Noise Reduction Suggestions

[ollieb]

Hello all,

I am trying to come to a decision on which why I will go for noise reduction. Mostly location audio cleanup, remote interview cleanup... ambient sound.

The options I am considering are:

DINR - $500 - is there a demo of this available?
Waves - very expensive - tried the demo... it seems ok
any other I sound think about?

or

Hardware:

Dolby A Cat 43 with remote - mono - $750
Dolby SR Cat 430 - with remote - stereo - $1500
Cedar and Sonic - out of my budget

What do you guys think?

What do you guys use?

I am leaning toward the Cat 43, I know people swear by them... is $750 a good price? It seems like an antique though...

Thanks in advance!!

ollie

[froyo]

Hello. Well it sort of depends on what is being asked of you, how drastic the clean up is and what kind of budget your client has. I know that this client dynamic has been around forever, but I believe it has been exasperated exponentially now with digital tools people expect that DAW software can work miracles at the click of a mouse for under $5.

The truth is some amazing things can be achieved in the field of noise reduction or forensic audio restoration if the audio is in that bad a shape. However, the more drastic the clean up that is needed, the more that the tools are going to cost if you want something to sound OK.

In other words, independent films with low budgets or no budgets, can't expect to get results like Cedar if they are not willing to pay for Cedar. Cedar can do some amazing stuff very cleanly and transparently, but they are expensive.

Also, as you probably already know, a lot of clean up can be done with your regular every day tools like downward expansion and tight notch filters. Sometimes that's all you need.

If you want to stay on lower budgets, SoundSoap on Mac could be an alternative. Soundtrack Pro from Apple also has some noise reduction tools, although I don't think you can buy it standalone anymore. On the PC side Adobe Audition has some excellent noise reduction tools. Excellent for the money. It is Windows only but with Boot Camp now you can use it. And it is very affordable. Also on the PC only side a company called Algoritmix has some fantastic noise reduction tools. They are not extraordinarily expensive but they are over $2000 or more. However they have a more affordable line called Easy Tools for about $300 bucks or so which may be worth looking into. On the PC side still also look into Voxengo plug ins, I believe they have some affordable noise reduction plug ins that could work. They are VST plug ins but can be used with the FXPansion VST-RTAS wrapper. These are all things that Boot Camp is making available now.

As you know Waves and Sonic have good plug ins. Cedar also offers plug ins. I believe they are also about $2500 or above, but they are excellent.

You may want to think about doing rentals also and selling the client on the idea. If you can show a client what can be achieved with these more costly tools, they may be willing to pony up the dough. I know you can do Cedar hardware rentals, but nowadays there are also plug in rentals. You could rent Waves, Cedar or Sonic plug ins on a per session basis and charge it to the client. Check and see which plug ins can be rented.

However this is definitely ultimately one of those you get what you pay for deals. If they want fantastic results they should expect to pay fantastic prices. If they have limited budgets they will get limited results.

[ollieb]

Thanks for your comments,

I am willing to pay around $1000 give or take.

Anyone have any comments on my software v. hardware questions?

thanks,
o

[Precava]

Cedar is what you want. It works as sound reduction tool. Everything else leaves nasty artifacts just when they begin to work.

Without having Cedar myself, I find that the best thing to use is a multi-band compressor, like Waves' C4, as an upward compressor/expander. Set the attack and release times to be quick, and the threshold to just touch the dialogue. In my opinion, this works better than Soundsoap and DNIR. And if you have a particularly bad piece of audio, you can use several C4's in succession, designating each to cover a different band width. For example:

C4 #1(low) Band 1 0-100Hz
Band 2 100-250Hz
Band 3 250-500Hz
Band 4 bypass (500-20kHz)

C4 #2(mid) Band 1 bypass (0-500Hz)
Band 2 500-800Hz
Band 3 800-1200Hz
Band 4 bypass (1200-20kHz)

C4 #3(high) Band 1 bypass (0-1200Hz)
Band 2 1200-2400Hz
Band 3 2400-4800Hz
Band 4 4800-20000Hz

Obviously, you'd have to tailor the settings to fit your needs and add as many C4's as you want... but you get the idea.

