Cool Edit Pro question

[Lydia Wilkes]

Hi. I recently transferred a cassette tape to my mini disc and then to
my computer. I was wondering if anyone could provide some advice on
reducing the tape hiss using CEP. Any help would be greatly
appreciated.

Thanks very much,
Lydia

[Scott Dorsey]

Lydia Wilkes <binxlovesblue@hotmail.com> wrote:
>Hi. I recently transferred a cassette tape to my mini disc and then to
>my computer. I was wondering if anyone could provide some advice on
>reducing the tape hiss using CEP. Any help would be greatly
>appreciated.

Go back and do it again, but THIS time don't go through the minidisc
generation. The lossy compression isn't all that audible, but it makes
further processing impossible.

While you are doing this, ALSO make sure the azimuth is right. Ride
the azimuth for the tape, and listen in mono. Just keep adjusting it
until the top end is as bright as possible.

Once you have a file on your computer that has reasonable top end and
doesn't have any lossy compression artifacts, THEN you can look into
broadband noise reduction software. CEP doesn't work badly at all on
the cheap, but it can't do miracles so get as close to the source as
possible.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Carey Carlan]

binxlovesblue@hotmail.com (Lydia Wilkes) wrote in
news:572e72c1.0308131230.3218e712@posting.google.c om:

> Hi. I recently transferred a cassette tape to my mini disc and then to
> my computer. I was wondering if anyone could provide some advice on
> reducing the tape hiss using CEP. Any help would be greatly
> appreciated.

Find a portion of the recording that is noise only (usually beginning or
end will do). Highlight that portion. Play it to make sure you hear just
hiss.

Effects > Noise Reduction > Noise Reduction...

Click 'Get Profile from Selection'
FFT size = 24000 points
Reduce by 10 dB
click 'Close'

The above steps teach NR what noise sounds like.

Now click on the track to un-highlight.

Return to Noise Reduction and click OK. This step reduces the noise.

Listen to the results. You'll definitely have less noise, but you might
also loose sound quality. If you want to reduce the noise level more,
repeat the above process. Continue until it's as quiet as you like or
until the NR artifacts get ugly. Don't expect a dead quiet background with
crystal clear music. That won't happen.

[Jonas Eckerman]

binxlovesblue@hotmail.com (Lydia Wilkes) wrote in
news:572e72c1.0308131230.3218e712@posting.google.c om:

> Hi. I recently transferred a cassette tape to my mini disc and then to
> my computer.

First sugestion is to record it directly to the computer without going
through mini disc. You want to minimize the noise in thye first place, and
it's allways a bad idea to apply a lossy audio compression before
processing the audio. Personally I bought a used cassette deck solely for
that, so I don't have to connect the computer to the stereo.

> I was wondering if anyone could provide some advice on
> reducing the tape hiss using CEP.

I can tell what I do.

Important note: I mainly clean speech recordngs (interviews and similar
stuff), wich is rather different from music. The recordings are usually
very bad, lot's of hiss and hum, because they have been recorded on cheap
cassette recorders and often transfered at least once from casette to
cassette.

I have found that I get less artifacts on real bad recordings if I apply
Cool Edits hiss reduction before I use the noise reduction. This might well
be a bad method for music.

1: Apply Hiss Reduction. Use the preview function on selectede pieces of
the recording and fiddle with the controls to find a good balance. You want
to remove as much hiss as possible without destroying the sound. For music,
hiss reduction can severly destroy the sound of some instruments, and for
speech it can make some voices sound unnatural.

2: Find a piece with only noise and select it. Open the Noise Reduction
plug and use get profile from selection. Close the plug. Use the preview
function on selected pieces of the recording and fiddle with the controls
to find a good balance. You want as much noise reduction as possible
without wrecking the recording. Too much noise reduction will create very
unpleasant artifacts.

3: Sometimes a touch of Virtos Denoiser (a commerisal DirectX plug) in
automatic mode (no noise print) can make the recording sound a bit better
when applied after the heavy noise reduction. I have no idea why.

On some recordings I've had to apply rather brutal filters to get rid of
the noise. One very badly done recording made outdoors in a lot of wind
comes to mind.

If your recording is music rather than speech, you'll have to be much
gentler with this stuff. With speech, the main thing is that you can
comfortably hear what's being said. It's very easy to completely **** up a
music recording by beeing to heavy handed with noise reduction tools. If
the recording is really bad, you simply can't clean it so that it becomes
good. You'll either have some noise left, or you'll create unpleasant
artifacts.

Regards
/Jonas

[Jonas Eckerman]

binxlovesblue@hotmail.com (Lydia Wilkes) wrote in
news:572e72c1.0308131230.3218e712@posting.google.c om:

> my computer. I was wondering if anyone could provide some advice on
> reducing the tape hiss using CEP.

Forgot:

Does Cool Edit Professional include Syntrillium's noise reduction plugs? If
not, then you'll probably want to buy that package.

/Jonas

[Troy]

Yes ,it has noise reduction.


Jonas Eckerman <jonas@truls.org> wrote in message
news:Xns93D9AD19B7194wastheworldcreatedby@127.0.0. 1...
> binxlovesblue@hotmail.com (Lydia Wilkes) wrote in
> news:572e72c1.0308131230.3218e712@posting.google.c om:
>
> > my computer. I was wondering if anyone could provide some advice on
> > reducing the tape hiss using CEP.
>
> Forgot:
>
> Does Cool Edit Professional include Syntrillium's noise reduction plugs?
If
> not, then you'll probably want to buy that package.
>
> /Jonas

[Arny Krueger]

"Jonas Eckerman" <jonas@truls.org> wrote in message
news:Xns93D9AD19B7194wastheworldcreatedby@127.0.0. 1
> binxlovesblue@hotmail.com (Lydia Wilkes) wrote in
> news:572e72c1.0308131230.3218e712@posting.google.c om:
>
>> my computer. I was wondering if anyone could provide some advice on
>> reducing the tape hiss using CEP.
>
> Forgot:
>
> Does Cool Edit Professional include Syntrillium's noise reduction
> plugs?

It does.

>If not, then you'll probably want to buy that package.

Not necessary if you already have CEP.

[Jonas Eckerman]

Jonas Eckerman <jonas@truls.org> wrote in
news:Xns93D9ACAF3ACCDwastheworldcreatedby@127.0.0. 1:

> I can tell what I do.

A slight addition:

I'm just now cleaning a very bad speech recording with lot's of hiss and
some machine noise. The hiss has two main characteristics, probably some of
it comes from when it was recorded and some from when it was later
copied to the casette I've received. It's pretty hard to get rid of enough
noise without getting unpleasant artifacts. What I'm doing right now is
this:

1: Hiss reduction as in previous post.

2: Noise reduction based on a noise print from before the actual recording
starts. This means it get only hiss that's added later, during copying.

3: Noise reduction based on a noise print further in. This print gets
what's left of the hiss from the original recording.

This two part noise print stuff works a *lot* better than doing just one
pass on this material. I can get rid of most hiss, leaving artifacts and
machine noice at a low enough level to not disturb listening to the speech.

If I get the time, I might then try some gateing or filtering, but that's
not necessary.

Regards
/Jonas