Is there a way to get automatic clip fades when deleting?

Man do I wish that could be done.
 
Maybe it can and I'm just not smart enough to find it.
 
scook should be along soon to tells us.

FreeFlyBertl

John T
Anyway, it's quick enough to go through and visually spot the breaths and chop them out, but this can easily leave short clicks at the edges of the cuts. Is there a way to get sonar to automatically add clip fades around the edges of deletions?

Chop the breathing out ... CTRL+A to select all clips ... zoom in a LOT ... and fade in at beginning and out at end just a tiny little bit which should add the same fade to every clip) ... should do the trick if you didn't chop too close earlier ... do a listening test
 
should be much faster than editing each clip

Excellent. Very Creative. I'm gonna use this again and again.

You could try "Remove Silence".
 
Take a copy of the clips first. Experiment with the settings.

The sneaky solution is to use AudioSnap with the track's edit filter set to Audio Transients. Set the AS Threshold to 100 so there are no transients, then add transient markers (Alt+click) where you want to separate words. Then choose Split Beat into Clips, but before doing so, go into Preferences for AudioSnap and set a time for Auto Fade Split Clips. Delete the clips that don't have audio...done.

rezab
why NOT use a gate? Isnt That easier/quicker?

Not if one or more of the breaths is louder than the words.
 
FreeFlyBertl's idea is an excellent one.  Simple, and so obvious, if only I had thought of it..

Yeah, in practise, I've found that there's no truly reliable automated way of doing this. These are audiobooks - I'm currently working on one around ten hours long; apparently the next one they're giving me is about 30 hours.
 
So if I was to try to do it automatically, I actually have to listen to the thing in full, possibly more than once, to make sure not starts and ends of words are being chopped off (which they will be) and no breaths are missed (which they will be). And then carefully repair those bits by pulling out plosives and what have you onto a track that doesn't have the gate on. At that point, the hourly rate is worse than flipping burgers for a living.
 
It turns out to actually be far quicker to whizz through the wave visually identifying the breaths, which are extremely recognisable, and delete them by hand. The performance is already approved, so I only need to actually listen to sections where I've done quite a few edits close together, or anywhere that looks dubious. Doing it like that makes the job viable.

I had a good old go at that method, and also tried using Izotope Breath Control. Which is very impressive but still leaves you with the issues of having to manually edit places where it doesn't quite work. It'd be ideal for shorter material, just doesn't suit the logistics of what I'm doing.

May have been mentioned and perhaps there are pitfalls I am not seeing but what about a Gain Automation envelope instead of making splits? By cutting out the breaths you are essentially stopping input to the track which I think is the same as reducing the gain to zero (which means it should affect any FX tails or whatever which is why a volume envelope would be undesirable). Slicing things out would be more difficult and time consuming than writing the envelope or doing it live with a controller.
 
And then there is the Mute Tool. Not sure if that applies any kind of quick fading to avoid abrupt stops.
 
Also I though the Split at Zero Crossings setting was supposed to deal with such issues... aaand how about gating (which could be automated at those points as well if need be)?
 
Just brainstorming.
 
Cheers.

I was wondering when I first saw this thread how long the track was. Unfortunately whenever a human is involved, trying to "automate" anything can get dicey.

Bristol_Jonesey
The problem with automating a gain envelope is that you will be affecting the level fed to any dynamics processors.This could cause undesirable effects further down the chain. In essence, attack/release/threshold/gain reduction will be totally unpredictable.
 
The downside to using any sort of mute, or cutting/splitting clips up and removing the breaths entirely is that the transition from an inherently noisy signal to total digital silence could and often does, sound quite unnatural and distracting.
 
I'd use a volume envelope and experiment with how much the breathy sections need to be attenuated whilst still retaining some "air" around the signal.

Yeah... I'm thinking more and more a "silent" but not silent take (using an input signal from the mics with nothing going on) would be the best and easiest way and I will probably do this from now on just in case.
 
