Strange 'blip' sound ruining my dialogue!

Report · May 23, 2020

Hi all,

I've been getting this weird intermittent blip/pop sound on dialogue audio and I have no idea why, its driving me crazy. I have included 2 examples below (example 1: blip @ "memoir", example 2: blip @ "affiliate"). This sound is not on the original audio files. All I've done is import the audio into Audition and cut it up a bit (the blips are not occuring where I've made edits). The blip/pop sounds seem to change location almost as if it is a sample rate issue or something. I've tried disabling all effects & the blips are still there. I've tinkered with different audio drivers, sample rates, re-installed/updated Audition, cleared space on the computer and closed other programs to free up ram.

One weird thing I've noticed is that the blip/pop sounds seem to not occur when I'm playing back the audio in the waveform editor but when I immediately switch to the multitrack editor and play from the same position the blips are there, even if there are no effects or processes applied to the multitrack.

What the hell is going on here?

Any help would be greatly appreciated 🙂

Report · May 23, 2020

Need more information. For a start, what format were these files in originally when you got them? Apart from cutting them up, have you done any other processing to them at all before putting them in Multitrack? Also, whilst I can hear a very slight blip in 'affiliate' I can't detect one in 'memoir', although the waveform for several of the words looks a little strange. And that's the other thing - there's no way it is going to be possible to discover anything that subtle from an MP3 file - whatever you present has to be in the original format that's causing the issue - so if it's causing this effect in Audition, it has to be a wav file, because that's what it's running as in - the native format.

In view of the fact that I can't detect one blip, and can only just detect the other, I'm also wondering about how you are playing these files. You haven't indicated whether this is a Mac or a PC you are playing them on, but if it's a PC and you're using a Windows-driven sound device then it's quite possible that the output is being resampled. When Microsoft does resampling, it's not good, and all quality bets are off...

Report · May 23, 2020

Thanks so much for the reply! Appreciate your thoughtful response.

Would Microsoft's crummy driver create the sort of issue I'm experiencing?

Bit rate 1536kbps WAVE files. I did apply EQ, compression and a hard limiter in the Multitrack but I disabled those before I bounced the examples above. So they were literally just imported into the multitrack and the issue appeared upon playback, but its not as prominent, sometimes not even present all, upon playback in the waveform editor. Playing the tracks on a PC, 8GB of ram, Intel core i7 (fine for much bigger projects than a couple of wave files). Using the windows MME driver. Tried the ASIO driver too and that didn't make a difference (I don't really know what the optimal settings are for the ASIO driver are...).

I bounced a couple more obvious examples, in the original format, in the attached files here. Example 3, blip on "disaster", example 4, blip on "continental" and audio weirdness on "eighty".

Examples 3 & 4...

https://drive.google.com/open?id=18c1ZGqnP8zUmV6u5m3kDzTZJNIMtXcs7

Any further insight would be greatly appreciated 🙂

Report · May 24, 2020

Need to see the original file, as well, to make a comparison. I can clearly see the blip on 'disaster' and it looks as though there's some sort of frequency-based error at the blip point (I've put a ring around it on one channel):

I can honestly say that I've never seen Audition do anything like that before, and although I suppose there's a first time for everything... that said, there are other disturbing things about your recordings that may well be significant, one of them being the rather grating distortion that I can actually show you pictures of. The first one is the waveform from a single word from one of your files, and the second is a picture of what a similar length word from a completely different file looks like when it's not distorted (I've ringed one bit of the distortion in your file so you can see what I'm looking at, but it's present everywhere):

And this is why I'd like to see the original untouched files.

Report · May 24, 2020

Oh wow!

Yea see if it was just the initial recording that was somehow falty that would make things much easier to figure out. Just my luck that my computer produces an issue that hasn't been seen before, classic haha.

I've added one of the original files I recieved directly to the shared folder below. I haven't done anything with it besides download it from pcloud and upload it to google drive here.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1SIY_d4v4OjREQS4dotLhm7uQbpPqv3-t

Keen to hear your thoughts!

Thanks again.

Report · May 24, 2020

Well so far, I've discovered several (actually quite a lot) of those blips on the original file, and that file doesn't seem to sound quite as distorted as the ones you posted earlier. But I did what, on the face of it, you must have done, and converted it to 48k stereo (even though there's no point in converting it to stereo, I did it anyway) and played it in multitrack - it sounds just the same as it did in Waveform view. And that's with zero effects or any sort of processing at all. Now if, for instance, there was something like the Speech Volume Leveler or any other compression app in the master channel (which you wouldn't see unless you opened the mixer) then this could easily produce these sorts of results in Multitrack that you wouldn't hear in Waveform view. And make the distortion worse too...

So I suppose the next question is - what template did you use to start the Multitrack session?

Report · May 24, 2020

I'm not using a predefined template. I opened a fresh multitrack session with 16 bit depth, 48k and stereo (I need to add SFX & music later). Just checked and there are not processes running on the master channel.

So do you think there is some issue with the source audio? Could it be related to uploading/downloading to/from the cloud somehow?

Report · May 25, 2020

I'm not going to go into it here (unless you are desperate to know) but there are very good reasons - especially if you are going to alter levels or do any processing at all - for having your Multitrack session as 32-bit Floating Point. And if it's for a podcast, you don't need to convert it to 48k either - just stick to the 44.1k it already is. By and large, 48k is traditionally used with video-based projects, and 44.1k is for anything purely audio.

The general idea with production - whatever it's for - is that you do everything in the production phase at the highest quality, and as losslessly, as you can. You only convert material to a compressed format when you've finished, and that's purely for distribution purposes. When you do that, you get the best compressed result from the highest-quality original - and that's why you do it.

So my next step here is to do a bit of an edit on your material in Multitrack in 32-bit FP, mix it down, and see what happens... I suspect that it will be fine...

Report · May 25, 2020

I really appreciate the effort you're going to to try to help. Unfortnately the issue is still present. I tried redownloading the original audio and opening a fresh Audition template with 32 bit FP & 44.1K. The blips don't seem to be present when I play back the unedited audio in the multitrack editor but as soon as I do a few edits the blips show up again & in random spot. This is so frustrating. I have tried importing the files into Ableton and Audacity and the blips don't seem to be present there (though when I bounced a segment of the audio from Ableton some new glitches were present). I guess I can edit the dialogue in those programs but it's really not ideal given that Audition is specifically designed for editing dialogue.

I have other projects in Audition that do not have this issue so I am beginning to suspect that there is some issue with the source audio in this case. Though I cannot for the life of me figure out why this specific issue is not showing up when I import the audio into Ableton or Audacity, only Audition.

Report · May 25, 2020

I might get a chance to have a look at this soon... (been a bit busy)

Report · May 25, 2020

I did a very quick multitrack edit on the first 2'40" of the raw material, and mixed it down. There were no artifacts added that weren't on the original audio, and no difference between the Multitrack and Waveform edit playbacks - I listened carefully. Yes there are little blips - but they're on the original recording.

First section edited and mixed down

Report · May 25, 2020

Thanks so much. I really appreciate it. I think I just discovered what may of been the issue, I'm assuming you did not 'stretch' the audio so that it would play back faster while editing it? I typically speed up the audio when editing dialogue to get through it quickly before double checking the edits I've made at regular speed. I just did an edit then without stretching the audio at all and the artifacts were not present. Every edit I'd dont before this point was while the audio was 'streched' to 45% and then after editing I would strech the audio out and I think that process is what is causing the blips to appear somehow. I do this regularly with every other project but on this one it seems the stretching process is causing the blips to occur at random points throughout the audio. Thoughts?