Author: Chris Curran

RX 10’s Repair Assistant helps you clean up your raw audio.

The handy “Learn” button creates a custom module/processor chain for your audio. It scans your audio and suggests custom amounts of optimization in each of the following modules: De-ess, De-click, De-reverb, De-noise and De-clip. Then you can preview the sound of those suggested settings as well as increase or decrease the amount of each module to taste. Then, when everything sounds good to you, simply click Render. 

Repair Assistant is included in the Standard and Advanced versions of RX 10. 

NOTE: “Assistant’s” like these do a good job of getting you started in the right direction, but you still need to use your ears to determine what sounds good. The initial settings it suggests MAY be the perfect settings, but more than likely you’ll be able to make it sound way better by making some small adjustments to the suggested settings.

Are you the type of audio producer who uses Assistant’s like these? Comment below.

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

Neutron 4 has so many modules within it including EQ, compressor, gate, exciter, transient shaper, sculptor and unmask. This complete mixing suite costs around $399.

Probably the most helpful feature for podcasters, editors and producers is its Mix Assistant which evaluates your source audio and then dials in suggested EQ/compression/etc. settings to provide you with a good starting point which you can then tweak.

They offer a 10-day free trial, too.

Have you used Neutron before? Comment below.

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

Remote podcast guests don’t know what they don’t know, so it’s our responsibility to soundcheck them and train them before starting the recording session to ensure we capture good audio from them. 

Here are 3 common occurrences which ruin remote guests’ audio quality: 

1. Noisy Background — Fans, air conditioners, noisy kids in the next room, dogs barking and running around, phones ringing, open windows letting in the sound of lawnmower or cars driving by, etc. SOLUTION: Work with the guest to turn off or eliminate all these noises before starting recording. 
2. Making Extraneous Noises — Moving their microphone around, slapping things down on their desk, rearranging their desk mid-interview, moving their chair around, clicking a pen, tapping their foot, slamming their drink on their desk, wiping the dust off their computer, etc. SOLUTION: Explain to them that they have to BE ABSOLUTELY QUIET because they are now in a recording studio and their microphone will pick up all extraneous noises and ruin the sound of the podcast. 
3. Bad Microphone Technique — Drastically changing their proximity to their microphone (which drastically changes their volume level), having nasty plosives due to not having a pop filter/windscreen combined with speaking directly into the microphone, using their earbuds microphone and having it flap around and rub against clothing, etc. SOLUTION: Ask them to stay the same distance from the microphone at all times, ask them to speak “past” the microphone if they don’t have a pop filter/windscreen, ask them to make sure their earbuds mic doesn’t flap around. 

BONUS NOTES: 

• If they’re using a bad sounding microphone (for instance like an old school headset from 1998) and that’s the only microphone they have, you’ll have to rely on post-production to fix it as best you can. 
• Make sure they have a solid Wifi connection; if not they should move closer to their router or modem. NOTE: Being hardwired with an ethernet cable is ALWAYS a million times better, but most guests won’t have that setup. 
• If their computer is acting weird and they haven’t restarted it since 2007, have them restart it 😉

There’s a lot more to know regarding handling guests and soundchecking them properly but these ideas are a great start. We spend more than an hour in Podcast Engineering School going over this and much more in great depth.

Question for you — do you have any pre-recording rituals you do every time? Comment below.

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

The dbx 286s is a relatively inexpensive piece of audio gear that solves many issues for podcasters, Livestreamers and YouTubers.

Issues it solves:

• Low volume / not enough preamp gain (It has plenty of preamp gain to boost up gain-hungry microphones like the Shure SM7b, etc.)
• EQ issues like not enough clarity/high frequencies and not enough body/low frequencies (Its Enhancer increases the level, detail and definition of the high and low frequencies)
• Dynamic range issues like loud parts that peak/distort and low-volume parts that are super quiet/inaudible (via its classic dbx compression)
• Sibilance (Yes, it has a de-esser!)
• Background noise (via its Expander/Gate)

It usually sells for around $275.00

See all its technical specifications HERE.

FYI, in an upcoming episode of my Podcast Engineering Show my guest used a dbx 286s.

Do you use a dbx 286s? Comment below with your opinions about it. I’d love to know.

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

The Realphones app/plugin makes your headphone audio sound like it’s coming through the expensive monitoring system of a high end recording studio control room. Some folks feel this can be useful with regard to producing good mixes. Others disagree.