Don't expect this to work if the sound you want to reduce is louder than the dialogue.

So, basically my suggestion is to not waste your money on the cheap stuff. I agree with the other post about renting. It makes sense if you're not using the equipment for more than a couple times a month.

Regards,
Jason Miller

[minister]

there is a much cheaper -- and somewhat better way to go than the CAT 430, WAVEARTS MUTLTIDYNAMICS can act like a compander. the 430 is aging technology, $750 is a lot of money (though i know they were expensive in their day). C4 also works great for this, but i personally don't care fro the WUP program, so i avoid waves. and besdies, the WAVEARTS works just as well for this and much less money.

if you understand companders, then you will know that that is only one tool. here is another cheap one : EQ. notch filters. spometimes in harmonic sequences, sometimes, just on the signature of the sound.

i have found SoundSoap to be worse than useless, i found it harmful.

DINR is good for about, MAYBE, 6dB of reduction and great for underwater effects! trick with a not so good tool like (or any) is to run it through twice. once at an amount that cause no artifacts. and a second pass at about the same settings. this is better than one brute force pass.

Sonic is fantastic! but out of your budget. Cedar is even more FANTASTIC but out of your budget.

look at SONY restoration, or waves.

[sidereal-studios]

I was going to suggest some combination of X-Noise and Elemental Audio's Eqium, which should keep you under your $1,000 budget. Alas, Waves doesn't sell X-Noise standalone. Looks like Waves' new thing is Z-Noise, which I have no familiarity with. I mention Eqium because it's cheap and good for hum, since it has various presets for removal that work very well.

Still might be worth investigating...

Eqium = $129
Z-Noise native = $800
Total = $929

Or...
Waves Restoration Native (X-Noise, hum, crackle, click) = $1,200

[CD Productions]

I have to say, I still like my Dolby Cat. 43A. Don't like the 430. With most plugs, its a trade off between artifacts and cleanlyness. Eqium by Elemental Audio systems is a terriffic notch filter for a very cheap price (I think $90). Sometimes a combination of plugs and hardware will do the trick.

[matt-o-]

In my practical mixing (and editing) work, I had the opportunity to work with several of the mentioned noise supressors. They all have their distinct advantages. I would summarize my experience as follows:
Cat. 43: the old fashioned sound, works nicely with not too problematic production sounds, gives voices a typical old-fashioned filmsound flavor, I sometimes use it, to colour too closely recorded adr in direction of production sound, moderately slow reaction time (Dolby A characteristics), not so useful for extreme treatments
Cat. 430: faster than 43, can clean up more critical production sound, colours less than 43, used to be one of my former favorites
Cedar: can do astonishing things, but can create very fast nasty artefacts, which I dislike very much. It works fine, if you want to chop dialog out of the production sound, but its hard, just to reduce the background noise a little
DINR: I never managed to get something useful out of this fingerprint denoiser, not my type of gear
Wavearts Multidynamics: if I have the opportunity to drop in during the editing, I use it prior to the mix. It works fine, but takes some time to fiddle. But you can do very detailed dynamic soundcorrection work. I bought it, because someone recommended it here in the DUC, and apart of some annoying behaviour of the plug in window, it sonically works fine
Elemental Audio Eqium: especially in conjunction with Inspector XL. If you combine the spectragram view with the Equim Filter you have a perfect tool to eliminate static hum and buzz. Works very fine!

If you do not have timesensitive clients sitting around you, I would recommend the software solutions (Wavearts&Eqium) because they offer more possibilities, otherwise the 43, because its moderatly prized and very fast to use, especially for straight Voice&Dialog cleanup.

just my 2 cents.
greetings, matthias

[ollieb]

You guys are fantastic... my partner just remembers that we get 2 free plug ins for upgrading to PT 7.0. I think one of our interns screwed them up... but I will try to get DINR.

And the Cat 43 seems to be so loved by everyone that I talked to I think I will try it out for a couple of days before I decide to pick it up.

I have the WaveArts Power bundle and use it constantly... what a fantastic company.

Thanks for all your help!!

cheers,
ollie

[Craig F]

You can always rent a Cedar for the job if nothing else is working.