Download Dialogue Tracks
Dhoal Boudreau
I'm currently working on a 2 hour narrative film that has 12 different characters and maybe 20 discrete scenes. I've gotten to the point where a single track for each character is proving to be very... limiting. The EQ, convolution, and track effects for each character change dramatically between and during scenes, so it almost seems more appropriate to have a single track per character per scene which would make this project much more complex (300 tracks), so I'm wondering how others manage. In DP I can embed sequences within a sequence, and I've seen some reference to using "sends" to simplify a workflow but still not sure how that would work.
Because I'm a Gen-Xer, I like to throw little snippets of dialogue in my playlists. Sadly, unlike in mixtape days, I can't just cut my own. Looking for any and all sources. Funny, weird, boring, doesn't matter. Just want a good collection of very short tracks.
On Star Trek Into Darkness I had the opportunity to break out of my usual Assistant Editor responsibilities and tackle a new experiment in temp sound editing. Will Files, Matt Evans, Robby Stambler and I formed a new mini-department within Editorial that was tasked with temping out the Editors' sequences and mixing them in 5.1. There's a lot to the process that is new and interesting, and I hope to get another post up soon that more fully flushes it all out, but for the moment all I want to talk about is a method for basic, global dialogue cleanup that is probably old hat to some (and par for the course for professional sound mixers), but was new and amazing to me.
Before this show, I didn't really know what RTAS was useful for, much less how awesome it really is. It allows you to use many of the AudioSuite plugins that you would normally apply to a clip, and apply them to an entire track instead, without rendering (thus the RT in Real-Time Audio Suite). Up to five RTAS plugins can be chained together per track. When applied to dialogue tracks, you can chain together 3 RTAS plugins that will make your dialogue much more understandable and leave more room in other frequencies for your sound effects and music.
The EQ you add here is basically a band pass with a little customization. Everything below 60Hz is gradually stripped away, as well as everything above 12kHz. This is because your typical dialogue won't produce any audio in those frequencies that you want to keep, but by throwing it away you can start to address issues of boominess, high frequency hiss, and other technical problems with your production audio that get in the way of understanding the dialogue.
Aside from the band pass, this EQ also lowers frequencies around 120Hz by 2db, and raises frequencies around 4kHz by 2db. Again, this helps with boosting the frequencies of your dialogue that are most useful for comprehension, and removing frequencies that tend to get in the way, but without being as blunt as the band pass since these are frequencies you do want to hear.
Now that you've removed unwanted frequencies, it's time to normalize the volume. For that you use a Compressor, which will actively limit how loud your dialogue can get. If it gets too loud and crosses our set threshold, the Compressor will bring it back in line. The more the volume goes past the threshold, the more it will be reined in. This helps make sure there are no loud surprises in your dialogue, and will save you some of the hassle of mixing loud clips down to a more comfortable listening level.
This one does exactly what its name implies, and helps with any S sounds in your dialogue that can be particularly piercing to listen to. It's basically another type of compressor that handles high frequencies instead of high decibel levels. On this we've set:
Ever wondered why your mix is quieter when encoded with the AC-3 (Dolby Digital) codec? Ever wondered why Atmos tracks often sound so quiet compared to other audio tracks? Want to know why the external Dolby Atmos renderer can be a quality control issue? For answers to these questions and more, please take a few minutes to read the following.
Speech threshold
Enabled only if Dialogue Intelligence is selected.
Defines the amount of dialogue in the audio program above which the dialogue loudness is used as a basis for loudness measurement. If the percentage of dialogue is higher than the threshold, the encoder uses speech gating to set the dialogue normalization value (otherwise, the encoder uses level gating).
Dialogue Intelligence
Applies the Dolby loudness measurement technology Dialogue Intelligence, which identifies segments of a program that contain dialogue (speech gating) and measures loudness only on those segments.
The more dialogue the encoder weights, the higher the risk of getting an extremely deviating value for dialogue normalisation. (Because the proportion of speech in relation to the rest is so extreme.)
To promote high-level exchange and discussion of law and human rights issues in the United States and China, the National Committee and the China Foundation for Human Rights Development co-organize an annual U.S.-China Track II Dialogue on the Rule of Law & Human Rights. Established in December 2009, this Track II dialogue is the first of its kind to be jointly hosted by U.S. and Chinese non-government organizations.
