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Sound Mixing help : from lav/shotgun interview to warm voiceover
  • I'm making a little documentary about boxing, and being by myself (shooting/editing/... everything!) it's always a compromise between what I want and what is doable. I already posted a small "teaser" showing the boxer

    My issue is that a properly staged interview in the boxing club was cancelled in the last minute (figure me, all my gear & the boxer in front of a closed door at 9PM... "little" bummer!). But I had to do the interview that night because the boxer had a plane for mexico the next day... A dream situation for any shooter. Living in Paris there isn't any quiet place that I can find in the last minute, so I decided to forget the visual interview, do a voice over and just record audio in my (somewhat) quiet room. My issue is that I don't have a Ribon mic or any proper "voice-over mic". So I did it with what I have :

    • A lavalier : sanken Cos. 11
    • a boom : Sanken CS3e

    So now I have my two mono tracks and hope to find a way to transform his voice into a voice-over with audition (I learn fast... but I don't know anything about mixing right now...). I will try to do what I can by testing over and over. But if someone can give me some advice on how I can enhance this voice it would be awesome. I don't necessarily want to transform his voice into something beautiful. I want to feel that I'm in his head. His thought... well a voice over. :-)

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  • Its quite unlikely that you will make it sound as you wish, but you could try to make your mic sound more like big membrane with something like this: http://www.antarestech.com/products/detail.php?product=Mic_Mod_EFX_5

    Remove some room with Unveil VST (stitch multiple exports of trial if to expensive).

    EQ, compress, gate & add clearity with Voxformer: http://www.voxengo.com/product/voxformer/

    It will make bad sounding stuff a little better, but not great. For sound its even more true that for picture: Get it right on set. There is other plugins that do the same (beside Unveil, its unique), do a little research with the terms you find in my links.

  • Thanks Meierhans! Yeah I never expect a miraculous "fix in post" but it's good to see some clue like theses. That make me less blind on my voice over tutorial quest.