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Hello all,

I was not sure if this was the proper forum for this, but I couldn't find one that seemed more appropriate.

I am working on a serious audio restoration project, trying to clean up poorly recorded speech in audio tapes from 30 years ago. The quality is very poor, but the tapes have signifigent historical value.

Are they studios that specialize in these kinds of things? I have googled the heck out of it, and I have found the tools that seem appropriate, from Cedar http://www.cedar-audio.com/, but no studios which seem to have them.

I am not an audio engineer, so I am assuming that there is no way I could do it on my own. Any one have any suggestions on where to start, who to call, anything?

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Don Grossinger Fri, 07/23/2004 - 14:57

Pacificiron,
Yes, this is the place. You might want to check out "forensic restoration" services. Those places can pull audible signal out of police survaillence tapes. That's the kind of studio to try. They can be found in L.A. I'm sure, as well as in the phone book in any major city.

Being in NY, I'm not sure of specific places on the left coast. Cedar is an amaizing tool to use, among others, for this kind of work.

Good luck!

FifthCircle Sat, 07/24/2004 - 12:20

There are a number of places that can do work like this for you...

What format are your tapes in and what level of work are you hoping to have done? Is this going to be a basic transfer with some cleaning or a high-resolution archival job? There is a lot possible out there depending on what you need and what you are willing to spend.

The forensic types will have some great gear for digging speech out, but you may find that to get that, they end up harming the sound. You may want to look at music or film houses to get a higher sonic quality.

Email me off list if I can be of further assistance...

--Ben

anonymous Tue, 07/27/2004 - 06:45

Hello,

I hate the self-promoting thing but we do projects like this all the time at Sony. Besides restoring recordings from as far back as the late 1800's, there are engineers here who do quite a bit of forensic work. We have full-blown Cedar and Sonic NoNoise as well as analog processors.

Feel free to email me with any questions.

joe lambert Tue, 07/27/2004 - 09:48

There was a studio in the mid 90's here in Manhattan. I forget the name, sadly the owner passed away. Most of there business was forensic work. The studio was in the same building as the studio I worked in at the time. He used Sonic for most of his work.
Like Mike said, Sonic is a great tool for this. We have 2 stereo no noise Sonic systems. Takes half as long as if you only have the one board.
It takes time to really learn how to get the most out of it. But once you do it's a great tool.