O - M - G !

Now THAT'S what I call "Grazie Proof"!

I have been a very late-comer to the iZotope group of plugs - got mine in SF9. But I am a complete convert now.

The visual representation of the sounds, sine curves and wavforms is truly awesome, and simple to understand. And now with iZotope RX™ this has made audio repair/recovery not too dissimilar to the Colour Correction we get in Sony - what you SEE is what you are gonna get.

I freaked when I saw the coughing and rattling of "coffee-cups" firstly being identified and then, THEN, directly on the waveform being SCRUBBED! And removed! OMG!

I don't have Audition 2, so this might be the one for me.

Bob, I regularly get the iZotope mailings to my inbox, this WAS going to be my next read. You posting here - and I KNOW the quality of your posting "Go-see" nudges are always worth the viewing, I clicked on the link. Thanks.

They say the Rx will have plug-ability come the new year. I hope that would include Vegas/SF? Must do, huh?

Grazie

"I hope that would include Vegas/SF? Must do, huh?"

I think it'd take a stuff up of monumental proportions to stop it from working, then again in this game nothing suprises me anymore :)

I'm kind of hoping seeing as how SCS and iZotopes have been pretty chummy of late we just might get some kind of deal on this, would be nice. As much as I love NR2 etc it is, um, well, getting kind of dated and I've always felt plugins were best left to those who specialise in them and the guys who write the DAW code should focus on their side of the fence so such a deal would sit nicely with me. Of course a contra deal for the Oxford plugs would have been even sweeter, sigh.

Bob.

"Of course a contra deal for the Oxford plugs would have been even sweeter, sigh."

Eh? Dunno this?

And yes, iZo's plugs I DO have are just so user friendly and OBVIOUS that I'm too going to the EQ Plug to do NR. Maybe not the correct thing to do, but it sure removes heaps of background stuff - and easily too!

I still can't get over the rattling coffee cups and coughing! - They have taken audio and made it very visual.

Grazie

"Eh? Dunno this?"

How could you not, just a stones throw from you in Oxfordshire, in what looks like a very English countryside. They're now called Sonnox, well they've spun the plugin business off from the hardware.

I've found another UK group, in London no less, The Foundry who write some very nice video plugins (don't run in Vegas though). Check out some of their FXs, like Condensation. At first I went arrgh, what a rip off, I can do all this in Vegas but when you dig a bit deeper you see their stuff really has that 14th coat of wax look to it.

But getting back to iZotopes RX, yes indeed, I first saw this more visual way of working in an Audition demo, up to that point I was going "boring, I can do all this in SF or Vegas". Oh if you like this visualization, then Vizualizer (LE version is free) will thrill you too. Only a metering tool though.

Bob.

Bob.

Thanks Bob...great find.....

Gees, I must be wierd. I am always looking for those coughing type sounds to make non recorded audio tracks sound real. Like scrapes, ac noise, room noise, bumps, objects dropping, baby crying, wind noise, table cloth flapping, human babling, car noise, train whistles, jet aircraft, tv noise, lawn mower noise, kids playing, etc.
JJK

I've been using RX for a while, and I can tell you it is amazing. It really does do wonders. The noise reduction stuff in SF is great, and quick, but when you have something that needs more advanced work, or something more transparent, then RX steps up. It also has major control over resampling and bit depth conversion that may make it one of the best tools for conversion, let alone noise reduction.
The spectral repair will leave you gobsmacked when you need to correct something, like a glitch, (or the glasses in their example).

I've used it on many things thus far, and continue to be amazed at how it can remove sounds that I never could before. An example, is a gunshot, with the target being hit (a can). Now that can is gone, and the gunshot can ring true at last.

Ken

Thanks for this tip, Bob, it could save some time for me on a very nasty job to fix someone else's criminally poor recording of a stage play.

On the demo on their site, the clipped peaks restoration is impressive. But I downloaded the trial, and I'm not seeing such an improvement on clipped/hot audio.

I must have jinxed myself posting this, just captured a job that's going to need a LOT of help audio wise. I've got clipping, noises and clattering crockery to deal with. Oh well, whatever I was going to make on this job will go to iZotopes.

Ken, "The spectral repair will leave you gobsmacked when you need to correct something, like a glitch, (or the glasses in their example)." oh yes . . oh yes . . .

Also, Ken, as we don;t have the plugin to Vegas or SF yet, what is your current workflow using Rx and some Vegas footage? can I right click and summon up Rx as my preferred Audio Editor? Do the biz and have it come back as, say Take2? I know it isn't yet a plugin - but? As a preferred Audio Editor?

I think that the scrub-PAINTING-out of the unwanted sounds is just amazing!

In the next 2 weeks I will have a mixed, non-controllable, noisy London-office busy organisation needing to be videoed. Having walked the plot and listened to much AC and traffic, chatting and so on, AND this is going to have quite a bit of talking head footage, I too can see/hear that this is going to be a boon for me. Yes, I will be using my shotgun mics. But I just know I am going to have an unfortunate audio appear just when I don't want it, and having this Rx suite may just push my capture form yeah-ok to hmmm, that's sweet now. OK, once I've cleaned it up I can then pass it thru' my audio fx-ing - and they are iZo's too.