In 2019, the National Committee established a new Track II dialogue between the United States and China to discuss issues relating to the digital economy, in partnership with the Guanchao Cyber Forum, a division of Chinese Internet Security Conference. The dialogue focuses on changes affecting corporations doing business globally and on finding ways that American and Chinese companies can cooperate to address these concerns.
For over nine years, this bi-annual Track II dialogue has brought together leading American and Chinese economists, economic thinkers and business leaders for a day and a half of off-the-record discussions on important issues related to bilateral economic relations and the global economic system.
The co-chairs and participants of the Track II Dialogue uniformly agree that a constructive, civil-society dialogue focused on climate change and clean energy is needed to strengthen and enhance the strategic partnership between India and the U.S. The Dialogue is dedicated to positively impacting how the two countries interact bilaterally while also demonstrating genuine leadership multi-laterally on climate change.
Audionamix made a plugin called IDC (Instant Dialogue Cleaner) that I have used for cleaning up dialogue that I prefer over the dialogue isolate feature from RX 6. IDC processes signal in realtime and can be used in a DAW, so I find it easier/simpler to just add that to my dialogue tracks and use one knob in IDC.
so my question is what is a good approach when mixing and using any audio tool like denoiser or compressor and reverbs. Single tracks, on the bus where I 've routed into. Any advice and link is appreciated
This video is an excellent demonstration of a basic dialog edit and the type of typical challenges you encounter with transitions. One important note: while this editor deletes volume automation on his dialog tracks before starting to edit, check with the re-recording mixer before you do this. Some mixers (like myself) always want the automation.
The Track II Expert Dialogues bring together senior nongovernmental advisors, former government officials and other stakeholders from each country. WRI works with actors from across the political spectrum, facilitating open and candid conversations with the aim of increasing ambition for climate action on both sides and advancing bilateral cooperation. Amidst a dynamic international political environment, these dialogues have become a platform for continuous communication, encouraging a better understanding of each country's climate and development priorities, barriers to action, and opportunities to increase climate ambition domestically and collaboratively.
Since 2020, WRI, in collaboration with the Natural Resources Defense Council, E3G, and the Center for American Progress, has led an Expert Dialogue series between the United States and the European Union. Thus far, several virtual dialogues have been held, with a focus on some of the most pressing issues and concerns facing both regions: green recovery, cooperation with other countries on climate and energy, and international climate progress.
The seventh EU-U.S. Dialogue on Climate Change was held in April 2023. Representatives from the U.S. and EU discussed transatlantic industrial policy and trade implications, opportunities to accelerate climate action, and reforming multilateral development banks and debt architecture. The dialogue led to numerous recommendations, including:
One thing that all starting engineers or mixers alike should keep in mind is the phase coherence between the boom and the lapel. If you are monitoring the boom and lapel together and suddenly find a dip in body or low mids, look for the phase between boom and lapel. There is 80% chance that they may be slipped or even out of phase. Many times in my experience, just nudging to fix the phase between the Lapel and Boom itself fixes the tonality without much EQ. A quick way to check this is using the Phasescope on an plugin (PAZ, Avid, Bluecat, Ozone etc). For this, I route the Lapel and boom tracks to a stereo bus in addition to routing it to the dialogue output. The Lapel would be panned left, and the boom on the right, and a phase scope can be put on the bus master. (I sometimes call the bus dPhase). A quick look on the plugin will show if there is phasing issues. Another advantage is, if there is a tilting towards any side, you can immediately know if the lapel is dominating or the boom is. So, tilt to left means lapel dominates and vice versa. This is a quick way to check balances.
That being said, I do have a preference on the choice of track I would use for a dialogue delivery. This choice is defined by a number of factors. Usually for closeup and mid size shots, I would prefer using the lapels. For a bit of distance I would use the boom if that is clear. I song usually mix the two together, but that is a personal preference. I would mix it if i find that lapel lacks body or if the boom lacks brightness. In this case, the balancing between the tracks is done based on what is less. So, if the boom is better and lacks upper mids or highs, I would blend in the lapel (after phase correction) to achieve this before I start to EQ.
760c119bf3