Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (losguy)

Sat, 23 Dec 2006 11:20:10 GMT

Fair enough. That technique is probably better suited for wows than for flutters. OTOH, if the flutter is fairly constant, i.e. semi-sinusoidal at a fairly constant rate and amount, then you could try an automatically-generated pitch envelope. I don't know if the AA tools support that, though.

Even so, you'd have to get the frequency, amplitude, and phase of the pitch-shift sinusiod to be in perfect opposition to the one imposed upon your material. Again, it could take a while, with lots of trial and error, and you'd probably only be able to fix one section at a time due to drift. But if you could nail it, it would do the job, and in semi-automatic fashion as well.

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (Joe Bravo)

Sat, 23 Dec 2006 02:01:45 GMT

Boy, I don't think I could do it like that Carlos. The pitch is shifting up and down at such a fast rate that I just don't think I'm capable of zooming in on anything to fix it or I would. I know it would work if I could though.

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (losguy)

Fri, 22 Dec 2006 22:22:37 GMT

The good news: Audition has a neat tool that will be perfect for this. Look under Effects > Time/Pitch > Pitch Correction

The bad news: While it will work, it will be tedious. Because of the complexity and polyphony of the source material, you will need to do it manually (i.e. click on the 'Manual' tab of the Pitch Correction dialog).

The warbling is physically caused by an instability in the motor of the the analog deck, either during recording, or playback, or both. It is actually affecting the entire audio, but it is much more noticeable on the piano because that instrument does not naturally have any warble in it. (In the old days, audiophiles would actually use piano recordings as listening references for quickly assessing wow and flutter on analog equipment.) Anyway, because it affects the entire recording, and because the pitch shifting is a physical speedup/slowdown of the material, a non-formant-correcting pitch shift on the entire material will correct it. That is precisely what the AA Pitch Correction will give you.

My recommendation: Load your WAV into AA, then listen for warbling. Where you hear it, add pitch envelope nodes to adjust it out. Repeat for the whole recording. It will wear you out, but it will get you where you want to go.

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (Joe Bravo)

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 12:59:00 GMT

Thanks James; I've got to split for a while but I'll download that thread and look at it later.

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (jamesg1213)

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 08:46:21 GMT

'Macflooze' had some success with restoring the sound on an old live concert from a cassette, here's the thread, might help...

http://forum.cakewalk.com/tm.asp?m=900442

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (davidchristopher)

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 02:26:06 GMT

1) AT only works on single note lines, it can't do chords.
2) The clapping, background noise and voice over would prevent even a single note correction from occuring.

Sorry mate. Autotune isn't what you need. I don't know what you DO need, but I know AT isn't it.

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (Joe Bravo)

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 01:27:31 GMT

Well, here's a sample of what I'm working with. Its a sort of comedy bit with piano and voice. You'll notice that the voice doesn't sound all warbly like the piano does. Can auto tune fix this piano at all?

The Tune

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (davidchristopher)

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 00:53:08 GMT

Autotune isn't going to help you with this - autotune will correct the pitch of a particular instrument, but it's more or less useless on a mix- esp if it's coming in off a camcorder. I don't think that there is a plug in that will eliminate w/f. It might be possible if you have something that can vary the pitch of a particular segment of the mixed audio, but I don't see how it would do this automatically.

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (Joe Bravo)

Wed, 20 Dec 2006 17:34:08 GMT

Well, Audition has picth strecting effects but not any kind of auto tuning. Anyone know of a free or cheap direct X plug-in that does auto tuning well?

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (Joe Bravo)

Wed, 20 Dec 2006 15:01:26 GMT

Cool avatar Yep. I used to be good lookin' like you.

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (Joe Bravo)

Wed, 20 Dec 2006 14:59:30 GMT

"The warble should be nothing more then a very fast.. slow down-speed back up.. thing that happens at a fairly steady rate."

Yeah, that's it. A friend out in New York sent me some old VHS concert tapes that were recorded by someone in the audience with a VHS camcorder back in the early 80's. He transferred them to DVD for me so I don't even have the original tapes. I'll try the auto-tune thing. I've never used that before. I think Audition has it. If not I'll hunt down a plug-in.

Thanks guys. Any other suggestions are welcome.

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (ohhey)

Wed, 20 Dec 2006 14:39:20 GMT

ORIGINAL: Joe Bravo

I don't see how it's possible to cure this, but has anybody figured out a helpful solution for warbly sound in either video or cassette tapes? I could give you an example but I think most people know what I mean.

For cassette a playback deck with low wow and flutter can help if the tape was good to start with, a plugin like autotune might be able to track fast enough to fix it if tape speed variation was in fact the problem. The warble should be nothing more then a very fast.. slow down-speed back up.. thing that happens at a fairly steady rate. I'm thinking autotune should be able to fix that if you get it set just right.

RE: Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (yep)

Wed, 20 Dec 2006 14:10:21 GMT

It's semi-possible.

Google "nonuniform sampling" and "wow and flutter" for more details.

Cheers.

Old VHS Video Tapes With Warbled Sound (Joe Bravo)

Wed, 20 Dec 2006 13:50:01 GMT

I don't see how it's possible to cure this, but has anybody figured out a helpful solution for warbly sound in either video or cassette tapes? I could give you an example but I think most people know what I mean.