[Complete/CHILD] The Wonder Clock by Howard Pyle - avs

Solo or group recordings that are finished and fully available for listeners
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PaleWriter
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Post by PaleWriter »

As I have started listening to this, another H Pyle work, I noticed from its incomplete status that there is this corresponding discussion. Couldn't help but notice the mention of mysterious noise, so I took a LOOK (the operative word being LOOK, NOT LISTEN). Having a modicum of experience w/ audio work from a variety of perspectives, this is a piece of cake. If you're working w/ Audacity you have the tools in hand; all you lack is the know-how, it appears.

I just uploaded chapter 4, after running it through a couple mod's, though I've not yet listened to that recording completely. I did notice the insertion of the correct chapter number at the beginning, so I TRUST that it has been fixed completely on that account. I'll try to take a listen later today if I have to make a little trip that's currently on my afternoon agenda.

Here's what I did - w/ Audition, not Audacity: I took a sample of the noise (in a good gap where there is no speech) and ran the "noise reduction" tool at about 2/3 strength. Pushing higher than that risks introducing an obnoxious distortion commonly known as artifacting. Then I looked again, at both the waveform view and the spectral view, and discovered quite a bit of low freq noise (NOT "white noise" as has been theorized). Although it looked somewhat muddied by (I'm guessing) some attempt to attenuate it, the evidence pointed at 60 Hz and 120 Hz signals, among others. So I ran a bandpass filter to try to knock out below 160Hz and above 6800 Hz. Those values were just judgment calls on my part, albeit a rather edumacated guess.

I also noticed a small amount of clipping, probably introduced by an attempt to gain amplitude (volume) across the entire file by amplifying it all a certain (guessed) amount. What would have been safer would be to normalize to something like -0.5 to -1 dB - approximately - or in the neighborhood of 90-95%, whichever metric is used on your normalize tool. So I declipped and renorm'ed it.

Normalizing is also a tool with which you would do well to familiarize yourselves, along with highpass and lowpass (or bandpass, which is both at once) filters. The afore-mentioned "noise removal" tool is not nearly so simple to master, and must be used with substantial discretion!

One key to ALL of this, though, is learning to use both wave and spectral VIEWS, so you can SEE what you're HEARING (or, often, see what you aren't ABLE to hear). While it may be convenient to listen when and where via your iPod or whatever portable, if you're prooflistening WITH Audacity (or similar) you will soon learn what certain problems LOOK like. Much of my editing is easily spotted without having to listen to the entire recording first. I can spot underlying noise that contaminates the whole thing, or odd dips or spikes or long pauses that stand out from the rest, or things like that clipping thing.

Anyway, this took less than a half hour last night, and could have all been done in 5 or 10. Truthfully, I spotted the ONE "chapter 4" insert and, not remembering that this also probably happened at the end of the file, I isolated that insert from the noise removal process that I ran on all the rest of it. I did run noise removal on that little insert, but with a different noise floor sample. Probably not worth the time and effort, but you're talking to Monk here.

Woops - did that slip out outloud?

Uh oh.

Anyway, if you have a set of recordings that seem to have the same challenges, perhaps batch processing would be appropriate? I do that with Audition frequently, and I'm fairly sure I've used Audacity similarly (not exactly the same, of course).

Fare thee well, and thanks for YOUR efforts!

Pale(and getting paler)Writer
kayray
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Post by kayray »

Michelle and I are going to give this project to Jill so she can open it up to other readers and get it finished. :)

Thanks, Jill, and happy reading everyone!
Kara
http://kayray.org/
--------
"Mary wished to say something very sensible into her Zoom H2 Handy Recorder, but knew not how." -- Jane Austen (& Kara)
jillebean
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Post by jillebean »

Kara -- do you still want to MC this project? Let me know. Also, would you do me a favor and move this over to the New Projects Launch Pad for now while we get the project up and running again? Thanks!

Jill
kayray
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Post by kayray »

Oh, no thank you, perhaps you can find a new MC?

And yes, I'll move you over to the Launch Pad right now :)
Kara
http://kayray.org/
--------
"Mary wished to say something very sensible into her Zoom H2 Handy Recorder, but knew not how." -- Jane Austen (& Kara)
jillebean
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Post by jillebean »

kayray wrote:Oh, no thank you, perhaps you can find a new MC?

And yes, I'll move you over to the Launch Pad right now :)
Thanks Kara!

We are looking for a new MC. Once I have that I have some questions about converting this over to a group project. Thanks for considering, everyone.

Jill :)
aravis
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Post by aravis »

Hi Jill!

I'll MC for you! :D

Edit: I've changed the first post to the group project template. Do let me know if you'd like to change anything or if you have questions. :D
Elli

"Tiefer und tiefer zogen die Buchstaben ihn hinab, wie ein Strudel aus Tinte...dorthin wo auch Staubfinger verschwunden war. An den Ort, an dem alle Geschichten enden." (Cornelia Funke)
jillebean
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Post by jillebean »

aravis wrote:Hi Jill!

I'll MC for you! :D

Edit: I've changed the first post to the group project template. Do let me know if you'd like to change anything or if you have questions. :D
Hi Elli! Thanks for MC'ing for me. :) Do you still want to be DPL, also? The first post looks perfect, thank you so much for updating all that to the group template! Will I be able to have access to the MW? I think that is my only question right now. Thanks, again!

Jill :D
aravis
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Post by aravis »

Hi Jill!

Yeah, I'd be happy to continue as DPL, if that's ok with you! :D

About the MW... you should be able to log in with your usual username and password. (You already have both, right?)
Elli

"Tiefer und tiefer zogen die Buchstaben ihn hinab, wie ein Strudel aus Tinte...dorthin wo auch Staubfinger verschwunden war. An den Ort, an dem alle Geschichten enden." (Cornelia Funke)
jillebean
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Post by jillebean »

aravis wrote:
About the MW... you should be able to log in with your usual username and password. (You already have both, right?)
I do have a username and password but when I put them in they are not working, it doesn't recognize me as the BC. When I was given the username/password I was told that they were temporary... does that mean anything? Thanks!

Jill
jillebean
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Post by jillebean »

aravis wrote:Hi Jill!

Yeah, I'd be happy to continue as DPL, if that's ok with you! :D
And, yes! I'd be grateful to have you continue as DPL. :)

Jill
aravis
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Post by aravis »

Oh, I totally forgot about those temporary passwords/usernames... everything should work now. :oops: Please try again! :D
Elli

"Tiefer und tiefer zogen die Buchstaben ihn hinab, wie ein Strudel aus Tinte...dorthin wo auch Staubfinger verschwunden war. An den Ort, an dem alle Geschichten enden." (Cornelia Funke)
jillebean
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Post by jillebean »

aravis wrote:Oh, I totally forgot about those temporary passwords/usernames... everything should work now. :oops: Please try again! :D
I am in! Thanks! :clap:

Jill
aravis
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Post by aravis »

Yay! :D

Time to move us to Readers Wanted!!!
Elli

"Tiefer und tiefer zogen die Buchstaben ihn hinab, wie ein Strudel aus Tinte...dorthin wo auch Staubfinger verschwunden war. An den Ort, an dem alle Geschichten enden." (Cornelia Funke)
jillebean
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Post by jillebean »

Would it be acceptable to change the source text link to point to the archive.org version of the text? http://archive.org/details/wonderclockorfo00pylegoog It's the exact same scan of the book but it's in the nicer archive.org format?
jillebean
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Post by jillebean »

I'm wondering if we should add a note that people should read the "o' clock" part and little verse before each section? I am also going to put links in the MW to the specific pages they can start reading on.

Jill
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