Advice on Audio Quality

[Mark Richards]

Late to the party on this, but offer the following:

1. A Google search on "spoken word microphones" will turn up results like this. I always used a shock mounted Electro-Voice RE-20 with a wind screen to record spoken word projects and radio/tv commercial voice overs. A large diaphragm cardioid mic is a must, IMO.
2. Good diction, breathing, pacing, use of chest voice rather than head voice, distance from the mic, are all key components of a professional sounding spoken word recording. Which leads to
3. All cardiod mics have "proximity effect". The closer the speaker is to the mic, the more disproportionatly pronounced the lower register of the voice will be.
4. As pointed out above, room ambiance detracts from the audio quality. You can address this by purchasing or making portable/free standing acoustic panels to create a sound deadening vocal booth around the speaking location. Again Google is your friend. Getting this right is by far preferable to using EQ correction. The poor man's version is to hang heavy blankets over a frame made with mic stands. If the speaker is sitting at a desk, the desk surface should also be treated with sound absorbing material ( a blanket will work nicely).
5. The natural human voice typically has a fundamental frequency range between 100 Hz and 1kHz. Above 1kHz are the overtones that make speech distinctive, introduce sibilance, etc.
6. If it's necessary to EQ, then rule #1 for applying EQ is to subtract rather than add (e.g. if slightly more low end is desirable, then reduce the mid range a few dB.)
7. Compression on spoken word recordings is almost always unnecessary and often creates rather than solves problems.
8. The chart above tells me you're recording too hot (hitting 0dB at 500 Hz , and reducing the mid-range may be the better option rather than boosting the low end.

Didn't mean to be so lengthy, but hope some of the above helps.

 

[-mjk-]

@Mark Richards said:

1. As pointed out above, room ambiance detracts from the audio quality. You can address this by purchasing or making portable/free standing acoustic panels to create a sound deadening vocal booth around the speaking location. Again Google is your friend. Getting this right is by far preferable to using EQ correction. The poor man's version is to hang heavy blankets over a frame made with mic stands. If the speaker is sitting at a desk, the desk surface should also be treated with sound absorbing material ( a blanket will work nicely).

@Mark Nicholson, room treatment is the single easiest and cheapest upgrade for any studio.

When I was building my room, I was looking at several vocal booth solutions. My wife had this huge stuffed quilt she was tossing and I immediately recognized this as an effective damping treatment. I hung some piping from the ceiling in the shape of a large "V" and clipped the quilt to it. It works very well and is completely removable. In that case, money wasn't really a consideration but the solution presented itself and I implemented it very easily.

I read a study that showed bath towels to be very effective sound dampeners. In the study, the author put several of them on top of one another and stapled them to a frame and hung the frames up in the studio. They worked as well as any commercial treatment solutions he tested.

 

[Blue Monster 65]

I've been in radio, etc., for about 40 years. What's a good radio voice? Your own. Don't try to fake it. Speak clearly and concisely. Practice doing this daily. Do not affect an accent or character unless the part calls for it. If you're reading from a script, practice reading it to know what's coming and how to pronounce every word properly.

Hope this helps!

 

[Mark Nicholson]

This is all such great advice, thanks all. I'm taking it all to heart, and focusing on everything before the microphone first.

I realized something last night. I sneezed, and heard the room ring after it. I have several acoustic guitars in the room, and I realized that they resonate along with sounds in the room. So not only do I have hard walls that reflect a lot, I also have several resonant cavities too!

 

[Mark Nicholson]

Thanks again everyone. I came across this:

https://current.org/2015/06/a-top-audio-engineer-explains-nprs-signature-sound/

- Mark

 

[Blue Monster 65]

Used lots of RE20s in my radio days. Sennheisers, too. I much prefer an SM7b (the later model) with a flat response. Lately I’ve been running it though a Soyuz The Launcher preamp and into my Model 16. Sounds really good to me at home!

We’re installing a new AMS Neve Genesys in the studio (it’s there; we’re running cabling now) and I can’t wait to try out different mics thru it. That will be fun!

 

[-mjk-]

@Blue Monster 65 I'm also a broadcast engineer and at one of the facilities I used to maintain, after they built it they said that they preferred RE20s over AKG 414C mics. So my friend went out and bought them new RE20s and they gave him the AKG's in exchange.

 

[Blue Monster 65]

That would be a nice bonus on the job!

 

[Mark Nicholson]

Well, I have made a big improvement by swapping out to a Rode Procaster Dynamic microphone. Huge improvement in quality! I've ordered a Cloudlifter for it too as it doesn't drive the Tascam loud enough when just recording normal speech.

 

[Mark Nicholson]

Just to wrap this thread up...

• sound dampening the room
• using a Rode ProCaster with Cloudlifter
• using a pop filter and speaking about 3" away from the microphone
• at about 30° to the front of the mic
• Speaking from the chest, and projecting like I was presenting

has all taken my voice recording to another level.

With the Cloudlifter I have the gain on the Tascam at 2 o'clock, compressor off, all the EQ flat and am getting very good sound. I can fiddle further later if I want, but the quality now is so much better. Thanks to all who helped me!

- Mark

 

[Mark Nicholson]

Resurrecting this thread as I'd like advice on where I've got to now. Please have a listen to this:

https://soundcloud.com/user-683674132-115654328/dgsummaryaudacity

The target audience is listening via YouTube. This is typical of my recording quality now, and it is based on a straight recording via the M12, then in Audacity I do some noise reduction, EQ and normalize to -6dB output. I'd appreciate the opinion of those with audio engineer ears on how far I've got...

- Mark

 

[-mjk-]

@Mark Nicholson a huge help with setting the final level to all the streaming services is loudnesspenalty.com

 

[Mark Nicholson]

Thanks! I checked that file as you suggested and it gave me a YouTube loudness penalty of --, which I assume is 0 dB.

 

[-mjk-]

It's not about dB, Mark. All those streaming services use LUFS, and the numbers mean what the service would do to your track loudness. In your case,"--" means YouTube won't turn it up or down.

 

[Arjan P]

Careful here, loudnesspenalty.com is intended for music and not for voice over or spoken word. Ofcourse, it still can give you an idea of your file's loudness. BTW, it does show the increase or decrease in dB because the streaming services don't change your loudness - they simply match it to a standard loudness they use, by decreasing or increasing the playback level of your music.

Then, the indication '--' here means that Youtube won't turn your music down - but Youtube also won't make it louder (it never does), so the dashes give you no real indication of loudness. See what the other services that DO increase playback levels show (Spotify, Pandora). That'll give you an impression of your room to work with. I would take the audio of a similar YT video you like the target loudness of - throw that in loudnesspenalty.com and see how you compare - this because the site is intended for music.

 

[-mjk-]

@Arjan P oh, wait! I thought that YouTube turned up levels too. At least I seem to recall a time when loudnesspenalty.com showed a + sign for YT too. At any rate, thank you for adding that very important detail as well as the other excellent suggestions.

 

[Mark Nicholson]

Thanks again for this link and discussion. I’m still interested in what y’all think of the sound quality of my file. It’s had everything I have to throw at it thrown at it and I’m curious what the experienced ears on here think.