R
radi0j0hn
New member
Hindenburg Audio Editor For Broadcasting and Podcasting Blows It Bigtime.
I have been editing spoken word audio for broadcast and audiobooks ever since I got my first 550 Meg AV compatible hard drive that cost $1,000. It was worth it to finally get away from cutting audio tape and even the crude Windows programs of the time seemed miraculous.
Later, huge numbers of radio stations, including the one I managed, settled on Adobe Audition 1.5 (or 2.0) to produce commercials, news and pre-recorded shows. Audition, a modest multi-track product based on shareware’s Cool-Edit was fine for us, but there were better choices for musicians.
A lot of time editing audio is spent removing “breaths” and shorter “gasps.” To visualize the seismic style or lie-detector waveform that represents the sound, imagine the actual recording looking like this : ###########.
A breath looks a bit like this: #######------#####
A quick gasp looks like this #######<>####.
Someone saying “uh...” looks like this: #######(0)#######.
These audio flaws are very easy to spot in the visual stream representing audio. And, very much like a word processor, you highlight the ------- or <> or (0), hit delete and the audio stream comes together so there is no “hole” of silence in the audio.
If your show is a few seconds too long, often finding a few --------s or <>s can shorten the show. And pulling out every “uh...” you can find makes the guest (and whole show) sound better.
Audition 1.5 is considered obsolete and has been replaced with newer more band-friendly features. For those of us who still love the simplicity of the original, there are few choices. We could switch to Audacity which, like Audition does multi tracking needed for adding music beds, etc. But it is a bit wonky. There are several Audition wannabees, but most are only single track.
So you have few choices if you are using a Windows 10 PC other than leasing the latest Audition version for $240/year or keeping an old XP PC around, as Audio 1.5 doesn’t play well with more modern operating systems.
I was very excited to find the “Hindenburg” audio editor for podcasting, broadcasting and audiobook production. It is set up a bit like Audition 1.5, handles multiple tracks and is made for Windows 10. With prices starting at around $95 for a base model, I thought I was set. I downloaded a trial.
I loaded in an audio file to see how the editing worked and was met with visual representation of the audio totally different from ANY of the editors out there. Instead of a squiggly line like a lie-dector where breaths, gaps and “uhhh….s” could be spotted a mile way, there was this multicolored “spectral” view designed to better show volume changes. That’s something muscians want. Radio people do nice even level which is accomplished AFTER editing out all the breathes, gasps and “Uhh...s.”
I’ll check again, but to the best of my knowledge, you cannot switch to a waveform view, which renders the app useless for serious audio editing.
What were they thinking???
I have been editing spoken word audio for broadcast and audiobooks ever since I got my first 550 Meg AV compatible hard drive that cost $1,000. It was worth it to finally get away from cutting audio tape and even the crude Windows programs of the time seemed miraculous.
Later, huge numbers of radio stations, including the one I managed, settled on Adobe Audition 1.5 (or 2.0) to produce commercials, news and pre-recorded shows. Audition, a modest multi-track product based on shareware’s Cool-Edit was fine for us, but there were better choices for musicians.
A lot of time editing audio is spent removing “breaths” and shorter “gasps.” To visualize the seismic style or lie-detector waveform that represents the sound, imagine the actual recording looking like this : ###########.
A breath looks a bit like this: #######------#####
A quick gasp looks like this #######<>####.
Someone saying “uh...” looks like this: #######(0)#######.
These audio flaws are very easy to spot in the visual stream representing audio. And, very much like a word processor, you highlight the ------- or <> or (0), hit delete and the audio stream comes together so there is no “hole” of silence in the audio.
If your show is a few seconds too long, often finding a few --------s or <>s can shorten the show. And pulling out every “uh...” you can find makes the guest (and whole show) sound better.
Audition 1.5 is considered obsolete and has been replaced with newer more band-friendly features. For those of us who still love the simplicity of the original, there are few choices. We could switch to Audacity which, like Audition does multi tracking needed for adding music beds, etc. But it is a bit wonky. There are several Audition wannabees, but most are only single track.
So you have few choices if you are using a Windows 10 PC other than leasing the latest Audition version for $240/year or keeping an old XP PC around, as Audio 1.5 doesn’t play well with more modern operating systems.
I was very excited to find the “Hindenburg” audio editor for podcasting, broadcasting and audiobook production. It is set up a bit like Audition 1.5, handles multiple tracks and is made for Windows 10. With prices starting at around $95 for a base model, I thought I was set. I downloaded a trial.
I loaded in an audio file to see how the editing worked and was met with visual representation of the audio totally different from ANY of the editors out there. Instead of a squiggly line like a lie-dector where breaths, gaps and “uhhh….s” could be spotted a mile way, there was this multicolored “spectral” view designed to better show volume changes. That’s something muscians want. Radio people do nice even level which is accomplished AFTER editing out all the breathes, gasps and “Uhh...s.”
I’ll check again, but to the best of my knowledge, you cannot switch to a waveform view, which renders the app useless for serious audio editing.
What were they thinking???
