Removing Camera Noise

[Jason J. Gullickson]

(I thought this was different enough to be it's own thread).

We are working on a short film for a competition. We have no budget so we're working with the tools we have on hand.

I needed to record some "ambient"\background sound since we wanted to ADR the very small amount of dialog. Since we're doing this on-the-cheap, I tried a couple of things, one of which was just to set my camera (Canon Optura 60) on a tripod where the action takes place and record using the on-camera mic.

I knew it was a stretch but we were running out of time and I thought the worst that could happen is that I'd have to go back with a real microphone.

So after importing the sound and dropping it into the timeline, it actually sounded pretty good! Bear in mind that the destination for this project is Flash Video, so it doesn't need to be THX or anything. In particular, there were many backround noises (trucks driving, church bells, etc.) that came in as if on cue!

So now I have this audio track that I'm fairly in love with but it does have a little of that high-pitched motor noise from the camera. I can hear it mixing with headphones so I'm not sure if it will be as prominent when converted to Flash and played back on computer speakers, but I'd like to see what I can do to clean it up.

I have Final Cut Express, Soundtrack and GarageBand and I'm wondering if there are any suggestions as far as types of EQ or EQ settings that I can use as a starting point to clean this up, or if any of these tools have something else that I could possibly use.

Any thoughts appreciated!

[Douglas Spotted Eagle]

If you're going to be compressing the audio, get it as clean as possible before final compression, or the noise will be glaring after pushing it down.

Look at either WAVES or Sound Soap from BIAS Inc. You probably have a Peak demo or lite version from BIAS already, which acts as a great host for Sound Soap or Sound Soap Pro. Very nice noise reduction tools, and should get rid of that cam noise in a heartbeat.

[Jason J. Gullickson]

Thanks for the tip, I'll have to check that out. Not sure if I can justify the cost for a little project like this but if I can use it in the future it might be worth it...

[Brian Kennedy]

Maybe this deserves a new thread, but I have dialog that was recorded very low and also has a whirring tape transport noise in the background. When I raise the volume on the dialog, the whirring noise gets much more noticeable.

I realize there is only so much you can do with audio that is both too quiet and not clean, but my question is whether it is better to noise reduce before or after compressing and getting volume levels where you want them? Is noise reduction a better first step or last step? Or does it depend on the original file?

I have worked on it a few different ways, and maybe I have gotten the best I can out of it but it still isn't all that great. I was wondering how someone more expert would handle it (this is not something I can re-record).

By way of background, I am using Sound Forge and Sony NR.