I recorded a presentation in a large room and was in a hurry. Channel one is the camera shotgun mic (XLR in) and channel two is an XLR in from a mixer attached to talent mics. Presentation was spoken word, no music or singing. Channel two on the camera was set to Mic LEVEL so of course the LINE LEVEL I was given over drove the channel. What do you recommend in Audition to try to correct? Limiting? Clip restore? It's not that the audio level is peaking, it is that there are no dynamics to it. It sounds like it was recorded in a metal shed. I also have Cubase 4 at my disposal, by I don't know how to use it as well.
Comments
follow-up I couldn't follow your suggestions. I got into AUDITI
follow-up
I couldn't follow your suggestions. I got into AUDITION and did a "resore moderately clipped" and that just seemed to reduce the volume. I had to turn it up again to hear anything but it seemed to sound better then. Someone else advised that "there's no dynamics because any level of input signal immediately clipped". The camera is a four thousand dollar HDV camera, a SONY HVR-Z1U, and the audio was monitored manually. The manual audio control on the camera can turn the line level up and down but it was crunchy through and through. There was no automatic gain control. There is a line / mic switch though. It's one of those mistakes you don't make twice.
Hmm... Odds are it's been soft-limited. That way it won't sound
Hmm...
Odds are it's been soft-limited. That way it won't sound distorted but it WILL be free of dynamics and could quite easily sound like a cranked PA system in a shed.
BASS SHACK, BABY BASS SHACK.
(This'll be the next trend: pimped out sheds with subwoofers and neon underlighting - and rims on the doors)
I have no idea how to use Cubase/Audition, so I can't help there.
You could try a little "upwards expansion" with a moderate attac
You could try a little "upwards expansion" with a moderate attack/release, and only push it a few dB. Quite a high threshold.
Of course - turn down the input volume to the expander (or output volume from it) or it'll just clip the track anyway.
Most cameras will have an automatic gain controller and that'll chop off the peaks. Basically a soft limiter.
You might want to listen closely to the mic track - it could well be affected by (at the same time as) the line level track.