Spoken word time compression prob

[Blue Ridge]

What's the best way to lengthen or to shorten recordings of spoken word interviews to fit exact broadcast time specs -- say, to shorten an interview from 30:30 to 28:45, "speeding up" the (lengthy) passage without altering the pitch? Is it merely a time-compression issue, or are there more delicate and sophisticated elements to consider?

This is new territory for me. The quality need not be of the highest fidelity (pre-Woodstock term there), since it's for AM radio in a talk-show format.

One PT book recommends Serato's "Pitch'n'Time." Is that overkill, or will nothing less work?

Any other third-arty programs out there?

Many thanks for any and all advice, we're starting from scratch here.

Blue Ridge

[grindx]

Time Compression is one method, but to minimize the timbre change, I would scan back through the piece and remove areas of silence where appropriate. If you can tighten it up a bit, you may not have to use the Time Compression effect, or at the very least you will minimize the amount you have to effect it. I realize that this is a spoken word recording and removing pauses may alter the artist's performance.

[MissHiss]

While the Time Compression/Expansion/ plug-in in the Audio Suite menu will do the trick, with an interview of that length chances are you can edit out some pauses to help start bringing it within range. Too much time compression will start to sound artificial --like one of those commercials where the announcer(s) talk really fast. Lengthening can be even worse. I've found that once you lengthen something by more than about 4 percent of the original time, it tends to sound like you're talking to somebody who is either retarded or almost deaf. These days, where everything in media comes at you fast, it can really stand out in a negative way.

Frankly, for a job like the one you describe, I think Pitch'n'Time probably is overkill. AM radio talk show. Yeah. Definitely. On the other hand, if it's likely you'll need to do this sort of thing frequently in the future, it's probably worth getting.

[Blue Ridge]

Thanks, I'll start praticing and get up to speed.

Blue Ridge

[Blue Ridge]

Thanks, I'll start praticing and get up to speed.

Blue Ridge

[froyo]

Hello. The reduction you are attempting should be workable. As was mentioned make sure you edit out breaths and pauses first. After you have a good edit you may go from say your initial 30 min 30 sec to 29 min 40 sec. After that, compressing the entire thing down to 28 min 45 sec may work. If it doesn't or some parts just sound too rushed or weird, the next step is to compress different sections separately to achieve the desired time. However, from 30 min 30 sec once you take out breaths and pauses you may be as far down as 26 or 27 minutes so that may be all you need. Good luck.

[Blue Ridge]

Thanks, I'll give it a go this weekend.

[Blue Ridge]

I'm using "strip silence" and hand-edits to remove silence, burps, and other extraneous material from a voice-recording (interview style) for AM radio (pre-recorded, of course).

I'm finding that the operations leave a growing number of new Regions with some little space between each one, all the way through the 30-minute or so broadcast program.

So far I've had to hand-push those regions together in Shuffle mode, one at a time, to line them up side-by-side, without any space between them.

Is there any "macro" command that can automatically bunch them alongside one another, removing the spaces between them? There are dozens of them in the longer program segments.

Once this tightening is achieved, I can use the helpful adivce already given regarding time compression/expansion, if needed for tweaking. But this operation is basic and has to come first.

Many Thanks

Blue Ridge