Racing the clock - could use guidance on a fade out gain question

[Robert Bone]

Howdy - my pain meds are making me a bit foggy, so apologies for being a bit dense today.

I have a friend who plays bass, and he wants to add his own playing over the fade out section of a commercial audio track from a CD.  

I have imported the audio into Cakewalk, and moved to the end of the track, to a spot just before the fade out begins.

I need to know how to add automation to counter the fade out that is on the track, so that the track volume remains at the same level as it was prior to them starting and doing the fade out.

The track shows a peak of -0.4 db prior to the fade out, and a short while later it is at -1.7 db, then -2.0 db, etc... until the track ends.

I have only ever done fade outs, where I add either a straight line or a curved line, to fade out tracks, and am not sure how to add whatever automation I need, to counter/reverse the fading that is baked into the audio track from the CD.

I am racing the clock to finish this, because my friend only has a limited window this afternoon, in about 2 hours, to come by and pick up a CD with the modified track, so if anyone can guide me, rapidly, I SURELY will appreciate the help.

Bob Bone

[John Vere]

Goodness Bob that's a new one even for me ⁉️  and a challenge.

I would think that all you need to do is draw a volume envelope going up but I do believe there's a limitation on how much gain you'll get which I just checked and its only +6db from 0.  So the CD track is already maxed out. A solution to this would be to apply gain to the whole song and reduce it down to a level that gives you enough headroom. This might be like -25db. Once you've leveled out the ending you could then normalize the track back to something like -1.0 db 

Other idea I might try is splitting it into a zillion chunks and applying Gain to each chunk to get them all the same level.. I would not want that task!  

Edited November 20, 2021 by John Vere

[scook]

Blue Cat's free gain plug-ins can do  plus or minus 60 dB

[Robert Bone]

5 minutes ago, John Vere said:

Goodness Bob that's a new one even for me ⁉️  and a challenge.

I would think that all you need to do is draw a volume envelope going up but I do believe there's a limitation on how much gain you'll get which I just checked and its only +6db from 0.  So the CD track is already maxed out. A solution to this would be to apply gain to the whole song and reduce it down to a level that gives you enough headroom. This might be like -25db. Once you've leveled out the ending you could then normalize the track back to something like -1.0 db 

Other idea I might try is splitting it into a zillion chunks and applying Gain to each chunk to get them all the same level.. I would not want that task!  

Yeah - I would have thought this would be a simple concept - reversing an existing fade out, but had not really thought about the mechanics when I told my friend I could knock this out for him.

I have just never run across my own need to attempt this before.

I thought about the zillion chunks approach, but do not know how I would do it in a way to keep it smooth - obviously the more chunks the smoother, but it still seems like that would be a rather jagged uneven result.

I am hoping someone can jump in with a good way to do this, as my friend has his own time commitments for using the modified track, after I finish the edits.  He is ready to record a bass video, playing over the track, and wants to get it recorded and uploaded to YouTube as soon as possible.

Bob Bone

 

[Robert Bone]

2 minutes ago, scook said:

Blue Cat's free gain plug-ins can do  plus or minus 60 dB

OK - but I am unsure how to properly apply it, to counter the fade out from the unmodified audio.

Prior to the fade beginning, the audio peak is -0.4 db and of course it fades to zero at the end.

How would I best do this?  I have that plug-in, and use it frequently, but have never tried to do this particular kind of thing with it.

[scook]

Automate the gain knob.

May want to add a limiter to make drawing the automation a little easier.

Depending on how (the curve of the fade) and what (changes to the mix, reverb, etc) was done during the fade, it may sound strange.

 

 

 

 

[Robert Bone]

Ah - the limiter might well do the trick, along with the gain plug-in - I will give it a shot - THANKS to you, and to John

Bob Bone

[Robert Bone]

Test post - ignore

Bob Bone