TEST: Vocal Pitch Shift

[marcL]

In a recent project I wanted to use vocal pitch shifting for one song. As usual I was working with CbB's "Radius Solo (Vocal)" until I detected some really ugly clicks and pops in some of the phrases. First I thought it may have to do with the Windows 1903 update, but further investigation proved that it is either a problem of the algorithm or its implementation. For I tested one of the failing takes in CbB, Sonar Platinum, Sonar X3 on several computers, one even with Windows 7. In CbB and Splat the result was everywhere the same, whereas in Sonar X3 the clicks were in other positions. When I was zooming in I could see the cause of the click in the wave form:

I was very frustrated, because I really liked the quality sound of the "Radius Solo" algorithm, but like that it is unusable in my project, because it failed not only on one phrase, but on many. My song has 9 choruses with each 7 takes = 63 phrases and I was not doing extreme pitch shifting, only 1 half-tone up. So I decided to try some other programs and plugins to do the job. This is where I thought others maybe also interested in my results.

What surprised me generally, was that all pitch shiftings resulted in minor note movings, i.e. the note start points are not exactly the same! Supposedly this is caused by the nature of the physics.

No-Go Alternatives IMO:

1. Radius Solo (Vocal): Very good quality and sound, but often with clicks and pops. I tried also the "normal" Radius Solo algorithm, but there were the same clicks and the sound was not that good.
2. Common Elastique algorithm (even Pro, in several programs): This algorithm resulted in a reverb-like, unnatural sound for vocals.
3. Audacity: Reverb-like sound, a lot of clicks and pops
4. Mixbus: Reverb-like sound, with or without "Preserve Formants", loudness change
5. Tracktion 7: Very much reverb-like sound, loudness change
6. TB_VoicePitcher: Sounded okay first, but a more detailed look revealed big quality loss (you see it in the wave forms), major start point shiftings and loudness change.

Better Alternatives:
Here I also checked the precision of the pitch shifting. I opened the results in Melodyne and moved the note start/end positions exactly at the same positions (because this influences the pitch). Then I calculated the average deviation. Again I listened to the sound compared to the original.

1. Magix Samplitude Monophonic: Good sound (like Radius Solo), rarely with clicks
2. Eventide Quadravox: Although pitch shifting is not the main purpose of this plugin it surprised with a very good quality, but I had to choose the "Soprano" preset for a male vocal to get best results. It is the only plugin/program that never had any artifacts in my tests. So I could use this one for 2 or 3 problematic phrases.
3. Melodyne: Good sound, rarely with clicks, but some notes had more deviation to the original melody.
4. élastique Timestretch: This is a plugin delivered with older Sonar versions, @scook recommended it once to me, the "Monophonic" setting had quite good quality, "Speech" was also acceptable, but it had more shifting deviation than the others  above.
5. Sound Forge: Preset "A01 Music", good sound, but even more shifting deviation, bigger start/end point shiftings than the others above

I am aware that there are many other programs and plugins on the market for pitch shifting and that my tests are individual to some degree. Nevertheless may them give some ideas about pitch shifting.

[Colin Nicholls]

I figure you didn't also trial V-Vocal because you don't have X2 or earlier?

[marcL]

22 hours ago, Colin Nicholls said:

I figure you didn't also trial V-Vocal because you don't have X2 or earlier?

Yep, I started with Sonar X3! I used another DAW and diverse hardware before.

Edited November 15, 2019 by marled
precision

[Colin Nicholls]

@marled, if practical I would be willing to apply the required pitch shift using V-Vocal. It may not be of interest seeing as no-one can actually purchase V-Vocal if they don't already have it, but the offer stands.

In case it is not clear, this is just so that you can add another data point to your tests.

Edited November 15, 2019 by Colin Nicholls

[marcL]

On 11/16/2019 at 12:02 AM, Colin Nicholls said:

@marled, if practical I would be willing to apply the required pitch shift using V-Vocal. It may not be of interest seeing as no-one can actually purchase V-Vocal if they don't already have it, but the offer stands.

In case it is not clear, this is just so that you can add another data point to your tests.

Thanks Colin for your offer! But as you mentioned V-Vocal can't be purchased anymore, aimed more for pitch correction and there are so many other pitch shift plugins/programs on the market. I don't think that my simple test can include any plugin around, it was/is more the objective to make people aware that there maybe problems using pitch shifting, that you have to check the results properly and you probably have to use different plugins. Not like me, who shifted a whole bunch of takes with Cakewalk's "Radius Solo (Vocal)" (I was so confident!) until I noticed that many of them failed due to the introduction of pops and clicks. ?

[Jim Fogle]

@marled Thanks for taking time to create this thread.  I found your observations, test and results very informative.  I have no practical experience using pitch shifting so this thread likely saved me a lot of time and grief sometime down the road.  Again thanks for thinking of other users!

One question if I may, how likely is it that others have as many pitch shifting tools in their toolbelt as you do?  I have five that I know of, the two that are included with Cakewalk, the one in Audacity I didn't existed until I read this thread, Melodyne Essentials and one that is standard with Band-in-a-Box.

I was not familiar with TB_VoicePitcher by Toneboosters.  I found version 3.1.8 at the KVR marketplace:  https://www.kvraudio.com/product/tb-voicepitcher-v3-by-toneboosters

Edited November 18, 2019 by Jim Fogle

[mettelus]

iZotope's Radius is also the underlying algorithm in some other programs. I believe that was originally a product that ended up getting more royalty fees from being licensed as an algorithm (Cakewalk, Adobe, etc.). I am not sure of the details to that one, but one thing that does come to mind is that I am not sure if all of the parameters (transient sensitivity, pitch coherence, phase coherence, etc. on the bottom of that page) are exposed in SONAR/CbB? There is a nice section about best results/usage also at the bottom. RX5's version doesn't seem to have changed much. The parameters (to any algorithm) - what they do, and how they are applied - is another important factor to consider.

[marcL]

On 11/19/2019 at 12:15 AM, Jim Fogle said:

One question if I may, how likely is it that others have as many pitch shifting tools in their toolbelt as you do?  I have five that I know of, the two that are included with Cakewalk, the one in Audacity I didn't existed until I read this thread, Melodyne Essentials and one that is standard with Band-in-a-Box.

Each time when I read in the "Deals" section of this forum I feel that there are many people that have much more plugins than me (although I think for myself I have too many to use! ?). So most likely a lot of them have even more pitch shifting tools! By the way, 4 of my pitch shifting tools come from Sonar.