Re: [ARSCLIST] Cracked Cylinder Record

[Roderic G Stephens <savecal@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi,

Continuing with comparing various ways to clean
clicks:
--- Don Cox <doncox@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> On 28/07/07, Steven C. Barr(x) wrote:
> 
> > ----- Original Message ----- 
> > From: "Mike Richter" <mrichter@xxxxxxx>
> >> Robert Hodge wrote:
> >>> GAD !!
> >>> If Cooledit hasn't some form of sensitivity
> control for setting a
> >>> threshold, I see a weekend of agony in your
> future.
Cool Edit does have threshold adjustments on its click
eliminator and also has some presets for trying
various ways on various clicks and pops.
> > === 
> >> I think you misunderstand the problem. These are
> not clicks overlying
> >> musical material. They neither replace recording
> nor coincide with
> >> it. Each represents the milliseconds of space
> occupied by that pass
> >> over the crack. In other words, they are brief
> intrusions into the
> >> flow of audio. ClickFix (far better than
> Audition's built-in tool) or
> >> any other declicker will fill in the space the
> click occupies with
> >> its best estimate of the missing audio. What's
> needed is just what is
> >> being done manually: excise the intrusion. I know
> of no software for
> >> any audio editor that will do what Terry Smythe
> needs - except the
> >> manual process he hopes to avoid.
Cool Edit can be used either way, as an overall
automatic process, or treating each "spike" manually.
> >> 
> > Would it not be possible...IF
> "sound-file-improvement" applications
> > can provide a visible and editable version of the
> waveform of the
> > pre-fixed original...to manually edit out the
> clicks NOT by removing
> > them...which is what tape-editing does...but
> replacing what probably
> > appears as a short-duration, steep-sided peak by
> replacing same with a
> > smooth continuation "patch" of the waveform?!
That sounds like Cool Edit's manual process.
> 
> When experimenting with the Wave Repair program, I
> found that the most
> effective tool was "smoothing" of the selected
> section. The selected
> section would be marginally longer than the click. 
> 
In Cool Edit, in the manual mode, you can vary the
boundaries on either side of the click/pop up to a
maximum point.  By trial and error with unlimited
"undos" you can find what works best on the hardest to
fix spikes.
> It is easy to create a macro which repeats the
> smoothing process several
> times on one key stroke. 
> 
Cool Edit uses F3 as a built in macro for repeating
the last function.
> > 
> > Of course, in the unlikely (but not totally
> impossible) occasion that
> > the crack-driven peak happened to coincide with an
> actual peak (when I
> > think about it, even more unlikely, since drums
> effectively couldn't
> > be...and thus weren't...recorded
> acoustically...?!). 
I've found that I can usually see the pop spikes even
in the middle of other peaks if they are longer in
duration, and so, treat just the pop.  You can zoom in
(expand) the wave form display both vertically
(amplitude) and horizontally (duration) to help
examine the selected area.
> 
> They were. You can hear a full drum kit in use on,
> for example, the 1917
> ODJB recordings. However, the lack of upper treble
> means that a physical
> click will sound much sharper than any acoustic
> recording of percussion.
> 
> 
> > I suppose the
> > singer could, in theory, have sung a "T sound,"
> which probably also
> > produces a similar waveform image...?!
> 
> In modern recordings, a muted trumpet has a waveform
> which is exactly
> the same as a series of clicks on vinyl. I had to
> give up trying to
> clean up a Buck Clayton album for this reason.
> (Fortunately Mosaic
> released it in one of their luxury boxes later.)
I have not found Cool Edit to touch muted trumpets,
although I'd like to know what recording we're talking
about, so I could try it.
> 
> Regards
> -- 
> Don Cox
> doncox@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> 
An interesting discussion.   Thanks to all,

Rod Stephens