One of the most important things about being a successful and reliable dialogue editor today revolves around using RX in a clean, efficient, and effective way. You can't heavily process things, you can't damage the quality of the dialogue recording in anyway, yet we are expected to work magic by cleaning up ticks, pops, bumps, hums, clanks, etc.
Here are some of the unique ways that I've learned to use RX 11. Many of these things come from experimentation, as well as getting tips and tricks from professional dialogue editors.
Use De-Crackle instead of De-Click and Mouth De-Click.
It seems that most professional dialogue editors work to combat harsh clicks, or upper frequency transients by using RX de-crackle rather than de-click or mouth de-click. This is more used as a safety precaution as you quickly learn that specifically de-click can totally kill transients and plosives of many important consonants.
Take this example of the word "picture". There is a natural sounding "p-pop" transient at the very beginning of the word. It doesn't need to be removed and should be left alone, but once running de-click and mouth de-click even on just the small chunk of the word, the consonant transient is totally removed. This is cause very big intelligibility issues down the line.
Here is the word "picture" in RX before any de-clicking has occurred.
Here is the word "picture" after de-click and mouth de-click were run on the word. You can visibly see the transient missing from the front of the word after the processing has occured.
I have found that it is best to use de-click and mouth de-click ONLY between words and not risk losing important p-pops. Also, this should be a given but NEVER batch process the entire clip with de-click and mouth de-click. If you have a clip that has crinkles, clicks, and extraneous pops it is best to run multiple light passes of de-crackle instead. This is why de-crackle is one of my most used repair modes in RX.
Using Spectrogram Settings to change the FFT size of the audio editor display
This is probably my favorite trick I've ever learned in RX. RX's editor display is so advanced that you can easily change the type of display and the FFT size. FFT stands for "Fast-Fourier Transform" and in a simple way, breaks down a signal into different frequency components. Using this in RX is a true godsend because a lower FFT size can give hyper-detail into time-centric events like harsh transients, while a higher FFT size can give hyper-detail into frequency-centric events like tonal hums, etc.
If you have a click that you can't seem to find and eliminate, it is often times revealed by simply lowering the FFT size.
At an FFT size of 4096 we can see a pretty balanced mix of transient and tonal information. You can see in the middle of the picture that there seems to be a light click, lets lower the FFT and see if we can get a more detailed view of the click so if we want to take it out we don't damage any of the surrounding noise.
Wow! With a FFT size of 128 we can now see the click in very fine detail, allowing us to be very detailed in removing the click, but not damaging any surrounding information.
Now let's look at a tonal problem.
Lets say that while playing this small chunk in the RX audio editor we heard a very light low-end hum. It might be faster and easier to click F to use the frequency tool and highlight everything below 700 Hz and run De-Hum. This is NOT what professional dialogue editors do though. Lets change the FFT size to a higher amount and see if we can't really focus in on the hum.
After changing the FFT size to 65536, we can now see all tonal events in more fine detail, while transient events are all but gone. I've highlighted the very light tone that we can now see, as previously it was not visible at all.
Changing the Color Map in Spectrogram Settings to "Multicolor " instead of "Cyan to Orange"
I might very well be alone in this trick, as I've still never seen anyone else not use the color Cyan-Orange while using RX. This has been a game changer for how I use the standalone RX editor though.
I was messing around one day and decided to change the color settings to multicolor. In my head I figured more color, more information, right? Well, I'm sure not everyone will agree with me, but I've found that that is mostly true. It is simply easier to visually see problems in the editor if you use multicolor (I've found that it is specifically helpful in issues lower than 1kHz.
Cyan - Orange Color Setting
Multicolor 1 Setting
There isn't a huge difference here, but I still feel like once you use multicolor enough, you will begin to see it. Maybe this is me gaslighting myself who knows, but I believe in the lower tonal frequencies there is more detail, definitely when you are trying to microscopically remove hums from around words, etc.
Using RX's Keyboard Shortcuts
This is a pretty standard tip and is a given if you want to work at an efficient rate. Just simply go into RX preferences and go to the "Keyboard" tab to add your keyboard shortcuts.
Here is my list...
1 - Mouth De-Click
2 - De-Click
3 - De-Crackle
4 - Spectral Repair Attenuate
5 - De-Rustle
6 - Deconstruct
7 - De-Wind
8 - De-Hum
9 - De-Plosive
- Decrease FFT Size
+ Increase FFT Size
I - Toggle On/Off Instant Process
[ - Instant Process Gain
] - Instant Process Replace
Using "Instant Process - Gain" instead of "Spectral Repair Attenuate"
Utilizing the "Instant Process" feature of RX has helped speed up my process so much. Not only has it helped me speed up, but I believe it has also resulted in much better results. Let's say we have a random little pocket of noise and it is in between words. Basically, all we need to do is smooth it out with some clean noise, instead of extraneous noise. The first thing we might do is to simply copy and paste clean noise floor from somewhere else in the file. But, let's say that there is not enough of clean noise anywhere to do that. Many people would reach for spectral repair attenuate to quickly get rid of the problem. While this certainly isn't necessarily wrong (definitely if you do very small passes at it with the strength set to 0.2 - 0.6), this can still result in "zippery" artifacts surprisingly fast. Artifacts that have a very small tonal variation that begin to sound like a zipper.
A way to combat this is to turn on instant processing and set it to "gain". You can then set the dB level to whatever you like. Mine is set to -3.0 dB so that when I come across something that I feel maybe doesn't need to be removed or replaced completely, yet needs to be lowered in volume or buried under a word, I can simply gain it down.
**Bonus Tip: This is also very good for grabbing harsh "sss" sounds and gaining them down. This gives you a lot more control as opposed to De-essing the entire clip.
RX "Instant process" turned on and set to "Gain"
Using De-Construct in Multiple Ways
De-Construct is the most underutilized and under-talked-about module in RX. De-Construct is amazing because it gives you flexibility and is easy to use. Similar to many new AI-powered Noise Reduction plugins today (Clear, Hush), De-Construct gives you three faders: a tonal gain, a noisy gain, and a transient gain. The way that I most use De-Construct is to combat hums. I find that De-Hum can sometimes strip away too much or cut into the noise, which can quickly cause fluctuations in the noise floor. To combat this, I will use De-Construct with the tonal gain at -InfdB, the noise gain at 0dB, and the transient gain at -InfdB. In theory, this will get rid of car noises, sirens, planes, etc., and not eliminate the noise at all. We don't want to create a black hole; we just want to get rid of the harsh tonal elements of these occurrences. Another way that I use De-Construct is as a backup or polisher to using De-Rustle. De-Rustle is great at a low strength (I usually have mine set around 1.5), but sometimes that is either too much or not enough. If De-Rustle isn't working for me, I usually use De-Construct with a tonal gain of 0dB, noise gain of -5dB, and a transient gain of -10dB. This will keep any tonal information intact (e.g., dialogue) but can reduce some of the harsh rustle or crackle by pulling down the noise by 5dB.
RX's "De-Construct" Module
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