*NOTE: *In my opinion* apps/plugins like Realphones (or Sonarworks, Waves Abbey Road Studio 3, Acustica Sienna, etc.) aren’t necessary for producing good podcast audio using headphones (studio monitors are a different story), but they can be useful for some folks. Remember, it’s always perfectly fine to simply get accustomed to your particular headphones over time and rely on them without the use of software like this.

I haven’t tried Realphones yet (Pricing: $69-$179 for different options).

Here’s a good review video I found with lots more info and sound examples: Is REALPHONES 1.8 really better than Sonarworks & Acustica Sienna for mixing on headphones?

From the Realphones website:

• A professional studio control room in your headphones.
• Modeling the sound of various models of professional monitors and consumer audio speakers, Check how your mix behaves under different listening conditions.
• Night club and car cabin for mix-checking.

What are you thoughts? Comment below.

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

I’ve heard good things about the RODE Wireless GO II. It’s a wireless transmitter AND recorder in one. And it doesn’t require any cables like a clip-on lavalier microphone does. You clip it on to your clothing as close to your mouth as you can manage and it will pick up your voice well. It can record on the device itself in addition to sending the audio wirelessly to the receiver which you then record in your computer, camera, etc.

Someone recently asked me to recommend a good wireless setup for someone making videos doing stretching and exercises. Basically there are 3 options here:

1. Wear the RØDE Wireless GO II or similar.
2. Wear a wireless transmitter (around same size as the GO) along with connected lavalier microphone clipped to the collar.
3. Wear some kind of headset with microphone that has a transmitter built into it. (Does that even exist?? — but wait — AIRPODS! FYI, the audio quality of AirPods is horrendous; I don’t recommend using or capturing AirPods audio anytime anywhere.)

Have you used the RODE Wireless GO II? Comment below.

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

It’s difficult to mix two podcast participants’ voices if one is wildly dynamic and the other is consistent and/or already compressed:

• The consistent and/or compressed voice will sound up front and intelligible the entire time; loud parts won’t be too loud and lower volume parts won’t be too low.
• The uncompressed voice will fluctuate wildly between way too loud and way too low volume. At times the audio will get super loud and blow the listeners ear drums out; at other times the audio will be drastically quiet (making it difficult for listeners to even hear) and mostly, if not completely, unintelligible.

Trying to match the overall volume level of those two differently dynamic voices (making both have equal perceived loudness levels) is a nightmare due to the inconsistency of the uncompressed wildly fluctuating voice.

The solution is (generally) to use the same amount of compression on each voice. After you do this, it’s actually quite easy to adjust all participants to be generally the same volume throughout the entire episode.

Of course this doesn’t solve EVERY mixing/balancing issue, but for podcast production it’s a GREAT practice to employ for the sole benefit of the listeners.

Have you ever thought of compression this way? Comment below!

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

Also check out our YouTube videos HERE!

The BOOM is a new audio interface from Apogee.

Check out Bandrew’s exhaustive demo and review: Apogee Boom Interface Review / Explained

Here’s some info and specs of the unit:

• 2×2 USB Type-C Audio interface with Built-In Hardware DSP FX
• BOOM is made for passionate creators that pursue their creativity without compromise. Whether you’re a musician, podcaster, or live streamer, BOOM will inspire you to take your projects to the next level, with legendary studio-quality sound by Apogee.
• With BOOM, you can record, monitor, and mix through class-leading mic preamps and pristine digital conversion, fine-tune your input sources using BOOM’s built-in hardware DSP FX, and take your studio anywhere your story takes you. All you have to do is connect directly to your Mac, iPad Pro, or Windows laptop, and let your ideas flow.

What say you? Comment below.

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

I’m posting lots of videos these days discussing podcast audio production.

Watch the videos here:

• YouTube — https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCw1z9z8ikRabXA4zku88w5A
• Odysee — https://odysee.com/@PodcastEngineeringSchool:5
• Rumble — https://rumble.com/c/c-1329674

Most of the videos are like my Daily Goody blog posts — quick, simple, etc.

Please give me feedback — I’m hoping to improve 😉

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

By “haircut” I mean Limiting! *See the image above showing a nice straight “haircut”; the loudest peaks have been “tamed”.

Limiters basically chop off any loud sharp pointy peaks in audio, and they do so without causing clipping distortion (unless you’re doing extreme limiting).

