Getting rid of the "puh" plosives in the "P" sound

Hi marianne, welcome to the forum!

Most of the people on this forum are going to start by saying..."Are you using a pop filter when you record your vocals? That's the best place to start...the source."

And if you don't know this already, disregard, but if you can turn your head slightly off axis in reference to the mic when doing the plosives, it should greatly reduce the pop noice that is usaully accompanied with the 'p' sound.

Good Luck Marianne!

-xs4is

Copy the section you want to treat on to a seperate audio track. Eq as desired than bounce this section (make sure you have the 'Add to Audio Window' option selected when bouncing).

Drag the newly processed (or bounced) file back into the arrange window and edit back into dialogue track where desired.

Also, if you are editing and eqing while only listening to the dialogue, try doing it with the music and or production (if any) playing at an appropriate level underneath. Often times, such plosives will go unnoticed once properly set into the mix.

Cheers.

Hi Marianne

You could bounce a pass with the worst of the 'puhs' eq'd out and edit that into your original vocal track when needed..you can do all your crossfades and I find you have a lot more control than you would with automation etc. You could get into compressor side-chaining but I personally think editing is quicker and more straightforward.

Hope that helps

Alan

I definitely agree with Aaron and Alan. Editing is the way to go here.

Put a Low cut filter on the vocal, and loop a bar or so that has one or two of the nasty plosives happening. Put the slider at around 100 Hz, and slowly move it upwards until the plosive diminishes.

Then solo the track, do a quick off-line bounce, and reimport that new track onto the arrange page. When you hear a plosive, cut in the new section for just that word. Put in a small crossfade, and you're good to go.

Automating the filter bypass doesn't really work, as you'll hear pops when it engages and disengages.

There are several gode answers here, but I would like to share my method as well..... if you got AudioSuite plug-ins. This is destructive editing, so start making a backup of the given file. Then open sample edit and monitor your file. You will soon get to know the waveform of a "P", be sure. Just select the area covering the P-energy, get a AudioSuite plug-in as a simple LoCut or similar (as steep as possible) and set the frequency to about 90Hz - then process it. The lo-freq. blow is now cleaned out - and you will keep the rest of your track as it is. Of course, if you got a load with P's, running a LoCut on the whole track could be a quick solution - but you definately will "slim" the sound.

this might seem obvious but in these situations i use a frequency conscious compressor with the freq set to around 85Hz and adjust thresold to suit. Then automate so it comes on in between words to avoid clicks.

Razzkazz might be onto something. It's likely that the same method for creating a de-esser could be done for making a de-boomer. Sidechain the audio into the compressor, emphasizing the boom in the sidechain. The sidechain may be enough to level out the audio passing through the compressor.

For the next time, though, don't be so close to the mic. A lot of the booms are caused by being too close.

jord

this might seem obvious but in these situations i use a frequency conscious compressor with the freq set to around 85Hz and adjust thresold to suit. Then automate so it comes on in between words to avoid clicks.

That's certainly a viable option as well, and one I have used before. Halstein's Audio Suite edits also can work, provided you have the plug-ins.

I think what this shows more than anything, is there are multiple ways to "Skin the proverbial cat". The thing for each user, is to find what method suites their workflow.

And though most of us in this thread are aware, it bares mentioning. All of these methods can be applied to de-essing as well. Most work better than a de-esser plug-in ( don't even try Logic's de-esser... that needs to be renamed Add a metalic-like ring to your signal"... but I digress...)

But as Jord mentioned, proper mic technique and distance can cure most of this stuff at the source... but we don't always get control over that...

i am missing why you need to bounce the copied track after editing. is it something to do with making the changes permanent before mixing them back into the master track? i'm fairly new to logic. i would have only thought of the automation route. this is great advice, but i'm still a little fuzzy.

James,
The instructions on bouncing the audio file were in direct reference to the original question asked in this thread. She was asking how to 'destructively' apply an effect to one part of an audio file and then edit it back into the original file.

In other aps, like Pro Tools for instance, you can highlight a section of audio, call up an audio plug in (without inserting it in the actual track) and then write the effect directly to the chosen piece of audio. This is not a feature in Logic, hence the need to bounce.

Sometimes automation may be more time consuming or more noticible (especially when automating an eq or filter), so this method along with a proper crossfade may sound more pleasing.

As you can tell from the responses, like everything else audio related, there are many ways to approach the same problem.

What happened to the gum jord?

I told you... I change it from time to time. 🙂

I thought I would list some of the other "instruments" I use. :-P

jord