Narrative Recording....retakes

[Fieryjack]

Hi:

I am recording a narrative project (total about one hour of speaking, in 6 parts). The speaker (author), who is not a professional V.O. guy, wanted to do some "re-takes" after completing one section in which he didn't like his phrasing of certain sentences in that section.

So I set up in the same room, with the same mic (AT 4033), same compressor (Focusrite Platinum), same recording chain, etc.

Despite trying to capture it 5 times, with different mic positions, the retake parts sound different. It appears that I'll have to re-record the entire section.

Can any pros out there give me advice on doing narrative re-takes?

[apropos of nothing]

Leave y'r mic up, channel locked, and duct tape the chair to the floor.

[Nozzler]

there are two things that would alter this record from the last, one being the proximity of voice to mic. Is the talent in the exact same posistion as last time? Is there a music stand in the way? The next biggie for me would be, are you in a climate controlled room. If not, humidity plays a big role on capturing sound. I was once tracking drums and everyday my akg 535 sounded completely different from the previous day's session. Problem was those particular mics don't respond well to climate change!

other than re-doing the record, could editing the phrasiing to get what the client is after an option or possibility?

[JGriffin]

Well, it sounds like you got the basics right by using the same mic, signal chain, room, etc. and I'll assume you documented all settings so your levels and amount of compression and eq are all the same. You should put the mic in exactly the same position as before. So now what comes into account is the voice. If this guy wasn't a pro he might have trouble getting back to the same voice he was using before. His pitch might be higher or lower, his delivery might be louder or quieter. Maybe hgis energy is lower becuase he skipped breakfast, or higher 'cause he had more coffee than usual. You can fix the pitch thing sometimes with pitch-shifting, but the louder/quieter thing comes down to performance. Your narrator has to do that himself.

One thing to try is to have him "read in" to the revised section: read the previous two or three sentences, even if you don't intend to replace them. This gets him into the rhythm of the larger piece, and allows you to edit in earlier, which sometimes disguises the edit. Try editing in the middle of a word, in the middle of a sentence prior to the new revised bit. If the change in sound is subtle enough, this will help hide the difference between the two parts.

Unfortunately there's a small amount of voodoo associated with this sometimes. Sometimes there's no reason you can find that stuff sounds different with the same gear, settings, room, performer, etc. Sometimes the front part of the edit sounds bad but coming out of it into the old bit sounds fine. How this is possible beats the hell out of me--but it happened to me just this morning.

How does the new part sound different? If you can describe it I may be able to be more helpful.

Hope some of this makes sense.

[Mike Simmons]

dwlb is right on the money.

One more suggestion: have him listen to the narrartion on either side of the edit points so that he has a sense of the energy, tone, rhythm and inflection.

Also, when reading in, record the narrator reading with the track for a sentance or so before the proposed edit. Then, mute the original track at the edit point and re-record the section to be revised. Have him continue after the proposed "out" edit point for a sentance. This will give you more options on where to make the final cut. Editing within a word or phrase is a great way to hide the edit.

I patched a v/o today that was recorded in January when the talent had a bad cold... we used all these things but still had to use eq to match it in the end.

[Substrated]

are you on a daw or tape. Had to edit the phrasing as noted above on a vo using a daw. the pauses I put in sounded a little weird with her inflection but when played for someone else they couldn't tell the difference. o yea I had to copy a silent area and mix it in so the edits weren't noticable (noise floor)