Room Tone for Narration

[CJ8073]

Hello, I have a quick question about how to get room tone into a narration.  I saw a video for a different DAW how someone took room tone to replace some unwanted noise in their narration by layering tracks.  I found a forum post about something similar using take lanes in Cakewalk.  In the post, the user showed how they had two take lanes:  one for the main work and another for room tone.  They seemed to highlight over the room tone with the muting icon showing on the take lane and the room tone instantly replaced the unwanted portion in the main work without split lines  and made it seem like a pretty smooth process.  The user also told the original poster to keep the room tone track muted.  I am attempting to try that as I think it may make some of my editing go much more quickly.  However, I can't seem to do it properly as when I try I get split lines where I am attempting to highlight on the room tone track and when trying to keep the room tone take lane muted (because I don't want it coming in quietly behind the remaining portions of the main work), it keeps it muted when I squish the take lanes back down.  If I unmute, I'm afraid there may be an overall volume increase because of the extra take in places I don't need it, plus it overlaps the main work and I can't see the narration track.  I would delete portions where the actual words of the main work are being spoken, but then I worry that if I need to edit later because I missed something I won't have the same room tone sound to work with.  I'm sorry if this is confusing, I am still very new to how this all works.  Thank you, in advance, for any help. 

*Edited:  Added a screenshot - Below is a screen shot from the Cakewalk post that I was reading.  As you can see the portion of room tone that had been selecting is showing as "active" and the rest remains muted and to goes into the top where the complete track is and the portion that's getting replaced goes muted.  That is what I am trying to accomplish, but mine are splitting where I am selecting and the room tone take lane is staying muted.  Thanks, again.

Edited July 31, 2023 by CJ8073

[Lord Tim]

You're overthinking it a little bit.

OK, first you should record 10 or 20 seconds of just the background noise of your environment. That way if you have to duplicate it (crossfading between each duplication) then it'll sound seamless. Put that onto either its own track or a track lane. The advantage of putting it on a track lane is if you want to do any processing on that track later, you do it to both your narration and the background noise all at once.

Then, slice up your narration as you see fit, putting fades on either side of the parts you want to keep to ensure there's no clicks and pops and it fades in seamlessly each time. Then put that on a second lane of a track. So your room tone would be on lane 1, narration would be lane 2.

That's basically it.

If you have several takes of narration, edit that up first and get it how you like before sweetening it with the room tone lane. And the process the track to taste.

[CJ8073]

Would this cause an overall volume increase, having that room tone underneath?  I'm just curious. And, when I squish the takes back down, how do I get the room tone to not layer on top of the narration, but stay underneath it?

Edited July 31, 2023 by CJ8073

[Lord Tim]

Yeah, that's valid. That's a good reason to use different tracks, so you have more control over the balance of them both.

If you're worried about the room tone adding up, you can always put in a Gain Envelope on the room tone while the narration is happening and manually duck it that way, or if it's on separate tracks, you can use a compressor with the sidechain keyed to the narration so it does it automatically, but that's a hell of a lot of work. It's probably easier just doing the envelopes.

Alternatively, there's also nothing wrong with just splicing in the room tone between your narration as well if it's consistent. If it's not, you'll hear obvious edits.

[CJ8073]

Here is a post link that I was referencing:

It's a post a couple entries down by Scook.  The animated image that they included seems to do what I was trying to do, but I can't figure how how they got it to do this.  It's like maybe I don't have some settings correct.  As you can see, when they highlight the room tone, it becomes the "active" clip and the remaining take stays muted with the portion being replaced also being muted, also there are no cut lines where the selecting begins and ends; it's like it's all smooth and seamless.  That was what I was going for, but can't figure out how.  Thanks for you help, I do appreciate it!

[Lord Tim]

The secret is to have your Lanes open and use the Smart Tool, and where you place your cursor will change the tool to get you what you saw in the animation:

https://legacy.cakewalk.com/Documentation?product=Cakewalk&language=3&help=Arranging.57.html#1832832

(Note: On some browsers the images are broken on that page, so you'll want to go to chrome://settings/content/siteDetails?site=https%3A%2F%2Flegacy.cakewalk.com  on Google Chrome and go down to Allow Insecure Content)

[CJ8073]

Okay, fantastic, I will read that documentation!  Thank you very much!  I love working in Cakewalk and have learned so much!

[CJ8073]

Yay, I figured it out!  Thank you, again, for the documentation.  I do have another quick question, if I want to delete all muted clips, can I do that in one fell swoop?  I tried right clicking and selecting "Delete muted clips" but it deletes all of the audio.  How do I delete all of the muted clips in the take lanes at once?  Thanks!

***Nevermind*** I figured it out, just turn off Ripple edit and it works perfectly!

Edited July 31, 2023 by CJ8073