show that had a similar problem and it was not called out in the source file.
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: George on March 24, 2004, 07:04:40 PM
Ok, i aint spreading it then...i had someone request a copy from here, i'll send him the link and he can decide if he still wants a copy of the show...man, doesn't this suck?  I can't wait to get my mics upgraded with phantom power, thanks again for the comments

+t nick  :)
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: nickgregory on March 24, 2004, 07:06:55 PM
it really sucks to go to the trouble to get everything in, do everything right inside and have an equipment failure.  It took me a couple of these experiences to decide it wasn't going to happen again, and caused me to invest in a better solution for what I stealth....+T, better days will be ahead
Title: Re:Removing static/distortion from a recording
Post by: George on March 24, 2004, 07:16:40 PM
it really sucks to go to the trouble to get everything in, do everything right inside and have an equipment failure.  It took me a couple of these experiences to decide it wasn't going to happen again, and caused me to invest in a better solution for what I stealth....+T, better days will be ahead

Thanks for the good vibes, hopefully by converting my mics to phantom power that should solve for the problem for the time being   ;)