Hi, long time lurker, first time poster. I'm working on a project that requires that I record intelligible voices that sound like they are far away. I mean simulating a voice that sounds about 50 feet away. I've heard a few different ideas on this topic and they vary. Some say you have to actually record far away to capture the correct timbre, and some say that it's sufficient to track close to the mic and bombard it with post effects later. I guess I'm looking for something similar to the sound design in Hollywood movies (sounding far away but completely intelligible). I'm more interested in getting an impactful sound rather than raw realism (like how they break celery rather than chicken bones for bone breaking effects). Perhaps I'm asking the wrong forum, but you guys seem to be pretty knowledgeable about sound production in general.
Making voices sound far away
- Thread starter mintcheerios
- Start date
ashgallows
resonant manipulator
well, you could try rolling off some of the highs for one seeing as bass travels further than treble. also put an extremely discrete reverb on it. and also of course reduce the volume on the tracks. i've never done this, but it would make sense to me to appraoch it this way.
Glenn Fricker
Very Metal &Very Bad News
I think I'll experiment with each method. It's a paradox of sorts since rolling off the highs would take away from the speech recognition frequencies.
The 'running closer' screams on Slaughter of the Soul were done by having the vocalist run through the hall into the control room while screaming... sometimes, there's no match for the original. Also try angling the mic away from the source, so you're hearing room sound - sounds less direct and, in a way, more 'distant' if you tweak it right.
Jeff
Jeff
JeffTD
Senhor Testiculo
I've just quickly scanned through SotS and can't find these screams... mind sharing a track/time? I'm really curious about hearing those!
Don't have it with me, he's screaming 'Suicide!'... the obvious guess might be Suicide Nation. My source was the DVD that came with the reissue in 2006 (I think), if it isn't in Suicide Nation I'll have to look at it when I have it with me.
Jeff
Jeff
JeffTD
Senhor Testiculo
Ah yeah, that's the track! A few of the takes overlap, so I figured it was done in post... but I can imagine Tomas running down a hall screaming that, for sure. 
I am really sorry for the off topic, but in the very beginning of this song I hear only one of the channels playing and it sounds really open. Then I realised that on the other channel there is some sound, which is *possibly* phase reversed to make it sound even wider. Am I correct?
I still don't have my copy nearby. Open it up in your DAW and separate the left and right channels (should be in the right-click menu), and then listen to the right channel. I didn't pay that much attention to it, I'll look into it when I have it with me.
Jeff
Jeff
theblackmoon
Casa Negra
Reverb? If the first reflections are a bit later than usual it may give you what you want. But far means less intelligibility, and if the actor was whispering than it would sound awkward, if you can make the talent say as if it wants to be heard in distance than it would problably work. But the question is far away where? On the other side of a Hall? Stairway? Room? Open air?
Skinny Viking
¯\(°_o)/¯ How do Lydian?
hmmmmm
maybe you can try bussing your voice track to an aux with a verb on it and then bouncing THAT to another track, just to print the effect of the verb? You'd probably have to really play around with your parameters in the verb and then maybe also some EQ. Or maybe not bus it but just set up a send for the original to the verb aux so you can really adjust the amount of dry signal in the beginning and wet on the aux. I've done it a couple of times, strictly for FX purposes, with various results but it can sound pretty cool if you fuck with it enough. Might be worth a try and if it didn't work, you wouldn't have wasted much time.
Cheers!
maybe you can try bussing your voice track to an aux with a verb on it and then bouncing THAT to another track, just to print the effect of the verb? You'd probably have to really play around with your parameters in the verb and then maybe also some EQ. Or maybe not bus it but just set up a send for the original to the verb aux so you can really adjust the amount of dry signal in the beginning and wet on the aux. I've done it a couple of times, strictly for FX purposes, with various results but it can sound pretty cool if you fuck with it enough. Might be worth a try and if it didn't work, you wouldn't have wasted much time.
Cheers!
theblackmoon
Casa Negra
In an open field there´s no reveberation, specially no early reflections. So I would record that on the most dead enviroment possible, make the talent speak loud, but no too close to the mic, avoid proximity effect. As people suggested a gentle HF roll-off may help, if it´s not intelligible enough maybe boost a bit of 3K or such... If you have any post-production fx use something like wind, or anything that gives the impression of outside. Hollywood Edge is the best IMO. Good luck.
not necessarily...most of the presence in the voice sits in the 2-6k area, so rolling off stuff above 10k would retain the clarity while also giving the impression of distance
