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Scott Pollak · Posted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 6:29 am Post subject: Some Adobe Audition questions

I recently made the rather quantum leap from Cool Edit Pro 2.0 to Audition CS5.5. Can't say it was worth the $350, but at least I'm current.

There are some things that drive me nuts about Audition that simply don't seem to be any improvement over my 8 year old Cool Edit, and I'm still doing some basic after-the-fact editing on CE because of it. Here are a couple of things I've run into in AA that drive me nuts and despite reading the online tutorials, can't find a solution. Can anyone offer up help with these?

- in edit mode, when creating a new file or copying a portion of audio to a new file, the default mode is always 32 bit. Since many of my clients have older systems that have problems with 32 bit, I often prefer to default to 16 bit recording. Yes, I know I can set it initially when recording the master file, but when saving many other segments, such as taking portions of e-learning, doing a "copy to new" and then saving, it always defaults to 32 bit and it's a somewhat laborious process to change the setting every stinkin' time I try to save the new, copied audio. Is there a way to set AA to default to 16 bit every time, no matter what?

- In Cool Edit, in edit mode, I had shortcut icons up in the tool bar area, one of which was a 'save as...' icon that I could easily click on. I see no way to have any such icons in AA in edit mode, and, again, it's an unnecessary extra couple of steps to click on "File" -> "Save As" for every file. Any way to add shortcut icons in the edit mode?

Thanks for whatever help you can offer.
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Jeffrey Kafer · Posted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 8:54 am Post subject: Re: Some Adobe Audition questions

todd ellis · Posted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 1:15 pm Post subject:

+1 on setting keyboard shortcuts - a lot of the pre-set ones, i simply have no use for (sec. & tertiary tones, for example) - so i've overwritten them with things i DO have use for.

makes life a lot easier.
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Frank F · Posted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 1:48 pm Post subject:

Make sure your Edit window settings are set for 16 bit, this is a setting in Preferences. The 32 bit setting is a floating point ratio (which translates to 24 bit) which is the standard ratio in the Multitrack window and not changeable.

Then follow the suggestions for keyboard shortcuts listed above as another idea.

F2
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Scott Pollak · Posted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 7:40 pm Post subject:

Okay, thanks with the help on the keyboard shortcuts. I assigned my F1 key to "Save As", but there is NOWHERE in AA CS5.5 to change or assign the default bit rate. Trust me; I looked thru preferences a million times. Arrrrgh.
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Scott R. Pollak
Clients include Pandora, NPR Atlanta, Wells Fargo, Cisco, Humana, Publix, UPS, AT&T, HP, Xerox and more.

www.voicebyscott.com

Frank F · Posted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 10:44 pm Post subject:

And another reason why I have no love for AA CS5. My question is; why can't they leave well enough alone?

If it ain't broke, don't fix it! But Adobe wanted a fix for Mac and messed it all up. Thanks Adobe.

FF
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whalewtchr · Posted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 11:41 pm Post subject:

You might try creating a custom workspace.
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Scott Pollak · Posted: Thu Mar 22, 2012 4:46 am Post subject:

Eddie Eagle · M&M Joined: 23 Apr 2008 Posts: 2393

Frank F · Posted: Thu Mar 22, 2012 8:17 am Post subject:

AA 2,0 was a really bad situation other than the minor improvements as you suggested. 2,0 is stable and added the few minor improvements while leaving DiectX plugs, better VST handling, and an improved sound engine (still not quite up to par with 1.5, but they had to "fix" something to justify the price hike).

I kept AA 3.0 on my system and often still use 1.5 in lieu of CS5.

The Mac version of AA CS5 has a few additional tricks added, but still is NOT up to par (I have used both Win and Mac varieties). Adobe went after ProTools on Mac with CS5 and failed miserably, in my opinion. I wonder how they will fix their fix, or if they will try?

Note: If you are having translation problems with 32 bit float, convert to 24 bit on Save or dumb it down with 16 bit. Most Video Edit systems will accept 24 bit resolution. natively. All will work with 16 bit.

Frank F
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Ed Gambill · Posted: Thu Mar 22, 2012 9:09 am Post subject:

Scott

What a bummer. I know you do some work for a Public Radio station and I also produce programming that airs on a Public Radio station.

Had you cross platform upgraded to SoundForge10 you would have been able to cut audio for them (NPR station), save to MEPG1 Layer II (MP2) the standard for public radio and then sent it to them ready to drop right into their Content Depot system.

I have SF10 and use the MP2 (NPR compatible setting) to prepare my program content for delivery by FTP.

With out saying SF10 does all those other compression formats as well. It appears from the PRSS (Public Radio Satellite System) site that Cool Edit 1.1 did save to MP2; just one of those enhancements that Adobe did that didn’t really help.
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Lynne · Posted: Thu Mar 22, 2012 9:25 am Post subject: Proud

Can I just say how proud I am in my advancing technical skills that I actually understood every word of what you guys were talking about! It's a process....
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SkinnyJohnny · Posted: Sun Mar 25, 2012 3:26 pm Post subject:

One cool thing about Adobe Audition CS5.5 is the heal function (also available in Audition 3.0). You can use it to take mouth noises out of the middle of a word or a harsh whistle that happens occasionally on "s" sounds. In spectral view you can see the clicks as a brighter line and the whistle as a brighter mark. You just click the band aid icon and mouse over the mark and it disappears. There's also "auto heal", but it doesn't always work without artifacts. I like the floating volume control too!
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Jeffrey Kafer · Posted: Sun Mar 25, 2012 6:00 pm Post subject:

John, I have this feature in 3.0 as well.
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