[COMPLETE] The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night (Arabian Nights), Vol 10 - tg

[Foon]

I think "endlessriver" will be fine for the catalogue for now.

Just looking ahead to some pronunciation questions -- am I interpreting these names more or less properly, and is there a pronunciation guide for the project? Just want to make sure I'm not way off .
Abú al-Sa'ádát, -- would this be pronounced as al - sah-ahdaht
Ma'aruf, -- mah - ahroof
Ikhtiyan al-Khatan - ick-tea-ahn

Yes, that looks good to me--that's how I'd pronounce those names. There isn't a pronunciation guide for this project. Just do the best you can and just make sure you're at least consistent within your own recordings, i.e. pronounce the same name the same way every time you say it.

[Foon]

Hi Paul,
I've uploaded fixes for sections 11 and 12. If you think the patch is noticeable in 11, I can always revert back to what it was before (but I do think 12 needs to be changed).

[SkyRider]

Hi Foon - no, that's fine. I can hear the difference, but then I'm listening for it. If somebody's listening to it without knowing, I don't think the corrections will get in their way at all.

I've only spot PLed, but it sounds great. I also realise that I mistyped the timestamp for Section 12 - sorry about that. I was getting very puzzled over why I couldn't find the right sentence!

Cheers,
Paul

[Foon]

Hi Foon - no, that's fine. I can hear the difference, but then I'm listening for it. If somebody's listening to it without knowing, I don't think the corrections will get in their way at all.

I've only spot PLed, but it sounds great. I also realise that I mistyped the timestamp for Section 12 - sorry about that. I was getting very puzzled over why I couldn't find the right sentence!

Cheers,
Paul

Thanks Paul!
And oops, I meant to post the time stamp of the correction. But eh, we both found it, so it all worked out

[endlessriver]

Hi, 1 minute test is up at viewtopic.php?f=21&t=72876
Thanks for any advice!

[Foon]

Hi, 1 minute test is up at viewtopic.php?f=21&t=72876
Thanks for any advice!

Hi, thanks for letting me know! My weekend is filled back to back, but I will do my best to find a bit of time to provide feedback., In any case, I'll keep an eye on it, if someone else gets there first.

[SkyRider]

Hi, 1 minute test is up at viewtopic.php?f=21&t=72876
Thanks for any advice!

The technical aspects of the file are correct and your reading voice sounds great. There's quite a lot of noise though - not so much that it renders your reading inaudible* but some people might find it distracting. You could use noise reduction techniques but I had a try on your sample file and the noise frequencies are sufficiently close to your voice that I couldn't remove a lot of the noise without harming the speech - you may have better results on the original file than a sampled MP3. Better, if you can. is to avoid the noise in the first place. Are there any fans you could turn off? There's something there that sounds a bit like mains hum - is the power cable close to the microphone one? If ypu're on a laptop, is it any better running it on batteries? Could you get closer to the microphone so the proportion of your voice to that of the noise increases - you'll probably need to turn down the recording volume for this.

That said, if I PLed a file with that much noise I wouldn't reject it, but it would be nicer to let your voice stand out a bit better.

Cheers,
Paul

(*There isn't a formal standard for Librivox, but Audacity provides a useful intelligibility test. Highlight some of the speech and select Analyse|Contrast then click the Measure Selection button against Foreground. Now highlight some of the background noise and click the Measure Selection against background. The Contrast Result will tell you how you fare against the W3C Accessibility Guidelines. Noise starts to get less noticeable with a Difference value in the high twenties and by the time you're into the thirties it'll be so much in the background as to not distract.)

[endlessriver]

Hi, 1 minute test is up at viewtopic.php?f=21&t=72876
Thanks for any advice!

Better, if you can. is to avoid the noise in the first place. Are there any fans you could turn off? There's something there that sounds a bit like mains hum - is the power cable close to the microphone one? If ypu're on a laptop, is it any better running it on batteries? Could you get closer to the microphone so the proportion of your voice to that of the noise increases - you'll probably need to turn down the recording volume for this.

