Cleaning Your Audio

Studio's Noise Reduction audio effect attempts to remove unwanted background noise from your audio files. The key word here is attempts. It generally works best on consistent noises like the hum of air conditioning or the recording noise from your camcorder, and works poorly, if at all, with random noises like a dog barking or a car horn.

You should never count on any Noise Reduction effect Studio's or any other as a curative that can fix any problem. The best course is to eliminate the background noise before shooting, because Noise Reduction is never a sure thing.

To apply the Noise Reduction effect

1.	Place the target audio clip on the Timeline and select the audio clip with your pointer.
2.	In the upper-left corner of the Movie window, click the Open/Close Audio Toolbox icon (Figure 11.1).
3.	On the left side of the Audio toolbox, click the Add an Effect to an Audio Clip icon (Figure 11.60).
4.	Click the Studio Plus Audio Effects category (Figure 11.61).
5.	Click the Noise Reduction effect (Figure 11.65). Figure 11.65. Getting to Studio's Noise Reduction effect.
6.	Click OK. Studio opens the Noise Reduction settings window (Figure 11.66). Figure 11.66. The controls for Studio's Noise Reduction effect.
7.	Do one of the following: Choose one of the three presets (Indoors, Outdoors, or Music Restoration) and proceed to Step 9. Manually adjust the controls as described in the next step.
8.	If you're manually adjusting the controls: Adjust the Noise Reduction setting to match the noise in the video, setting it higher for loud background noises and lower for slight hums. Select the Auto Adapt option to have the effect automatically modify itself for changing conditions. Adjust the Fine-tuning control to specify the level of cleaning. Select the Remove Wind option when background wind is the problem. Preview the effect frequently while modifying these settings. The most commonly experienced problem is distortion, which can make the audio sound heavily metallic or hollow. Also preview at different points in the audio clip to test for distortion, especially if conditions change.
9.	Do one of the following: Click the X in the upper-right corner to close the Special Effects window. Click the Add New Effect button to select and configure another special effect. Studio saves the first effect and returns to either the Movie window for additional editing or to the Audio Effects window to choose and configure another special effect.

Tip

• If Noise Reduction produces unacceptable distortion, try using the Equalizer control and reducing levels in one or more bands (Figure 11.62). If the offending background noise is mostly contained in one or two bands, often you can remove the background noise without distorting the original audio.