Audio a little too clean

[George Bonilla]

Also, I am editng on Final Cut Pro latest version, thanks

[Ty Ford]

Hello George and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum,

Sounds recorded inside seldom sound like sounds recorded outside because there are inevitable sound reflections inside. You can try an overly dead room and the same mic and preamp that was used during shooting. Keep the mic at the same distance it was during shooting. It’s not easy to do well. Even with big budget movies I can sometimes hear the ADR line. Can you go back to the original location?

Do you have an alternative take where the audio is good? There is a plugin called Vocalign that can analyze the dialog in the scene you want to save and time expand/compress an alternate take so that it syncs with the scene you want. There are limits, but it’s pretty amazing stuff.

Regards,

Ty Ford

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[George Bonilla]

Hi Ty, thanks so much for the response. The problem we had on location was a busy street and motorcycles constantly passing. The ambient is pretty useless. Is there a filter in Fcp that will give it more of a outdoors ring? Thanks again

[Ty Ford]

Hi George,

Sorry. There really isn’t. Locations, and even mic angles at a location, have their own sonic finger print.

Regards,

Ty

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[John Fishback]

Try what Ty suggests. Use the same type mic that was used in the field and point it at the talent the same way it was done on location. If your studio is too live try using some sound blankets or other absorptive materials around the talent to deaden any reflections from the walls, ceiling, floor.

John

MacPro 8-core 2.8GHz 8 GB RAM OS 10.5.4 QT7.5 Kona 3 Dual Cinema 23 ATI Radeon HD 3870
ATTO ExpressSAS R380 RAID Adapter, PDE Enclosure with 8-drive 6TB RAID
24″ TV-Logic Monitor
Final Cut Studio 2 (up to date)

Pro Tools HD w SYNC IO, Yamaha DM1000, Millennia Media HV-3C, Neumann U87, Schoeps Mk41 mics, Genelec Monitors, PrimaLT ISDN

[George Bonilla]

Hi John, I really need to be able to do this artificially. The problem is the actors are scattered all over the country. I am sure there must be a way to filter the too live sound to give it more of an outdoor tone. I have the ambient just fine but the audio just sounds too canned. Any other ideas and I really appreciate your time. I was able to easily make a small room sound like a tunnel is there no way to make a small room sound like a yard? Thanks again guys!

[John Fishback]

FCP doesn’t have the greatest audio functionality. You might first try the graphic eq in the audio filters tab. Then experiment by pulling down first higher frequencies above 8 to 10 kHZ and see if that helps. The other range of freqs to play with are lower freqs – under 200kHz. See if that helps. Maybe the studio mic is “hearing” more highs or lows compared to the location mic. Rolling off the high end will make the sound “duller.” Rolling off the bottom will make it sound “thinner.”

If the problem is truly the “sound” of the space there’s not much you can do even with a high-end system. It’s the same answer as when people ask how to remove too much “echo” or reverberation. AFAIK that can’t be done.

John

MacPro 8-core 2.8GHz 8 GB RAM OS 10.5.4 QT7.5 Kona 3 Dual Cinema 23 ATI Radeon HD 3870
ATTO ExpressSAS R380 RAID Adapter, PDE Enclosure with 8-drive 6TB RAID
24″ TV-Logic Monitor
Final Cut Studio 2 (up to date)

Pro Tools HD w SYNC IO, Yamaha DM1000, Millennia Media HV-3C, Neumann U87, Schoeps Mk41 mics, Genelec Monitors, PrimaLT ISDN

[George Bonilla]

Thanks John, I will try that now. It is ironic that usually we are trying to clean the ambient out of audio. This time the audio just sounds to clean. One of my guys said it looked like a Japanese movie. The lips are sinced perfectly it is just they sound too good! Oops!

[John Fishback]

Let us know how it goes. Good luck.

John

MacPro 8-core 2.8GHz 8 GB RAM OS 10.5.4 QT7.5 Kona 3 Dual Cinema 23 ATI Radeon HD 3870
ATTO ExpressSAS R380 RAID Adapter, PDE Enclosure with 8-drive 6TB RAID
24″ TV-Logic Monitor
Final Cut Studio 2 (up to date)

Pro Tools HD w SYNC IO, Yamaha DM1000, Millennia Media HV-3C, Neumann U87, Schoeps Mk41 mics, Genelec Monitors, PrimaLT ISDN

[Randy Wheeler]

Take an audio speaker/monitor outside and playback the audio and rerecord it thru the same mic in front of that speaker. Then possibly mix/blend that new audio with the original if needed.

Randy