Clipped peaks must be the most obvious and difficult result to rectify. Like over-exposed video footage, once it is gone, it is, well, gone. It all depends on the amount of clipping I guess? I too looked at the results of the "singer" clipping, and thought, yeah, ok, but there is enough still left to correct there. Even so, the way the clipping is done is just so straight forward.

This is an amazing product. And I hope to experience this for myself real soon.

Grazie

Hi Grazie - I'm back down under - great to meet up with you in good old London!

For talking heads in noisy environments, I'd lean towards wireless lapel mics if you have the choice - maybe not practical if you have several talkers at once, but with a constant distance between lips and mic, there may be less problems to fix, no matter how good the software!

cheers

Peter

Couldn't agree more, nothing beats recording it right up front.
If you can wrangle the talent you don't have to use wireless mics, good wired lapels are a lot cheaper.
If you have more than one person talking and they're sitting at a table don't overlook a boundary mic. I bought a cheap Samson a couple of years ago and it's taken a while to get our clients to take to it but those that have have been very happy with the results. The only problem can be people thinking it's a coaster.

And welcome back Peter. Hope Grazie didn't lead you too far astray.

Bob.

Peter? Led astray? I think the Glass was on the Other FOOT!! We did lots of chatting .. didn't mention Vegas ONCE!! - I did say "ONCE" . . .

No excuse for bad recorded audio - agreed. And no software can remedy it. But, but, but .. sometimes, just sometimes . .. yeah? Peter, I implore you, if you haven't done so already, just see the iZo Video, and the audio visualization of this stuff. Remarkable. I bet you WILL find a place where you can use it.

Cheers Peter [ hic ]

Grazie [hic]


.. ps Peter, I start with

oh man, this tool is really good. I had a distorted line at the beginning of a film I was working on and was just able to make it completely clean. I'm shocked. I can't wait to check out the rest but a cursory glance shows incredible promise.

Thanks Bob. Yes Grazie, I am already very impressed with the iZotopes plug-ins in Sound Forge 9, and the video Bob linked to very much reinforces that - their functionality and visual interface design are wonderful. Just waiting to hear about possible plug in versions of these tools before buying ....

I bought Audition 1.5 just for the Spectral cleanup abilities. Is anyone out there able to compare the Izotope products with the combination of Sony NR and the Audition spectral capabilities? I like what I see, but before I drop $199, I want to be sure I'm getting a lot of bang for the buck. Thanks!
Bob

From what I have seen thus far, Rx is WAY more powerful and competent than Noise reduction and spectral cleaning from Sony, Adobe (Audition and Soundbooth).

I can't speak for teh cut-down version - as I have only the advanced version, but they were one and same for a fair time, and the engine is the same....

If I had more free time, I would happily offer an open challenge to anyone to present audio files to put through Rx and I would show you how good it is. But I don't have free time atm. (unless your audio file is short and you ask really nice etc etc...).

As for Grazie's answer, you can of course assign Rx as your preferred audio editor. Rx is not an editor as such, and SForge is better for that, for trimming, cutting, normalising, EQ'ing (using Izotopes EQ of course :) ) etc. But for repairing audio - thus far Rx is the new king as far as I am concerned.

Ken

Yes, I will be using my shotgun mics. But I just know I am going to have an unfortunate audio appear just when I don't want it

Consider renting a Sanken CS-3e shotgun. It can eliminate a lot of noise other shotgun mikes can't stop, especially in the lower frequencies where other shotguns do nothing.

It also has a consistent frequency curve across a wide angle, which means it doesn't require supernatural skills from the boom op to point it at a constant angle to avoid shifts in voice coloration.

I love mine, especially since it also sounds so incredibly good (at last as good as a Senn 416 which is justifiably famous for great sound but which has nowhere near the suppression of the CS-3e).

The "3" in its model designation is for 3 mic elements, which is what makes the impossible possible.

"Rx is not an editor as such, .. "

Ken, I realise that. I was wanting to get from you your preferred workflow. And yes, the iZo Equalizer (and their compressor! Woah!) is tops.

No, Ken, I realise it isn't an audio editor, it was rather I wished to ascertain what was YOUR preferred workflow, with Vegas, and the option for TAKES coming back into Vegas? I'm spoilt with Vegas+SF!

TIA

Grazie

God I love you guys! And I love when something I want just so happens to be something a client needs. Even moreso when theyre willing to buy it for me. I'm editing an indie dock, riddled with bad sound, hums, etc. Sent my client to the site to see the little demo on their site and he got it for me today. In about an hour, having little to no clue what I was doing I was able to clean up one scene to the point that I am just awe inspired. I know a handful of tricks of the trade for fixing this stuff up but Sony's noise reduction, at best, would have left everyone talking like robots with the amount of problems in this. The hum is gone, the noise is gone, all thats left are the voices, just the voices, simply stunning.

Grateful to have this one in the toolbox and already sold another copy of RX for those iZotope folks, friend came over and in 30 seconds of showing them step by step what I had done and the result they went home to get a copy.

I'm a fan.

- Ray
www.undergroundplanet.com

It's a bit good huh!

G