Actually, solve as much of the noise in your signal first (cables, type of soundcard, power, etc). Go to www.prorec.com msg board for many posts on this. Gating is just that..gating, not a full-time answer.
You want to be gating "everytime" you record? No.

But, if you're forced to do noise reduction on a finished track you need to keep, use SF's noise reduction plug-in. Hopefully you have a second or two of strict noise in the file (before sound\music enters). You would then want to make a noiseprint of that so you could apply it best to the rest of the sound file.

joed

It sounds like you're doing the correct steps, and I'm very familiar with the "pipedrain" effect you're referring too....I usually refer too it as the "glassy sound". You've reduced the noise by -9dB so far, with minimal "pipedrain/glassy" sound side effects. I would try a couple of the different mode selections, and see if one works better, and you might find you might be able to reduce the noise a little further. MODE 2 always seems to work the best for me for voice only recordings with background noise.

"I am trying to use NR to reduce the sound of an airconditioner at a therapy workshop."

JoeD said:
"Actually, solve as much of the noise in your signal first (cables, type of soundcard, power, etc)."

That's brilliant advice, why don't you read the post next time before you try to answer it....He's trying to reduce "airconditioner" background noise. Now how would cabling and power connections etc help "airconditioner" noise being picked up by a microphone. IDIOT!!!!

LOL!!!
AC noise especially CAN and (get this) "SHOULD" be addressed....

you hack!

Rednroll studios latest ad: free discount to new customers due to AC noise in all recordings (sorry, there's nothing we can do about it...but, it we can turn it into dolby surround AC noise if you would like)

You're the hack!!! Air Conditioners are high current devices and usually run on 220 Volt outlets, thus they're put on their own circuit breaker unless they're the cheap window hangers like you have in your bedroom studio, thus they have a seperate Ground, from your studio outlets. The only way electrically they could therefore get noise through the wires from the Air Conditioner is if their Grounds where tied together via the third pin on the AC outlet of you're studio equipment, which they're not. I know they're not in MY studio, because my studio outlets have seperate grounds from the Electrical company grounds. Come on now Organ boy go back to tickling the ivories and leave the electrical advice to someone who knows what they're talking about!!! Do you really want to debate an Electrical Engineer in this department? I don't have to go to "prorec.com" and read some water downed information, I know this information like the back of my hand. Chump!!

Lol!!!

(claps) Bingo. You have just answered why I said: FIX THE LARGER PROBLEM !!! (unless you feel it's ok to have a pro studio with consistent problem with AC).
The rest is up to this guy.

Man red this is great, it's fucking hilarious to watch you snip and jump about, and 9 times out of 10 it's you slamming another bullet in your foot in the process.
It's almost like there's two or three different people in there - all yelling at one another.

Friggin beautiful entertainment.

JoeD

I'm not taking sides in this seemingly eternal war... but the grounds do not necessarily have to be tied together for noise to be heard in other equipment.

REdnroll... whyd you have to start that!!!! :) :) lol

<<<REdnroll... whyd you have to start that!!!! :) :) lol >>>>

Because he spends more time reading posts rather than recording?
(potshot guess)

It's awesome though, let him go....friggin beautiful entertainment.
Feet like swiss cheese.

JoeD

As I said:"why don't you read the post next time before you try to answer it"

"I am trying to use NR to reduce the sound of an airconditioner at a therapy workshop."

Hear that? "At a therapy workshop"? Do you really think wiring and grounding is an option? "Oh yeah....for my location recording session, I'm gonna have to rewire your building, which means I'm gonna have to reroute the entire electrical wiring, so that none of my audio cables are near them, and I'm gonna have to remove the grounds and isolate them." That's brilliant advice!!!! JoeD, can throw that one at a client, because he read it on "prorec.com"....I'll be going for something more practical, where the client isn't going to be laughing in my face at such a ludichrist suggestion. Why don't you just say "Turn off the airconditioner?"...duhhh

Roger74 said:
"I'm not taking sides in this seemingly eternal war... but the grounds do not necessarily have to be tied together for noise to be heard in other equipment."

No kidding, it can also be coupled into your audio wires, if you're using "unbalance" equipent, or if you have improper grounding techniques using balanced equipment and your audio wires are running accross power wires. Now if you're working in your OWN studio, this might be practical advice, but once again....go back and read the original post.

I love the JoeD advice,....duhhhh...rewire the building.... or how about? "My computer is sluggish when mixing 24 tracks, what do I do?.....duhhhh...go buy a 5Ghz dual processor Xeon, with a UDA10,000 SCSI card, and 100,000 RPM drives and a gazillion Gig of RAM....Duhhh...No shit Sherlock!!!! How about some practical advice that applies to the situation. Anyone can state the obvious.

This is one of the most uncalled-for flame threads I've ever read. I keep wishing for this forum to be properly moderated.

Red, what is wrong with my telling him how to best use sf's NR?
I don't get it kiddo, why do YOU care if I suggested NR usage?
(Is the original post really from YOU?)

Fixing the problem: One would try to avoid using a NR period (proper recording), but it seems he cannot address that...so I described the best way to use sf's NR.

Cut the tough guy act as I'm embarrassed for ya now (but it's still hilarious).
Who are you posing for? These guys here could probably care shit one about me anyway...why the act?

Let's learn together...tell me about your mother.

JoeD

- well I missed half of whatever went on, thanks to a long-standing "Ignore" setting.

Anyway - it's all very simple. A camera was placed below an overhead airconditioner outlet and the resulting noise was captured through an external mic on the camera, nothing to do with cables etc. The lady giving the workshop was still audible, but I am trying to separate her from the airconditioner's hum.

Thanks for the constructive comments - I'll take the best advice and see what I can do to put out the best product.

"This is one of the most uncalled-for flame threads I've ever read. I keep wishing for this forum to be properly moderated."

Oh My!!! Please my apology Mr. Politically correct. Sorry, but in my opinion, WRONG misdirected advice, is worse than NO advice at all. So consider me your moderator. I'm moderating advice that sends a user into the wrong direction, and then other users read it and use that advice. Eventually, you have a problem, where if every user starts believing something, then it must be true. As you can see from the reply from the original person who posted the message....cabling was not an option....Well of course, you could have figured that out from the original question, if you took the time to READ it and UNDERSTAND it and have some EXPERIENCE. You think when someone posts a question like, I'm using noise reduction to try and reduce noise can someone give me assistance? Then an answer like, make sure your wires and shields are properly grounded and use Noise reduction. Can you say REDUNDANT, REDUNDANT and NOT APPLICABLE APPLICABLE?

How's this for moderation for you? If you don't know what the hell you're talking about then shut the f**k up and listen!!

Redncrap: a legend in his own mind

The intitial reply of mine, yours, and another describe NR usage (the bonus info added states to AVOID problems beforehand so you don't have to).

The problem has been attacked from all angles you shit for brains. Don't you have another post to pose around in?

JoeD

Since this is a lecture and not music, one thing you might try is a sharp bass cut at the highest possible frequency that doesn't interfere with the speaker's voice before you apply noise reduction (for this a low shelf filter is OK but I prefer SF's 20-band EQ since the rolloff is steeper). Air conditioning systems often generate a lot of low frequency energy and you may be well served to EQ first and then use NR.

The "ignore" button on this forum is an elegantly powerful noise reduction tool in its own right; perhaps SF should consider adding it as an upgrade to their noise reduction product as well. ;-)