De-esser question for the wizards here please...

Amy Snively · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 06:04 (GMT) Post subject:

Forget the equipment, my love. Work on your mouth! You can't control the equipment you work on from studio to studio. Getting this fixed at the mouth level (reading tricky text aloud and doing exercises daily, if necessary) is the way to go!

Maxine Dunn · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 06:26 (GMT) Post subject:

Jacob Ekstroem · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 09:47 (GMT) Post subject:

Maxine,

I use this one from Waves: http://www.waves.com/Content.aspx?id=325. It came with one of their older bundles. Works for me, but it might not be the right one for you. Waves has a DeEss plugin called the Renaissance DeEsser aswell, which I also have, but I always end up using the first one.

Grant Holmes · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 14:04 (GMT) Post subject:

I need to show my true naivete here and admit that while I've heard of this problem I'm not sure what it means/sounds like.

Is this a case where "case" sounds more like "Cathe" (Or esses turning into th )?? To risk my reputation suchat is it... can you clarify?

September Day Leach · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 14:27 (GMT) Post subject:

Grant, here's a sample. The first is take is dry, the second has been de-essed very hard. I hissed a little to much to get the full "th" sound that the de-esser will give, but it will give you a general idea

Grant Holmes · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 14:46 (GMT) Post subject:

Okay, so it's where the Ess sort a grabs the "CE" as in "ICE" where you hand on the C.

In the "DE-Ess" it seemed like I heard more of what I thought it was and more of a TH coming through.

I'm not sure either would be better, would it?

Jacob Ekstroem · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 15:17 (GMT) Post subject:

Sibilants can create really nasty peaks and make a microphone go "sizzzzzzling", so that's one reason to utilize a De-Esser, but you could also look at it as a single step in multiband compression, as De-Ess'ing would compress the sibilants, allowing more overall wideband compression, and thus, higher RMS-power in your recording. That said, a decent engineer could, and would in many cases, use EQ'ing instead. De-Ess'ing is kinda the shortcut - not always resommended, but in small amounts acceptable. September's recording is a good example of De-ess'ing overdone.

September Day Leach · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 15:58 (GMT) Post subject:

Exactly Jacob! And I'll tell ya, I have never,ever been able to de-ess something and make it sound acceptable to me. Even the slightest sibilant has to be edited and redone. Perhaps it's just my voice though.

Allen Brown · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 18:52 (GMT) Post subject:

I've often think that voice talent is too self-concious about the "s problem".

Somewhere along the way a nasty tendency to replace "s" with "sh" crept into frequent use. You hear it often in broadcasting (even at the highest levels) where "western" becomes "weshtern", "special reports" become "shpecial reports" for example.

All it takes is one director (or other critic) to mention one sharp "s" and we may take it so to heart that we replace our normal way of talking with a manufactured shpeech...uh, speech impediment.

Lydia Scholten · Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007, 21:30 (GMT) Post subject:

"shpeech - speech - thpeeth "

now there's one for my beloved clients.

come on now, everybody - who can say it 5 times fast??? Laughing

but seriously ...
how would it work for folks to try saying the 's' - but very light and quick - instead of using the flat front part of your tongue, use the front edges only - just a slight reference to the 's' and move on to the next sound right away...just a thought. Not at all sure how it would sound when the mike picks it up, but i think this might be the way to do it.

I agree, that substituting 'sh' sounds awful on the radio...like they have loose dentures or something.

Lance Blair · Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2007, 00:04 (GMT) Post subject:

I like Spitfish, and I'd use it if I really needed to (if the copy was inherently s-heavy). Plug-ins seem to work better than hardware solutions, as it is a cheater-compressor: hardware de-essers tend to make things more lispy more than spitfish will.

I agree that it's all about your voice, not the gear. Also, pronouncing it lightly with the edges of the tongue etc. will help. Either hit the S lightly and just move on to the next sound or don't think about your Esses at all: the more you try to make a perfect ess, the more it will sssssssthink.

I often wonder how Portuguese audio engineers can deal with all the inherent sibilance in their language Smile

.

Jacob Ekstroem · Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2007, 00:25 (GMT) Post subject:

Lydia Scholten · Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2007, 00:39 (GMT) Post subject:

I believe it's been shown that English actually has a lot more ''s' occurrences in speech anyhow, compared to other European languages. Just have a listen to the steady/dominant sound of a large group of people chatting with one another (eg not at a party but before a speaker starts their talk). You'll hear tons of 'sss'.
My take on Portuguese is that their 's' sound is more 'sh'-like , so maybe the sound engineers dont find it as much of an issue. (..any Portuguese speakers out there who'd like to comment?)

I'll have to have a look at the Spitfish program sometime soon.

Don Randall · Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2007, 01:57 (GMT) Post subject:

For some, it is a mouth problem. For most, it is more related to poor mic technique.

If your editing program supports directX plug-ins, dbAudioware (www.db-audioware.com/) offers some very nice toys. Their DeEsser is well worth while if you can't get around the problem otherwise.

And yes, their prices are very, very good.