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King
("nerd" is a term of respect as most nerds are very rich.)
However, I spent some time with Audacity and made a recording but it has 2 serious flaws:
It sounds like me.
There is serious string racket up on A and E ?
Is there a recording trick for noise reduction or is it technique and/or string(s) to blame ?
When you come to a fork in the road, take it.
Members
Well, I will take "It sounds like me" as a joke "complaint", Oliver. Your playing has a distinct style and sound to it, and that is a *good* thing. There's far worse things to hear in a day than a bit of Oliver's playing.
Now about noise when recording. First off, some noise can be good, at least a little of it. Without a little bit of bow/string sound, there would be nothing to let a listener know that they are hearing a real person playing a violin. I didn't really notice anything bad in that regard when giving the tracks a listen as a listener. I thought the playing sounded pretty good, personally.
There is some room/environment noise though. One can fix that in a couple of different ways. One is to only record in a really really quiet room. But with air conditioning, central heating and so on, that isn't real practical all the time, especially not when just doing a quick "take".
Noise removal in Audacity isn't hard. You need a few seconds on the track where you aren't playing and so it is just recording the background noise like fan, breeze, etc. That ten seconds of "blank" space I recommend at the beginning of a take will usually have a few seconds of that kind of (non) silence. Use your mouse to highlight that time where all you were recording was basically the room noise. Then go to "effect".. "noise removal".. and you'll see something like "get noise profile". Click that. Then rewind to the beginning of the track. Click "effect" "noise removal" again. This time, you can click "ok" under "section 2".
What that does is "get noise profile" gives the computer a sample of what you want taken out of the recording. "Ok" tells it to go ahead and remove that from the track. Then it "automagically" goes through and takes out the part of the sound that sounds like the noise sample you let it profile..
The default settings are pretty good for most things, and usually will be enough.
BUT.. the added little plus.. Is that since some of the bow/string noise will be kinda similar to air/fan noise, it will get reduced a bit as well, though not completely eliminated. It will take some of the harshness off it.
The result is the track will sound much cleaner, and so the sound of your instrument will come through clearer
It isn't perfect, but I think it will fix some of what you are not liking. The noise removal in Audacity is actually pretty good. *Really* good for a piece of free software, in fact.
"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman
King
Thanks for Audacity tip. Will try.
I think my noise issue is worse "under the chin" so I'm listening for it when recording.
"My playing" ................ still struggling with the violin/viola transition. The years with violin just won't go away entirely.
Anyhow, my original issue was about the violin tuned viola and maybe, would I dare to play it publicly? I'm satisfied that I have played with violins that did not sound as good and got away with it. And the physical fit of the viola (15") is just right for me. I do everything better on the viola once I figure where on the finger board to do it.
My new Dominant viola "A" (alum wound) is better but maybe not worth the money.
(replacing Crystal violin "A")
Yes, recording setups would make a good poll as you suggested.
When you come to a fork in the road, take it.
King
@FM
I hear the same thing you do in the lack of a rich violin sound which chorus and reverb might remedy. But the root of my concerns is what does the instrument sound like? Is my recording telling the truth?
Without benefit of our smarts there is an army of students out there making very good recordings. We see their posts. What do they use given perhaps only a few weeks of violin experience and possibly little knowledge of recording?
This situation calls for the suggested DanielB poll. "What do you use to make your recordings?" (Maybe they crank up chorus and reverb
Maybe it would be more useful to have a multiple choice list?
Incidentally, I counted that BreakRoom had over 1000 hits in the last 2 weeks.
When you come to a fork in the road, take it.
King
Well, after a long search I may have decided on my final strategy. I have enough software to dial in almost anything including ZOOM G1N and the faithful Audacity (+ others). And the really "good" violins are out of reach.
So, it is the hardware, not the software, that limits me or my sound.
Then there is the issue of instrument size and my recent shift to 15" violin/viola. That was a good move.
Bottom line ...... the situation calls for a 15" electric viola !! All bases covered !
All that is left is to check out electric violas at the fiddler shop and there ain't none !!!!!
No wonder viola people have a complex !!!
When you come to a fork in the road, take it.
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