Be careful: If a raw audio recording is extremely dynamic, the loudest parts are going to be severely loud and will almost certainly clip and distort when you boost the overall level in post. In these cases you should definitely use some compression before limiting.

Here are some helpful articles:

• Limiter vs. Compressor: One Way to Think About It
• If the “hair is WAY too long” on your audio (meaning it has lots of huge loud peaks), check out this post: If You’re Cutting Off Lots of Peaks in Mastering

Do you fancy yourself an “audio hairdresser”??! Comment below 🙂

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

I’m now making short daily videos and you can watch them on:

YouTube — https://www.youtube.com/c/PodcastEngineeringSchool/

Odysee — https://odysee.com/@PodcastEngineeringSchool:5

Rumble — https://rumble.com/c/c-1329674

*KEEP IN MIND that these videos are similar to my Daily Goody posts in that they are only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these videos to be long, earth-shattering deep-dive masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of.

Consider subscribing to one of the channels listed above to make sure you see the videos.

Want to receive the Daily Goody in your email, daily or weekly? Subscribe free here.

And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

TL;DR:

1. If a podcast participant is NOT wearing headphones or earbuds — you MUST use echo cancellation on their audio.
2. If a podcast participant IS wearing headphones or earbuds — you should NOT use echo cancellation on their audio.

Full explanation:

Echo cancellation is an audio process that can be used during podcast recording sessions. It was designed to eliminate feedback which jumbles the audio and makes conversation impossible. It’s meant to be used on participants who are not wearing headphones or earbuds — meaning, they’re listening to the other podcast participants through their computer speakers (or other speakers). Of course this projects the sound of the other participants into their room, which then bounces around their room and is picked up by their own microphone. This causes the other participants’ audio to be sent back to them, causing the effect of “feedback” for the other participants. The echo cancellation eliminates this feedback and makes conversation possible.

Echo cancellation is offered by most remote recording services like Riverside, Zencastr, Squadcast, Streamyard, etc.

Recap:

1. No headphones = use echo cancellation
2. Wearing headphones = don’t use echo cancellation

*But I hear some of you maniacs: “Excuse me, Chris, but can’t we just ALWAYS use echo cancellation just to be safe? What’s the harm?” ANSWER: Echo cancellation causes substantial-to-severe audio degradation, so I recommend only using it if it’s necessary 😉

What are your thoughts on using echo cancellation?

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

For around $35.99 the Clarity Vx plugin from Waves seems to be a pretty awesome noise removal plugin. I haven’t tried it yet but the reviews are excellent.

Here’s a video of it completely removing the noise made by a blender!

In podcast production this would come in very handy for cleaning up the noisy audio of a remote guest who has a fan or air conditioner on in the background, or a noisy computer fan running, etc.

From their website:

• Clarity Vx is the highest-quality and the fastest way to clean your vocals from background noise and prepare them for any mix, production, podcast or video.
• Powered by the same Waves Neural Networks® engine as the larger Clarity Vx Pro, Clarity Vx is optimized with a simple interface to guarantee the best of both worlds with zero learning curve: impeccably clean vocals – no artifacts, no damage to the performance – AND results in seconds.
• In the past, cleaning noisy vocal recordings at the highest fidelity required serious engineering know-how, as well as the luxury of time. The solutions were not optimized for musicians on a budget, home producers on a schedule, and content creators who are not professional sound engineers.
• We’ve changed all of that with Clarity Vx.
• Whatever noise you’re dealing with – from light AC or computer fan noise, to heavy traffic outside your bedroom studio window, or anything in between – we have you covered with Clarity Vx. Simply turn the single knob clockwise – and hear the noise go away with the voice quality fully preserved.

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”

Some remote guests love their AirPods so much, and simultaneously they know so little about audio quality, that they believe (wrongly) that the microphone in their AirPods is a great sounding option to use when they appear as a guest on podcasts.

It’s not.

That is all.

OK, but seriously, all podcast producers worth their salt always discourage the use of AirPods, except as a last resort when the guest literally has no other microphone options. Some producers even prefer built-in laptop microphones over AirPods!

NOTE: It’s totally fine to use AirPods to monitor audio when recording, but recording the AirPods microphone is never pretty.

What are your thoughts on the audio quality of AirPods?

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And please keep in mind, the Daily Goody is only a tiny little tip, fact or lesson everyday. Please don’t expect any of these posts to be long, earth-shattering masterpieces that instantly answer every single question you can think of and completely transform you into a world class podcast engineer. “Little by little, a little becomes a lot.”