make recordings from diff mics sound similar and compression question at DVinfo.net

Chris Sweet · May 7th, 2010, 01:22 PM

So Im a noob when it comes to audio post and am sound editing in FCP a feature I recorded. The timeline is a checkerboard jumping from lav1 to lav2 to boom mic etc. Sounds good, but sometimes the jump sounds too obvious. Is there a way to fix this?

Also for the levels.. do I need to go through the whole movie and individually edit the clips one at a time or is there a faster way? Any basic compression settings I could try?

Thanks heaps for any advice!

Rick Reineke · May 8th, 2010, 11:19 AM

I start by moving scene/talent/mic clips to a single track, for instance, "Scene 1', 'Talent/Lav 1' to the NLE's audio track 1".
Separate 'dual/mono (converged stereo) clips to single mono clips if needed depending on your NLE Manually adjust, via the clip/event volume or envelope. (Manually adjusting each clip's volume within the track/scene should be minimal unless poorly recorded.)
When scene clips are track assigned, I apply (if needed and as little as possible) EQ and compression to the track. (or a buss)

Andrew Hughes · May 10th, 2010, 02:55 PM

"do I need to go through the whole movie and individually edit the clips one at a time or is there a faster way?"

You pretty much have to go through and set each level individually. However, if as you said, only a few of the transitions are jarring, I would concentrate on leveling out those.

I'm not sure that doing this kind of work in FCP is going to be great. Probably exporting the audio to ProTools or Logic or something similar like that would make the job easier, especially when it comes to "matching" the different mics.

You're probably gonna have to apply some EQ to match the boom with the lavs, and depending on how dry the lav sound is and how wet the boom sound is, you might add a touch of reverb to the lav to make it sound more wet. But you'll need to play around with the reverb settings to try and match the reverb of the space, and with this, less is more. Dial it in until you really start to hear it, and dial it back a notch or two. It should be felt more than heard, unless you're going for a bathroom or warehouse effect.

As for compression, this is useful to tame some of the peaks in the dialog, but isn't a replacement for leveling the dialog with automation. You should try and get the dialog as level as you can before you apply any compression, as compression invariably changes the tonal characteristics of the sound to some degree.

Geoffrey Cox · May 10th, 2010, 04:15 PM

There's really no quick fix for this - just like image editing, fine tuning of audio takes time and effort and work on many individual files - compression can help but if things are varying a lot, it is a very blunt instrument - the music industry is obsessed with compression and it has ruined audio mastering mixing to some degree and I've noticed the tendency creeping into film sound more and more. Too much audio compression is very tiring on the ears and takes out subtlety and nuance and dynamic range of course.

I'd also second the point about FCP capacity for fine audio editing being rather limited - I use Logic for this though the natural DAW for FCP is Soundtrack Pro but I must say I find it rather limited.

Jay Massengill · May 11th, 2010, 07:18 AM

Did you record (or can you find at the start or end of a clip) any ambient sound from each of the mics while the talent is totally quiet?
An extra second of crossfading ambient sound can often help a transition from mic to mic be less noticeable if you must make a hard short cut due to dialogue timing. But as others have said that is part of the intensive audio work that is required to get a really good finished audio track.

May 7th, 2010, 01:22 PM	#1
Chris Sweet Regular Crew Join Date: Apr 2008 Location: Vancouver Canada Posts: 89	make recordings from diff mics sound similar and compression question So Im a noob when it comes to audio post and am sound editing in FCP a feature I recorded. The timeline is a checkerboard jumping from lav1 to lav2 to boom mic etc. Sounds good, but sometimes the jump sounds too obvious. Is there a way to fix this? Also for the levels.. do I need to go through the whole movie and individually edit the clips one at a time or is there a faster way? Any basic compression settings I could try? Thanks heaps for any advice!

May 8th, 2010, 11:19 AM	#2
Rick Reineke Inner Circle Join Date: Aug 2008 Location: New York Posts: 2,038	I start by moving scene/talent/mic clips to a single track, for instance, "Scene 1', 'Talent/Lav 1' to the NLE's audio track 1". Separate 'dual/mono (converged stereo) clips to single mono clips if needed depending on your NLE Manually adjust, via the clip/event volume or envelope. (Manually adjusting each clip's volume within the track/scene should be minimal unless poorly recorded.) When scene clips are track assigned, I apply (if needed and as little as possible) EQ and compression to the track. (or a buss)

May 10th, 2010, 02:55 PM	#3
Andrew Hughes Regular Crew Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Austin, TX Posts: 48	"do I need to go through the whole movie and individually edit the clips one at a time or is there a faster way?" You pretty much have to go through and set each level individually. However, if as you said, only a few of the transitions are jarring, I would concentrate on leveling out those. I'm not sure that doing this kind of work in FCP is going to be great. Probably exporting the audio to ProTools or Logic or something similar like that would make the job easier, especially when it comes to "matching" the different mics. You're probably gonna have to apply some EQ to match the boom with the lavs, and depending on how dry the lav sound is and how wet the boom sound is, you might add a touch of reverb to the lav to make it sound more wet. But you'll need to play around with the reverb settings to try and match the reverb of the space, and with this, less is more. Dial it in until you really start to hear it, and dial it back a notch or two. It should be felt more than heard, unless you're going for a bathroom or warehouse effect. As for compression, this is useful to tame some of the peaks in the dialog, but isn't a replacement for leveling the dialog with automation. You should try and get the dialog as level as you can before you apply any compression, as compression invariably changes the tonal characteristics of the sound to some degree.

May 10th, 2010, 04:15 PM	#4
Geoffrey Cox Major Player Join Date: Aug 2008 Location: Huddersfield, UK Posts: 469	There's really no quick fix for this - just like image editing, fine tuning of audio takes time and effort and work on many individual files - compression can help but if things are varying a lot, it is a very blunt instrument - the music industry is obsessed with compression and it has ruined audio mastering mixing to some degree and I've noticed the tendency creeping into film sound more and more. Too much audio compression is very tiring on the ears and takes out subtlety and nuance and dynamic range of course. I'd also second the point about FCP capacity for fine audio editing being rather limited - I use Logic for this though the natural DAW for FCP is Soundtrack Pro but I must say I find it rather limited.

May 11th, 2010, 07:18 AM	#5
Jay Massengill Trustee Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Burlington Posts: 1,976	Did you record (or can you find at the start or end of a clip) any ambient sound from each of the mics while the talent is totally quiet? An extra second of crossfading ambient sound can often help a transition from mic to mic be less noticeable if you must make a hard short cut due to dialogue timing. But as others have said that is part of the intensive audio work that is required to get a really good finished audio track.