HPR3004: Fixing simple audio problems with Audacity

Overview

I recorded the audio for the show I did with MrX in late 2019: “hpr2972 :: The foot of the ski slope”. I was using my Zoom H2n recorder in my car, on a small tripod placed on the dashboard. Something about this setup caused the result to be very boomy and (to me) unpleasant to listen to. This episode is about what I did for a cure, after some research.

I have also been using the ‘Truncate Silence’ effect in Audacity incorrectly in the past, and I used the opportunity to learn how to do a better job with it.

Now, I am well aware that there are some skilled and experienced Audio Engineers out there in HPR-land. I am certainly not one of these, though I quite enjoy fiddling with audio to make it sound better. I’d like to make two requests:

1. If I didn’t do a good job, please tell me what I did wrong here, and how I should have done it.
2. Think about doing a show (or shows) on HPR about how to deal with common audio problems. For example: how to remove a mains hum, the use of compression and normalisation.

Long notes

A longer form of these notes may be found here (full_shownotes.html). These go into more detail on the steps I took to try and make the audio for show 2972 more tolerable.

Links

• Wikipedia page describing Audacity
• Audacity website
• Effects:
  • Noise Reduction
  • High-pass Filter
  • Amplify
  • Truncate Silence

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