anaes int So ep Tp Troe: te Noman Noe on ‘he Bent vceoeroners Resource -NET Sony Vegas Tips & Tricks: Audio Normalization and Noise Reduction Br Die Mek ed 3m 31, 209, Welcome ta our latest tutorial on Sony veges! The mont’ tople saudi. But before we get nto dealng with aud In postpoducton, allow me to gat on my soapbox about videographers obtaining quality audio in the first pace. Strive to get the best-qualy aud you can ght up fron t's been said hat audio makes up at ast halt fof wnat you"see" ia your video What coes tet mean? It means thet the auslocampanert af ou work actully judged mare ciicaly than the video component. “our autlencs may notevennotce—or mil 3 leat frgwve-—shaky ideo 9 poo color, Bit even the slgntest aud eropavt is raticoaole. Be sure to spene enough te Planning how you wil acoure the aus fr Your productions. Tis may include any combination of the following? lapel Tes (wired or witsess): Feld recorders such a¢ those fom Marantz, Eat or tre weeding daring iRiver; boom mis wth eperatrs; Rana-held mcs; anc camera-mourted ms! knew snoctng ve events can be treky, But most of ur ean doa better job at Bu for hase stances when your captured audio leaves something to be desire, Ws grest to have pesoroducion take that can make a diference. Sony Vegas actualy started ie as 2 multack digital audio workstaton (OAW) plot Being a vdeo pewerouse, anc stil Boasts the best complement of aio features af any KLE an the marset ‘Step 1: Drag an Audio File Into the Timeline aes tnke 2 lock st what Vegas das up automaticaly win every audio Pace. Orag an aus fet the timee. Clk he Taek Fx Deton onthe Track Hea voullse thet by dela you areedy hove an EQ, Compressor, and Noise Gele every auio Wack (Figure 1, below) tops nrc oethe most common talk used in auslo work. Although these tole ar already asigned to Your tack thay ae aweys Set by default to neutral, oF 8 nortfect state, We're going to skp over these Base tools oF now, but we wl tak about the Compressor ina tr arte, ‘Step 2: Check Your Levels Before jumping Inte the tools, let's check our levels, View the basic aulo mixer in Vas by choosing View - Mixer (Figure 2, below). ep mer chaise!nanzs vent So ep Tp Troe: te Noman Nose on ‘step 3: Open the Leves Editor Play your oui trek nthe timeline by clicking the spaceber, pressing the | key, or leking the Play lon. Where goth levels it on the mixer? A genelrle of thumb i hat your audio should peak at “645. You can go as high as 0, but shouts you? Probably not, butt cepends on your application and Your audence, Alt of enn ea erent aanaes vent So ep Tp Troe: te Noman Noe on current pop and eck musics mixed in such a way hat everthing is aormalizee, compresses, ane squashed to it consistently at a8. Tere is no dynam ange, thre arena percawvee peaks and valley nthe volume, and faigves loners ‘Then again, ave you ever noticed how the commercials on TV are “Touder” tan the rogram? I's because they've gt only afew seconds to grab your attention, and the same concep o keeping the audio constant at Od is employed: In ary case, you must rever go higher than Od8 becavse you'lleng up wih digralestoreen. Your mixer wishow you when you go higher than 0 by displaying the dB level in re (Figure 3, below} tops nrcnanaos vent So ep Tp Troe: te Noman Nose on Never Go Above 0 dB ‘step 4: Adjust Volume Over Time ‘You can adjust the volume of your audio track overtime by using # Volume Fnvelope and sting envelope pois. Click on your audi track to select. From the menu, choose Insert ~ Audio Envelopes ~ Volume (Figure 4, below) ep mer chaise!anaes vent So ep Tp Troe: te Noman Nose on Prony Shera aioe pares Fee cee changes in Vohime Over Time the monitoring device youll use here to check the overall sound levels. As you add audi tracks, your overall combined volume wil Increase. Ths Is where mixing becomes an ar Since your overall output nau sly stny around 68, rome tacks may need fo ncreare in volume whe You may have 9 resuce the volume of erste get the prog mie eons Pro allows you to have an unlimited numberof audio ane vdeo tracks. When youre desling with many audi tracks or when you's working on an suo-only ‘multback projec vs nett to use the Mixing Console view, which emulates a recording suido's mixing conole. rom the menu, choose View ~ Mixing Consol, For the purposes of is arc though, we're seckng with te staneare Vegas mixer described ear. Step 5: Choose Switches to Normalize Thernext procedure i want to ciscuss is ormatzaton. n Vegas, nermalzation Is found by rghtccking the aud event and choosing Shes Normalize. THs tcl Is Used a adjust he overall evel ofthe suo, Veges takes the laidest pk ofthe event sets to OB (atthe event evel) and everything soe inte event set Felatve to tht. This is called Peak Nermalzaten. Sony Sound Forge, 2 ere cetled and specific aucl too, can do AUS Normalizing, which rls the volue based fon the average lrvel ofthe auido event instead of te peak. Since both product come from Sony Creatve Software (Sound Forge als separately) there Is 3 natural integration betes thes. You can start with allo your auda evens in Vegas and perform more cealed surgery on them with Sound Farge as needed, for an extreme arount of fe-tning of your auto ‘ut for tis article, were going to do Normalization frm Vagas only. To Normalize your auto track in Vege, right-click th event and ten choote Switches ~ Normatze (Figure 5, betow), tops nrc oeStep 6: Look for Peaks in the Audio Waveform ‘The "Sten" paracgm Is equivalent t “tipping @ switch” ona mixer’ input channel Once normal2ee, you may netce the waveform