Popping P's

[Tim Miskimon]

For all my clean up work - hum, hiss, buzz, click, pop, guitar noises, amplifier & pedal noises and a bunch more I use RX7 by Izotope.
It might be up to version 8 or 9 by now but it works both in Saw and as a stand alone program.
It's a bit costly but there are so many usable tools that it is great for cleaning up all kinds of noises.

[Carl G.]

Be sure you are not using latency inducing plugins pre-fader on the track with plosives while trying to adjust plosives through timeline automation. There is a slight difference between whatcha see and whatcha get.
There are other good de-plosisve alternatives with Waves.

I usually automate over p-pops, a special blend of EQ automation (in a 60 hz eq fader steps to -15, before I apply the High Pass Filter at 60hz, then reverse that on the way out). I also have several dif presets of depth.... to match only what I need for affective de-plosive. So it's a quick process of Highlight the Plosive and 'insert' automation. Takes literally about 2 seconds, with clean results, and no worries about attack or release times.
(may take 10 minutes setting up/saving the automation, but you'll have it for years)

[Dave Labrecque]

Be sure you are not using latency inducing plugins pre-fader on the track with plosives while trying to adjust plosives through timeline automation. There is a slight difference between whatcha see and whatcha get.
There are other good de-plosisve alternatives with Waves.

I usually automate over p-pops, a special blend of EQ automation (in a 60 hz eq fader steps to -15, before I apply the High Pass Filter at 60hz, then reverse that on the way out). I also have several dif presets of depth.... to match only what I need for affective de-plosive. So it's a quick process of Highlight the Plosive and 'insert' automation. Takes literally about 2 seconds, with clean results, and no worries about attack or release times.
(may take 10 minutes setting up/saving the automation, but you'll have it for years)

I do a similar thing. Nice, right?

Note to the uninitiated around Carl's admonition re: latency-inducing plugins affecting automation timing relative to actual audio stream: pre-latency-inducing-FX automation is fine. It's only automation following such FX that gets pushed out of sync. It's a bit of a drag, because fader automation (post the pre-fader patch point--by definition) is often the one we want to get surgical with, and (for me, anway) there's often a patched compressor that really wants to live pre-fader. (Post-fader FX are not a problem in this regard.) My work-around has been to turn the channel compressor on and use it's output setting in place of the fader for surgical gain moves; it works because it's before even the pre-fader FX patch point.

If you want to play with moving your latency-shifted automation entries to do what you have in mind, know that you would want to move them forward in time, i.e. to the right along the time line. Seems counterintuitive to me, but there it is. Actually, now that I think about it (it's only taken 20 years) it's the audio stream that's getting delayed, so of course the automation (and waveform) is going to be early in relation to that. Duh.

[jmh]

I think you guys are saying the same thing (although it also sounds like your not). I had incorrectly thought that you could have any FX patched in pre-fader without a problem offsetting automation.

I've occasionally sought zero crosses and automated the input attenuator - which doesn't have the slope.

I had never got into using the automation libraries, but I can see how Carl's application could be pretty useful.

[Dave Labrecque]

I think you guys are saying the same thing (although it also sounds like your not). I had incorrectly thought that you could have any FX patched in pre-fader without a problem offsetting automation.

I've occasionally sought zero crosses and automated the input attenuator - which doesn't have the slope.

Hmmm... this would go against my working understanding: that any pre-FX automation does not suffer the loss-of-sync issue. A simple buildmix-to-hottrack test could verify that. Let's see...

Test Result (click)

Three automation entries on first track:

1. Attenuator to -inf
2. Attenuator to 0db
3. Channel fader to -inf

BuildMix on second track. Note that the first two, which are pre-FX, are right on, while the last one, which is post-FX, is off by 1261 samples.

Looks like any issues you're having with attenuator automation are being caused by something else. Thoughts?

[jmh]

Dave, Your FX-plugins are patched in in the pre-fader, correct? (which would be in agreement with Carl's description - and I think your's).

The attenuator is applied before anything else - so that is always in sync (as would be any built-in dynamic or eq).

A while ago I was trying to a tune with minimal fader moves - and real long slopes and I was having difficulties and having to drag them to positions that didn't really match the waveform. I was thinking is was the linear shape of the sloped fade rather than the log fade you get with 'f'. In retrospect it may have been due to pre-fader-fx. I tend to mostly use the pre patch point - but I may want to reconsider that.

[Dave Labrecque]

Dave, Your FX-plugins are patched in in the pre-fader, correct? (which would be in agreement with Carl's description - and I think your's).

The attenuator is applied before anything else - so that is always in sync (as would be any built-in dynamic or eq).

Yes and yes. Sorry, I guess I totally misunderstood your prior statements:

I had incorrectly thought that you could have any FX patched in pre-fader without a problem offsetting automation.

I've occasionally sought zero crosses and automated the input attenuator - which doesn't have the slope.

Not sure why I did that. I thought you were saying that using non-sloped attenuator automation you were still getting the sync

A while ago I was trying to a tune with minimal fader moves - and real long slopes and I was having difficulties and having to drag them to positions that didn't really match the waveform. I was thinking is was the linear shape of the sloped fade rather than the log fade you get with 'f'. In retrospect it may have been due to pre-fader-fx. I tend to mostly use the pre patch point - but I may want to reconsider that.

Yeah, unfortunately it's an issue that Bob has said would require a major engine re-write, and I can see how he has little incentive to take that on at this stage.

I've entertained same idea of putting my latency-inducing plugins in the post-fader slot to be able to get accuracy placing fader automation as you said, but I use a lot of compressors, and the fader would pretty much lose it's ability to mix-balance as it should, so I haven't gone there.

I do use the slope value on single fader moves often. It's just quicker than creating and tweaking a "proper" fade curve, and often sounds fine.

[Ian Alexander]

If you don't have a lot of pops (don't need to automate) there's another method that sometimes works if the pop is between the initial transient and the following vowel sound. If you K cut the track before and after the pop, often you can Shift-Right-Drag the audio so your pop region has less-objectionable audio in it. Of course, if the pop is polluting the following vowel, this might work only with cross-fades or not at all. HTH I can try to come up with a couple pics if that would help.

If you do have a chance to coach someone on mic technique, suggest that they 1) back off, and/or 2) move the mic to one side (the mic has to be aimed at the mouth, but the mouth DOESN'T have to be aimed at the mic).

[jmh]

If you don't have a lot of pops (don't need to automate) there's another method that sometimes works if the pop is between the initial transient and the following vowel sound. If you K cut the track before and after the pop, often you can Shift-Right-Drag the audio so your pop region has less-objectionable audio in it. Of course, if the pop is polluting the following vowel, this might work only with cross-fades or not at all. HTH I can try to come up with a couple pics if that would help.

If you do have a chance to coach someone on mic technique, suggest that they 1) back off, and/or 2) move the mic to one side (the mic has to be aimed at the mouth, but the mouth DOESN'T have to be aimed at the mic).

I find this method is great if you have an occasional click or lip smack. If its really short, doing a K cut right before and after the following note (or even the middle with a crossfade) and nudging it over a few ms usually can be imperceptible. My friend who I've been writing songs with and is singing on drum-de-bleed (post #11) song has fairly severe asthma - that if acting up makes all kinds of wheezing and mucus noises . Since it is always acting up, I can rarely get him to re-sing anything, and I'm becoming expert at pruning those noises (which has also happened in the linked tune).