I’m a big fan of continuing education and I really like the products that iZotope (www.izotope.com) has been turning out. So do many of you, I would imagine, considering the market share gains that the company has been enjoying.

Izotope has a couple of videos on the ‘net that walk the user through examples that use the RX2 plug-in to rescue damaged audio. You can also download the actual before and after audio files that were worked on and a pdf that explains the procedures. You can even download a trial version of the product if you want to take it for a test ride prior to purchase.

I just spent about an hour replicating the processes that Matt, the tech support guru who cleans up background noise from a clip shot in a park, and the dreaded 60 cycle hum from a guitar track, performed.

Quick take: I was able to clean up the audio nicely, but I didn’t feel that at the end of the process I had gained a fundamental understanding of the concepts. Look, this particular blog is not for you Mix genius engineer-types… to you folks, this is elementary school stuff!

As high quality tools like the ones iZotope is turning out become less and less expensive they will become increasingly available to troglodytes like me. I’m going to keep working at this, and will let my fellow neophytes know how I’m doing- hopefully the teacher is grading on a curve!

Check out the video tutorials here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMrVgZeCXa8 (reducing unwanted background noise)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCkvnSXrHxY (rescuing noisy guitar)

Grab the files here:
 http://www.izotope.com/rx/tips

Let me know how you do!