has changed its shape Pay the Depending onthe orginal avo fe, you mht not Bu #he volume was recorded ow to Bepin wn, wl now Be four, Any peaks inthe fle wil be acusted to Od. Lats aay, for example, sur aus oF» mumbling groom. In our sua sarmle you con sor of heer xe groom, but you can defintely heb where ne fumble wih iz 1 and brushed the mcropnone,creang an unmanted peak (Figure 6, Below). Te same could be Vue of # cough, a sneeze, or some einer transient sour. — EE <= tops nrcnanan vent So ep Tp Troe: te Noman Nose on then you normale, you set the loudest point ofthe event to OdB. (Remember, in Vegas we have Peak No-mslizaton) The udest pont was when the groom brshed ‘One thing you can dot i tha to alate that peak away from te other sudo and normalize again (Figure 7, below). Set your cursor jut before the peak and ek 5 for Spt. Then set your cursor eo just aftr the peak and cick again tops nrc weraises rin So ep Tp Troe: te Noman Noe on co Plast Ties O-[¥ Track Noise Gate HP treckeo HIP Track compressor . [Auto gah compensation [Smooth saturation ‘Stop 8: Insert a Volume Envelope and Add Certelek eaes evert an ether size af he unwanted noisy peak, right-click, and again choose Switches ~ Normalize. (If Nermalze is already checked, do tis wice to Ise original peak of te Bushes mic Figure 8, below). top nceronass int So ep Tp Tee te Noman Nose on ‘You can further acust he loudness by inserting a vlume envelope as previeusy described and insereng your volume points where neaded. Step 9: Ieolate the Noise ‘As you stent your audio event; does It sound nosy? Maybe you reoréed a person taking In 2 noisy room, and when the person pauses detween sentences you can environment where @ constant noise ar hum was present. OF if the audio was recorded too low and then brought up via normalzation, there may be some backaround hiss & Noise Reduction (Wt) plug-in can help eliminate hiss, num, ane eter types of nase IRs noticed wih Vegee Pro, but sane ofthe fist aude plug-ns I racommend gating. As a stand-alone plug-in it's avallabe for purchase from Sony Create Softuare, but sao incades wih the previouly mentones Sony Sound Forge aus ear (but no wrth re Sound Forge Audio Studs Ine vernon. The NR pon stone makes buying SoundForge a great value f you have Sound Frge stalled, you can use the iduded NR plug-in dee from within Vegas winout Raving fopen the auton Sound vorge you dont nee, The dea behind WRI snp once you understand I. Lats say your audio I of # person talking drt nto te camera mi. When you recorded you dnt rele you were stanaing near an ar conctoner vert that produced 2 constant hum. But ence you go: nt the ed, the Mum ia oo notceabe (Figure 9, below, eft). See Using the NR plugin, We're gong to “teach the NR plug-in whch pat af our aud is nlee xo at wil lear the frequencies to operate on, First place the selecton irs onthe timeline 3¢ a pont where the only aso I oie. Nxt, clk the Taek Pk button bring up al the plugins on tis rack Sn lk the "Plug-in China” bution (Figure 9, Below, ght) tops nrc coGood Audio Step 10: Select the Noise Reduction Plug-in Selec the NR plugs for your auto track by deube-ccking on I fom the Ist of effects that comes up. This assumes that you have eer istalee Sound Forge wih the NR plugn ietaled jst the RR plg-n by Arle. Ether way, once the plug-in iz sales, youll see inthe Is of effets availble for Vegas Pro (Figure 10) tops nrc v0Step 11: Capture a Nolseprint Inthe NR plug-in nthe car, select the Noeeprint tab Think of moseprint a # thumbprint, something that uniquely iden the noise, Check the box or Capture noiseprt (Figure 11, below) ep mer chaise!nanan vt So ep peo: ie Noman Noe on [Beloton ecomser ‘Step 12: Identify the Noize and Reduce nen you are reacy to nave th Noise Reduction “learn” what you're dentving as noise, cIck the very top bar ofthe main Vegas window to get focus Back tothe main program. Clck the L key to tart playback fom the current positon ofthe cursor. “The NR plugin instant grabs hols ana leans what to recognize as noise. Wat 1 second and ck the K Key t stop playback. ‘You may find that once apie the overall timbre ofthe audio has changed, perhaps t a point of sounding robotic and unnatral. The NR plug-in wses very specific qualzers ane ters to work ts magi; isnt alnays perfect. Yu can adust te amount of else reduction tats applied to You le by adjusting ee ser abeled Reduce noise by (cB) (Figure 12, below). Tha defask amount of noise reduction apples is 12eB, but you may na you need more or less. If you find you need a ‘more, you can even chain opether instances ofthe NR plugin one flr the other. tops nrc owvt So ep pee: te Noman Nose on eel Ties O-[¥ Track Noise Gate HP trackeo ER track compressor HIP nose Redoction 2 reset; [ [Sys] Detauk for Fast computers a x] 2 ae eee) fudicon —[Fodez =] Reduce noe by (od: ———[J—— [zo ies (20 20) —g foo — Ici: © trerage Peak rs aio sy —«a00 amore 7 ake eho 980 aaa Keep residual output Ft sae (2t02,048 ports): [5123] FE capture noseprint I~ Automatic capture timeout .005to 1Sseconds): [1.000 S| plug-in works. This is one of those tools hat can really clean up your suo Practice using noes reduction on several diferent sud fest got the fel of how top nceanaes vent So ep Tp Troe: te Noman Nose on David Meknight (dovid at mcknightvideo.com) is haf of Ncknight Video of Houston. He is vice president ofthe Houston Profesional Videographers Associaton, has Sony Vegas and HOV cerication, i the technical edtr of Veoas P08 Edting Workshop (Foca ress), ad se cantibutor to TheTuIMD Bask (VASST). He and his tops nrc sw