Mark LaCoste Posted September 3, 2003 Share Posted September 3, 2003 I was helping My son with a little project. He has a number of files that were recorded direct to MP3. Some of the files were recorded at 128kbps, and those files are twice as big as we want them to be (most of these spoken word recordings were done at 64kbps). I used Pyro to save the big files at the lower resolution, but the result sounds like someone left a low quality flanger accross the stereo bus. All swishy and blubbery. Can this artifact be avoided? -armand Rubber Lizard Studio Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anderton Posted September 3, 2003 Share Posted September 3, 2003 That's the problem with data compression. Render in mono when going to a lower rate. The quality of a mono file at 64 kbs is about the same as a stereo file at 128 kbs. Also, **you don't want to recompress a file that was already compressed.** Get ahold of the original recordings and recompress, or live with the larger size files. Craig Anderton Educational site: http://www.craiganderton.org Music: http://www.youtube.com/thecraiganderton Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/craig_anderton Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gus Lozada Posted September 3, 2003 Share Posted September 3, 2003 [quote]Originally posted by Anderton: [b]The quality of a mono file at 64 kbs is about the same as a stereo file at 128 kbs. [/b][/quote]:eek: Did not know this ! Músico, Productor, Ingeniero, Tecnólogo Senior Product Manager, América Latina y Caribe - PreSonus at Fender Musical Instruments Company Instagram: guslozada Facebook: Lozada - Música y Tecnología www.guslozada.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark LaCoste Posted September 3, 2003 Author Share Posted September 3, 2003 Ah... interesting. I don't want to re-compress... Okay, the original recordings ARE mp3 files encoded at 128kbps. What I am trying right now is this: Imported the mp3 file into SONAR. Sounds good! So I'm Exporting at 64kbps. This is taking a while, as the file is a two hour lecture. When I Imported to SONAR, did the file become a .wav? If not I should have saved it as one. I hope to ditch any re-compression artifacts in this way. Make sense? Rubber Lizard Studio Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt.Hepworth Posted September 3, 2003 Share Posted September 3, 2003 Welcome. Welcome to mp3. Yes, I believe SONAR does convert to .wav. No matter how good something is, there will always be someone blasting away on a forum somewhere about how much they hate it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gus Lozada Posted September 3, 2003 Share Posted September 3, 2003 [quote]Originally posted by NE-One: [b]Yes, I believe SONAR does convert to .wav.[/b][/quote]Yeap, but Armand, do not expect the MP3 to recover all of its harmonic content. Músico, Productor, Ingeniero, Tecnólogo Senior Product Manager, América Latina y Caribe - PreSonus at Fender Musical Instruments Company Instagram: guslozada Facebook: Lozada - Música y Tecnología www.guslozada.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark LaCoste Posted September 3, 2003 Author Share Posted September 3, 2003 The file is taking forever to render. This reminds me of doing 3D scenes on a 486. I'll post the results - If NE-One is right I'll go down to defeat. -armand Rubber Lizard Studio Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
philbo_Tangent Posted September 3, 2003 Share Posted September 3, 2003 [quote]Originally posted by Rubber Lizard: [b]I was helping My son with a little project. He has a number of files that were recorded direct to MP3. Some of the files were recorded at 128kbps, and those files are twice as big as we want them to be (most of these spoken word recordings were done at 64kbps). I used Pyro to save the big files at the lower resolution, but the result sounds like someone left a low quality flanger accross the stereo bus. All swishy and blubbery. Can this artifact be avoided? -armand[/b][/quote]If you're putting this on a CD, why compress it further? You can get about 20 hours of stereo 128K MP3s onto a single CD. Another option, since it's only speech, is to use .WMA format. Higher compression than MP3, though I detest what it does to music... A better MP3 encoder than Sonar's is the freeware LAME encoder. Look for RazorLame on Google. It's both faster and sounds better. IMHO. Phil Tangent Studios http://artists.iuma.com/IUMA/Bands/Tangent2/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark LaCoste Posted September 3, 2003 Author Share Posted September 3, 2003 Thanks, Philbo, Gus, and all. I guess the quality of this project is not all that important, being voice only and non-commercial, but I want to avoid wonky artifacts. So, Gus, while I'd worry about quality if it were one of my songs, I'm not sweating this one. I'm just learning from you guys. I may grab that LAME encoder for future stuff. The one thing I've really learned: The Electrovoice RE20 is a great mic for voice. The folks who make these recording know NOTHING about audio. They turn on the system. Yet the recordings sound quite natural. We now return to our regular off topic program. -armand Rubber Lizard Studio Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anderton Posted September 3, 2003 Share Posted September 3, 2003 A couple interesting things about MP3... * If you render to mono and stereo at the same bit rate, the file sizes will be the same, but the mono one will have better fidelity. This is because the bandwidth is "spent" on better fidelity in the mono sample than splitting that fidelity over two channels. * You can think of a 128 kbps stereo file as consisting of two 64 kbps mono files. (Technically this is not the case, but conceptually it is.) That's why a mono file rendered to 64 kbps will sound about the same as the same file rendered to stereo at 128 kbps. * In the August EQ, my Power App Alley article tells how to add a decent-sounding and FREE MP3 encoder to Sonar. Craig Anderton Educational site: http://www.craiganderton.org Music: http://www.youtube.com/thecraiganderton Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/craig_anderton Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
philbo_Tangent Posted September 3, 2003 Share Posted September 3, 2003 [quote]Originally posted by Anderton: [b] * In the August EQ, my Power App Alley article tells how to add a decent-sounding and FREE MP3 encoder to Sonar.[/b][/quote]Craig - That was a GREAT issue! I still need to download & evaluate that encoder... Maybe there's opportunity for a tech-head (lab measurements) type encoder shootout EQ article? (I suppose it's been done already, but new encoders seem to keep popping up here & there...) Phil Phil Tangent Studios http://artists.iuma.com/IUMA/Bands/Tangent2/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.