audacity fix for less clear, more muffled voice?

Post your questions & get help from friendly LibriVoxers
Post Reply
Kirsten Wever
Posts: 1197
Joined: October 29th, 2010, 4:58 pm
Location: Arlington, Massachusetts, United States of America
Contact:

Post by Kirsten Wever »

Sometimes -- but not often -- my pre-PL Audacity Effects edits result in my voice sounding less clear, less distinct, more muffled. When it happens, it happens after I do the following:

(1) Noise reduction
(2) Tempo (increase about 10)
(3) Compressor (two or three times)
(4) Amplification (down, to compensate for compressor increase)

I have two questions. First, which of these effects could cause the loss of clarity?

Second, is there an Audacity Effect that could reduce the muffle / increase voice clarity? I tried the High Pass Filter, but I don't really know how to use it. (a) At what level should I set the Frequency and Roll-Off? (b) Does this filter necessarily reduce the volume so drastically that I have to amp up by 10 or 15?

Any ideas / alternatives / help will be greatly appreciated.

8-)

Kirsten
– Kirsten

A person who won't read* has no advantage over one who can't. – Twain

* or at least listen!
lurcherlover
Posts: 1206
Joined: November 10th, 2016, 3:54 am
Location: LONDON UK

Post by lurcherlover »

Kirsten Wever wrote: March 26th, 2022, 11:14 am Sometimes -- but not often -- my pre-PL Audacity Effects edits result in my voice sounding less clear, less distinct, more muffled. When it happens, it happens after I do the following:

(1) Noise reduction
(2) Tempo (increase about 10)
(3) Compressor (two or three times)
(4) Amplification (down, to compensate for compressor increase)

I have two questions. First, which of these effects could cause the loss of clarity?

Second, is there an Audacity Effect that could reduce the muffle / increase voice clarity? I tried the High Pass Filter, but I don't really know how to use it. (a) At what level should I set the Frequency and Roll-Off? (b) Does this filter necessarily reduce the volume so drastically that I have to amp up by 10 or 15?

Any ideas / alternatives / help will be greatly appreciated.

8-)

Kirsten
All of these plugins will effect the voice detrimentally. Why do you need to increase the tempo? Compression and Noise reduction even at a lowish level will have an effect, but once you apply it heavily or many times then the damage is quite bad.

The best thing is to get a good recording that needs none of these plugins to be used, although I realise that optimum recording conditions are not always possible. (Compression two or three times will do a lot of damage).

Can you send a sample of your recording before effects, and after they are used?
SowasVon
Posts: 200
Joined: January 24th, 2022, 5:00 pm

Post by SowasVon »

While my Audacity knowledge is limited to the functions I actually use, I suspect the problem is with step 1, since the others should not affect the clarity of the recording.
Or rather: Could it be that your recording has a lot of noise before noise reduction? By that, I mean: Before the effect, do the silent sections where you don't speak look like a thick, bristly blue line, or rather like a thin line with some tiny bumps here and there?
It should be the latter. Because if it's the former, then it means you have a lot of noise. And to rectify that, the noise reduction effect will do such a harsh job that it affects your own spoken words, too.
The only thing you can really do against that is to reduce the noise pre-effects as much as possible. For example, my first recordings were done on a laptop the fan of which sometimes went really loud. What helped somewhat against that was to keep the load on the processor low by having nothing running but the recording tool and the text to read in an app (and also, as it turned out, to open the case and blow all the dust out of the fan :shock:). Now, I can record on a desktop PC, which is less noticeable in regard to fan noise.
Or, I noticed that analog microphones seem to record more static than USB ones. So, a switch of microphones could help, too.

Another possible reason for muffled audio: Is your microphone oriented incorrectly in regard to your mouth?
Of course the distance matters (it shouldn't be too far away).
And then, there's the question how your microphone picks up sound - e.g. omnidirectional (from all sides) or cardioid (just from the front)? That affects in which orientation you should use it. I have my microphone set to cardioid, and when it's slightly rotated to not face me, audio becomes worse.
Since I don't know what microphone you have, I suggest googling for its name and "positioning".

Ah, one more remark: You shouldn't need to use compressor more than once. Depending on the result you're trying to achieve, in my understanding, it should be doable by changing the compressor settings.
"You're on Librivox? Pffft. You just like to hear yourself talk."
"Yuuuup." :mrgreen:
Post Reply