iZotope RX 3 vs. Adobe Audition, Part 2: Noise and Reverb/Echo Reduction
In this final round between audio editing champs iZotope RX 3 and Adobe Audition CC, we compare the two audio editors in noise reduction and reverb/echo reduction.
I ran multiple test cases in Audition and RX3. The primary difference was that RX3 did a noticeably better job removing noise from speech. That is, when the background noise was the only noise present on the waveform, both tools did a fine job. But when the noise was integrated into the speech itself, RX3 proved better at removing that noise.
You can hear this in two samples. The first was provided by World Trade Press, consulting client, from their A to Zebra Language product.
World Trade Press
Briefly, the A to Zebra Language product includes over 6,500 vocabulary terms and 5,500 verb conjugations in five languages. Processing these files is a huge chore, and I was hired to help streamline the encoding and noise reduction workflows. A faint noise had appeared in the audio files during shooting; it wouldn’t have been a problem for most videos, but since many users of the product listen via headphones, World Trade Press wanted the audio as pristine as possible.
I produced files using Audition CC and iZotope. You’ll probably need headphones to hear the difference, but if you wear headphones, you’ll notice that the background whine in the speaker’s voice in the Audition file, but not the iZotope file.
Videoguys Tutorial
The second file is from a video tutorial that I shot for the NewTek Tricaster TC40. My office is pretty quiet, but to record the tutorial, I had to have two computers running; the TC40 itself, and the computer capturing the screencam. That created a noticeable whine.
If you play the Audition file, again with headphones, you’ll notice that the whine remains in the speech, which is particularly noticeable when I finish a word or sentence, and the noise remains for a split second. iZotope did a much better job removing the noise from the speech as well as the otherwise silent areas.
In concluding this section, I should say that I consider myself competent when using noise reduction with Audition, but certainly not an expert. Audition has lots of controls like Spectral Decay, Transition Width, and Precision Factor available, which I experimented with but didn’t perform regression analysis in an attempt to improve the results. I can’t absolutely say that iZotope is “better” at noise reduction than Audition, but I can say that iZotope allowed me to produce a superior result faster and easier, which for most users is the same thing as better.
Related Articles
This tutorial demonstrates Adobe Audition's Remix feature, which allows you to shorten the length of a music track to match the duration of your video edit.
Key features of new versions include Clip Gain, Dialogue Denoiser, and roundtrip workflow with Pro Tools and Logic
This tutorial demonstrates how to use an After Effects alpha matte to make your video "shine through" your text.
Today Adobe announced updates to all Creative Cloud video apps that will debut at NAB. Here are details on the updates, plus a video tutorial on four key new features in Premiere Pro CC: Master Clips, Live Text, Masking and Tracking, and new 4K format support.
While After Effects may be daunting for some Premiere Pro editors, here is an easy-to-follow workflow that can enliven your text and titles with pre-built animations found in Adobe Bridge, applied in a few simple steps in After Effects, and imported directly into your Premiere Pro timeline.
iShowU, a Mac-based screencam app from ShinyWhiteBox.com, is quick, easy-to-use, and inexpensive; here's a look at how to use it to produce pro screencams that you can import into Adobe Premiere Pro CC to integrate into your video projects.
In this tutorial, we'll look at how to create screencams with TechSmith Camtasia, and then import them into Adobe Premiere Pro to incorporate them into your existing Premiere Pro projects to create professional-quality instructional videos that seamlessly combine screencams and HD footage.
Here are three quick tips that will streamline your titling workflow in Premiere Pro when you create styles you like and want to use them consistently without reinventing them each time.
We've all had the misfortune of recording clipped, distorted audio from a signal that's too hot, resulting in time-consuming retakes or total disaster if the audio is from a live event. The Declip feature in iZotope RX3 can reduce that disaster to a quick and easy fix.
This video tutorial demonstrates how to restore muffled sections of spoken audio using the Multiband Compressor in Adobe Premiere Pro CC or Adobe Audition.
This video tutorial demonstrates how to use and leverage 3 key new features in Adobe Media Encoder CC: Lumetri Looks support, and image, text, and timecode overlay.
This tutorial demonstrates how to apply an effect to a portion of a video image while leaving the rest of the clip untouched, and how to track that portion of the image throughout the duration of the clip, using the Track Matte effect in Adobe Premiere Pro CC.
Recent upgrades to Adobe CC make it easy to apply graded looks in Adobe Premiere Pro CC and match shots with different color temperatures via seamless roundtripping between Premiere Pro CC and SpeedGrade CC.
In this first installment of a two-part series, Jan Ozer compares the declipping and crackle and pop-removal features in iZotope's new RX 3 pro audio editor to the parallel features in Adobe Audition CC.
Exploring 3 new key features in Audition CC, the newest version of Adobe's professional audio editing application: Sound Removal for eliminating hums and other variable-frequency unwanted noises, the Loudness Radar Meter for matching and adhering to broadcast volume standards, and Automatic Speech Alignment for ADR.