Hi thanks for the great feedback - this is likely my laptop fan showing up, I intend to read from kindle to solve this problem. Ive also determined how to silence the house furnace completely for a time. I'll also experiment with a tripod to get closer to my mouth without the mic being directly in the path of my breath. I am sort of learning the physical logistics of recording as I go. I should be able to make a new test in the next few days, and hopefully get recording shortly thereafter.

Thanks also for the Analyse tips with Audacity, that is very good to know.

[endlessriver]

Hi, 1 minute test is up at viewtopic.php?f=21&t=72876
Thanks for any advice!

You could use noise reduction techniques but I had a try on your sample file and the noise frequencies are sufficiently close to your voice that I couldn't remove a lot of the noise without harming the speech - you may have better results on the original file than a sampled MP3.

I've uploaded a noise reduced version of the original test at the test thread, I'll have a chance to record a new test tomorrow morning.

[Foon]

Hi, 1 minute test is up at viewtopic.php?f=21&t=72876
Thanks for any advice!

You could use noise reduction techniques but I had a try on your sample file and the noise frequencies are sufficiently close to your voice that I couldn't remove a lot of the noise without harming the speech - you may have better results on the original file than a sampled MP3.

I've uploaded a noise reduced version of the original test at the test thread, I'll have a chance to record a new test tomorrow morning.

I see that Sonia (Kitty) gave you the OK on your test, so feel free to start recording! Let me know if you have any questions about the project. And most importantly, have fun!

[MrMike79]

Hello! I have section 5 finished. It is 11:46

https://librivox.org/uploads/triciag/arabiannightsvolume10_5_anonymous_128kb.mp3

Thank you!

[Foon]

Hello! I have section 5 finished. It is 11:46

https://librivox.org/uploads/triciag/arabiannightsvolume10_5_anonymous_128kb.mp3

Thank you!

Thank you Mike! I've put it in the MW for Paul to prooflisten.

arabiannightsvolume10_##_anonymous_128kb.mp3 (all lower-case) where ## is the section number (e.g. arabiannightsvolume10_01_anonymous_128kb.mp3)

Please note the file name for future sections; it has a two-digit section number (in this case, it should be 05).
No need to fix this now, if there are PL notes, you can reupload with the correct file name, or if it's PL OK right away Tricia will probably be able to edit it on the server.

[MrMike79]

Hello! I have section 5 finished. It is 11:46

https://librivox.org/uploads/triciag/arabiannightsvolume10_5_anonymous_128kb.mp3

Thank you!

Thank you Mike! I've put it in the MW for Paul to prooflisten.

arabiannightsvolume10_##_anonymous_128kb.mp3 (all lower-case) where ## is the section number (e.g. arabiannightsvolume10_01_anonymous_128kb.mp3)

Please note the file name for future sections; it has a two-digit section number (in this case, it should be 05).
No need to fix this now, if there are PL notes, you can reupload with the correct file name, or if it's PL OK right away Tricia will probably be able to edit it on the server.

Thank you, Foon! I'm having a great time with this so far.

[SkyRider]

Hello! I have section 5 finished. It is 11:46

Thanks, Mike. You've got a great reading voice and I thoroughly enjoyed listening to you. I've got no issues with the main body of the reading, but there are a couple of small points with the intro and outro that could do with revisiting. Some of these may seem a little bit petty, but your readings don't exist on their own and there's the need to provide a certain degree of uniformity with other readings within the book.

Technical file parameters: Foon has already picked up on the file naming. All the other technical parameters are fine.

00:01 There should be 0.5s-1s of silence at the beginning. You're actually a smidge over the one second mark - not enough to worry about it, but enough for me to suggest that you probably want to keep a weather eye on it in future.

00:33 The section title should be in here, it "Night 994" instead of "Section 5"

11:26 While I appreciate the friendliness of the whole "Thank you for listening..." piece, could we keep it to the standard "End of Section [number]. Recording by [your name], [city, your blog, podcast, web address]" please? Again, you've been overgenerous with the silence at the end too - there only needs to be five seconds.

Cheers,
Paul

[MrMike79]

No worries, Paul. I appreciate the feedback and I’ll make the changes.

Mike G.