V-Vocal question

Hey folks..Sonar8.5 Pro Newbie here. Enjoying the use of V-vocal very much, (my singer, even more)
  I'm still very new to the pitch "doctoring", and I find it very easy to get carried away with it. I've run into an issue vocal blips and chirps after using the "auto" correct function. I've searched the forum's using key words, to no sucess.  Could someone please tell how to get rid of them, or point me to an indepth tutorial on V-vocal. Tried Youtube, and there was some heplful stuff there...but didnt cover the "chirps"
Any help would be awesome!
Thanks, Kev

Could someone please tell how to get rid of them, or point me to an indepth tutorial on V-vocal.

Have you checked the Sonar Reference Guide?  There's actually quite a few extensive sections in there for V-Vocal.

And the Cakewalk YouTube site also has a few good videos.

PGShadow


Hey folks..Sonar8.5 Pro Newbie here. Enjoying the use of V-vocal very much, (my singer, even more)
  I'm still very new to the pitch "doctoring", and I find it very easy to get carried away with it. I've run into an issue vocal blips and chirps after using the "auto" correct function. I've searched the forum's using key words, to no sucess.  Could someone please tell how to get rid of them, or point me to an indepth tutorial on V-vocal. Tried Youtube, and there was some heplful stuff there...but didnt cover the "chirps"
Any help would be awesome!
Thanks, Kev

Hi,
The auto-correct option is never going to be as good as correcting the vocal track manually. It takes longer but the result is much better. This is my typical 'vvocal' workflow:

• ACtivate V-Vocal on the final, comped vocal track and solo the plugin
• Zoom in to the extent that one word/syllable is easily distinguishable
• Hit space (play) and listen to just one phrase, correcting individual syllables only where it affects the performance - i.e. not every syllable needs to be spot on pitch. The nature of the corrections would be either...
  • Most commonly just drag the word/syllable to the correct pitch (use your eyes here, not just the line marker that V-Vocal displays - sometimes, because of note slur, the perceived pitch will be flat or sharp if you snap the marker line to an exact note)
  • Occasionally drag part of a note. Drag and select the time line of the part you want to move, then drag the V-Vocal marker line. V-Vocal will split the marker line at the begin/end of your selection.
  • Rarely, reduce the pitch variation of a note
  • Rarely, 'straighten up' a sliding note (i.e. a word/syllable that changes pitch within the note time). Highlight the note and move teh V-Vocal marker line a tad so the begin/end (green) nodes appear. Grab one of the nodes and drag it until the pitch graph looks averagely level. Now drag the V-Vocal marker line (which will be at an angle) to the pitch you want.
• Save as you go (just press Ctrl-S)! I still get very occasional Sonar crashes with V-Vocal so I take no chances
• Next phrase and so on
• When finished, bounce the V-Vocal clip (select and Alt-C)

 

Thanks folks. You've all given me things to look into. The Vibrato sensitivity is something I may have to look at turning down for sure.

If your singer requires a lot of pitch correction, what happens when you play live?

Sijel


Go to almost any concert and you'll find out ;-)

I don't go to concerts with bands that can't sing in tune.

Sijel


+1  Very good advice on the editting approach.
 
FWIW, I've included a workflow in some earlier threads: http://forum.cakewalk.com/fb.ashx?m=2082915 -  there are several similarities to what you mention.
 
The one area where I deviate Is:

Save as you go (just press Ctrl-S)! I still get very occasional Sonar crashes with V-Vocal so I take no chances

I have decided to AVOID Saving while I'm editting in the V-Vocal clip.  The concern was accidently corrupting the Project file.  I have never corrupted a Project file - but some people in the forum claimed this - and I thought that not saving "open" VVocal edits would help prevent this.  (This approach may be unnecessary - I haven't tested both ways.)
 
Usually, if I make a great edit in a V-Vocal clip and I want to make more, I'll sometimes bounce to a clip, create another layer and repeat my workflow.  This interative approach saves the edit but keeps me using my workflow repetitively.  And as we know, reptition is key to not skipping steps and preserving the process.
 
Just food for thought - hope people find this valuable in meeting their VV goals .
 
 
 

Interesting.
 
I've NEVER bounced a V/V clip and it's not crashed once under 8.5.3
 
I did get the odd crash under 6.2.1 but nowt since.

NEVER use the auto pitch correction, not with V-Vocal nor with Melodyne, and probably not with AutoTune either, although I've never used that product.

Always make every correction by hand. Always audition it as soon as you've made the edit and use the erase tool if it doesn't sound right. Avoid steep changes: if you need to make a large change, use the line-drawing tool to make the transition more gradual.

And most important of all, make no change that isn't necessary. Sounds obvious, but it's easy to get carried away when you're looking at the graphical display. Listen to the note or phrase without looking at the display. If it doesn't sound out of tune, resist the temptation to "fix" it just because it looks off.

Re: Vibrato tool ... That is the main thing I do use V-Vocal for ... I've never read the manual (lazy) but just from trial and error what I do is this:

I'll highlight just the section where a vocal (or horn note) is sustained and then use the vibrato tool to remove all the vibrato.  And then correct the pitch if it needs it.  And then I just drag the vibrato icon left to right over the region where I want the new, perfect vibrato and use the vertical mouse movement to determine how wide the pitch change is in the vibrato.  It usually makes a very smooth and lovely sounding vibrato.  But the tempo of the vibrato will be the same over the entire note - so if you want the rate of the vibrato to change over time then I don't know how to do that (but I imagine it's in there if I would just RTFM).

Adding a couple of notes:

--You may hear an unnatural tone if you've shifted the syllable/word as much as a full step.  The Formant window goes a long ways to making it sound more natural again, because that big shift changed the Formants in the recording.

It's logical enough - in the formant window select the portion which was shifted - draw the selection if it's only part of the clip, otherwise just select the whole thing.  Move the line down by no more than -4.  That will bring the note more in the realm of sounding natural.  And of course if you shifted a note down, then move the Formant line up a tiny amount to compensate.

I use the vibrato tool often.  The natural vibrato, which is wobbling up and down from the target pitch, is important to the natural sound - so you don't want to mess with it very much unless you're going for special effects.  I often reduce the vibrato just a bit, and draw in bits that were too wild.  Then when moving the note up to the correct pitch, since the vibrato is a sine wave going both above and below the pitch I usually find that the best result is to hit the guide line short of the mark - flat.  As has been said, having the horizontal line exactly on the note can sound sharp - and that's because of so much vibrato swooping above the pitch, and our ears are usually especially sensitive to detecting sharp notes. Reduce the vibrato a bit to control extreme wobble, and as always, let your ears be the judge of how much shift is needed.

I often have the clip line soloed with a MIDI track which has the song's melody played on a piano.  That way I have an aural guide to what the notes are meant to be, and a visual guide when needed.

The time shift window is useful too - just make your selections large enough, because that defines how much or little you can time shift that part of a note.

Randy B.