Failing that just making a copy of a period of silence on the actual vocal track the pasting it into a new lane wherever a breath needs to be yanked out then comping would be a way to workaround recorded a long silence take.
 

Personally I don't think this is an odd requirement at all. I do it all the time for:

• vocals (I record metal, so it's not meant to sound natural. sometimes there's bleed from the vocalist's headphones too)
• drums (mute drum tracks between hits to reduce bleed, keep kicks out of the bottom snare mic, etc)
• guitars (remove fret or muting noise before and after a passage)

etc. Chopping up one long track into many shorter audible parts is a common and important procedure.
 
Yes, a gain envelope would work, but you have to manually draw in each part. Tedious. (I don't buy the argument about it affecting dynamics processors though. If there is no audio on the track at that point then you have no dynamics you want processing.)
No, Split at Zero Crossings doesn't work. That eliminates the high frequency pop at the end, but there is still a discontinuity in the waveform that is abrupt and audible. The same would apply to any automated mute system that didn't come with a fade setting.
 
Having a setting that could generate fade-ins and fade-outs whenever a clip is split would solve this problem, and also my drum editing problem. I believe that Cubase, Reaper, Pro Tools, and Ableton all have this capability.

Ah... in that case then, agreed! :)

No, the people commissioning it have hired in a bunch of different readers, who are all pretty good.
 
My impression is that since the guy is using all freelancers, he's had to come up with a set of rules just to get usable work out of the less experienced people. Which is fine. I'm going to do this one according to the rules, and then send him a sample of another approach. I reckon I can do it in a quarter the time, but that'll be with breaths reduced rather than eliminated. Will have to see if he finds it acceptable.

John I know they don't want this but I have found from experience that dropping breaths down by 10 dB works really well. (no clip splitting required hence no fades required either. You could drop them down by 30 db as well) Once some compression is added to tighten up and level out the VO the breaths don't come up in volume at all but they are barely there but still keep the VO natural sounding.
 
You can over complicate the issue in terms of adding fades to the start and end of clips. The way FreeFlyBertl has suggested is the way to go.  You only have to make the fade times very small eg 5 ms or less and any clicks will go.
 
I still feel an editor program is the way to go as well.  eg Adobe Audition etc.  It is just WAY faster.  No DAW can compete doing those sort of jobs.
 
And there is NO quick or automatic way to do it either.  You have to edit the VO all the way through manually to get the perfect result. 

Craig's approach sounds great but still involves clips being split.  And the moment you split clips you really have to check how things sound over the boundaries.  Longhand, in real time.  There is still no quick way.  You will have to reconsolidate the file too.
 
What I like about an editor is once the VO has been recorded I open up the whole full length file no matter how long it is.  It is real fast to recognise the breaths and just swipe the area with one action.  Then I have got a key command setup so one button press drops the breath by 10 db or removes it.  Then you just rewind a little and have a listen and move on.
 
Occasionally you might get a click right on the end of the previous word or the start of the next word in the swiped area but mostly not.  Often there will no sounds there at all just the breath gone or dropped well down.
 
Sometimes too you may want to remove an area of silence because the reader just hesitated or took a slight pause for some reason.  In the editor you can also swipe the area of extended silence and in one key command it gets chopped out and the whole file to the right moves back in an instant.  That is what I mean by fast.
 
It is easy to undo anything too in an editor.
 
Then you just save the newly edited file with a new name and you are away.  You can always open up the original file too if you need to and go back.
 
I have always believed anyway that a decent editing program is a must alongside your DAW.  Especially if you are doing lots of serious VO work.
 
I open up every track of a multi track mix before mixing in the editor and do some prep work there. There is ton of stuff you can do there that will save buckets of time later.  Checking levels with a VU meter being one of them too.  Any quiet bits can be easily lifted or loud bits pulled down a tad.  Stray noises removed.  Noisy sections noise reduced out etc...