Print-through echo. The cure ??? at DVinfo.net

Bob Hart · April 23rd, 2014, 06:39 AM

Sooner or later I am going to have to de-echo some Nagra tapes and some 16mm magnetic tracks which have been stored both tail-out and head-out.

I am familiar with Cool Edit Pro and vaguely familiar with Adobe Audition which is where Cool Edit went.

Does anyone have any handy clues. Print-through is a cyclic echo of soundtrack which occurs when signal on a tape reproduces itself on the neighbouring layer of the tape during storage. Storing the tape tail-out mitigates the effect to a less offensive trailing echo.

Unfortunately, the period of the echo shortens ever so slightly with each turn of the spool as the diameter of the roll decreases so a simple automated correction loop would drift out of sync. But in the years hence, someone may have wrought a miracle cure.

Slightly off-topic, in the days of mass-duplication of movies onto VHS and Beta rental tapes, there was an effort to develop the "print-through" phenonema as a high speed duplicating process similar in very general principle to contact printing with film.

It was sought to be an alternative to banks of recording decks and the labour involved in changing all the cassettes out with each real-time duplication run.

It turned out to be a research dead-end.

Benjamin Maas · April 23rd, 2014, 10:42 AM

No easy cures, unfortunately. When I have to deal with stuff like this, I tend to either edit the offending sounds out, or if I'm in a timecode/sync situation, I spend a lot of time using spectral editing to get sounds out. Nothing is perfect, though, and there will almost certainly be areas that you just have to live with.

--Ben

April 23rd, 2014, 06:39 AM	#1
Bob Hart Inner Circle Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: PERTH. W.A. AUSTRALIA. Posts: 4,477	Print-through echo. The cure ??? Sooner or later I am going to have to de-echo some Nagra tapes and some 16mm magnetic tracks which have been stored both tail-out and head-out. I am familiar with Cool Edit Pro and vaguely familiar with Adobe Audition which is where Cool Edit went. Does anyone have any handy clues. Print-through is a cyclic echo of soundtrack which occurs when signal on a tape reproduces itself on the neighbouring layer of the tape during storage. Storing the tape tail-out mitigates the effect to a less offensive trailing echo. Unfortunately, the period of the echo shortens ever so slightly with each turn of the spool as the diameter of the roll decreases so a simple automated correction loop would drift out of sync. But in the years hence, someone may have wrought a miracle cure. Slightly off-topic, in the days of mass-duplication of movies onto VHS and Beta rental tapes, there was an effort to develop the "print-through" phenonema as a high speed duplicating process similar in very general principle to contact printing with film. It was sought to be an alternative to banks of recording decks and the labour involved in changing all the cassettes out with each real-time duplication run. It turned out to be a research dead-end. Last edited by Bob Hart; April 23rd, 2014 at 06:41 AM. Reason: error

April 23rd, 2014, 10:42 AM	#2
Benjamin Maas Regular Crew Join Date: Jul 2010 Location: Long Beach, CA Posts: 150	Re: Print-through echo. The cure ??? No easy cures, unfortunately. When I have to deal with stuff like this, I tend to either edit the offending sounds out, or if I'm in a timecode/sync situation, I spend a lot of time using spectral editing to get sounds out. Nothing is perfect, though, and there will almost certainly be areas that you just have to live with. --Ben __________________ Benjamin Maas • Fifth Circle Audio • Signal Hill, CA http://www.fifthcircle.com