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Sonic Foundry has kept up quite nicely with the ongoing revolution in
digital sound creation and processing, regularly creating and updating
powerful, reliable and full-featured Windows applications and plug-ins that
stand in a class by themselves.
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Sound Forge 4.5 is the latest incarnation of Sonic Foundry's flagship audio
editing and processing package for the PC. It sports the functions that anyone
serious about audio needs, while adding new features that keep its edge over
the closest competitors. Although not cheap - about $350 street - it
delivers the goods.
The main screen "workspace" is uncluttered and customizable. Up to eleven
different toolbars can perch above a substantial blank field. All functions
are available via drop-down menus if you want a really clean display, but
you'll probably want at least to have the exceptionally nice-looking and
usable floating audio meters handy. They're entirely resizable (horizontal
or vertical format) and scalable from -90 to 0db, with peak and valley
holding options and a graphical clip alarm.
Individual sound files display as graphic waveforms in resizable, floating
"data windows." Each window has independent transport controls ("play
bars"), horizontal and vertical magnification buttons (scalable between 1:1
and 1:1024), and a standard scroll bar along the bottom. A level ruler on
the left side marks waveform amplitude. A time ruler (samples, beats, SMPTE
frames or a combination) marks location and allows you to set markers and
formats with a right click. Three selection status fields display the
beginning, end and total length of the current selection.
Practically everything on the workspace and data windows is tool-tipped in
case you forget what a button or window element does (the function can be
disabled if it gets annoying). Right-click option menus also abound.
There are almost too many features and options to describe - pretty much
everything you'd want to get done, plus. The usual options for selecting,
copying, cutting and pasting, cross fading and mixing are easy and fairly
intuitive. You can easily drag and drop between data windows, making it easy
to mix and crossfade different waveforms together without using the
clipboard. This encourages sound design experimentation.
Audio processing is extensive and powerful. It includes trim and crop (make
a selection and lose everything else in a keystroke), channel output
selection, EQ, fades, silence insertion (for adding buffers and bumpers), a
flexible normalization function, usable noise gating, time
compression/expansion, and reversal.
Effects abound as well - decent-sounding ones. Presets include amplitude
modulation, chorus and flanging, wah-wah, delay, distortion, compression,
phasing, tremelo, gapping, pitch bend and shifts, reverbs (pretty good
ones) - you name it. All are quite configurable; you can preview even
reverbs in real-time (if you've got the CPU and RAM), while dialing in
tweaks on the fly. And you can store your tweaks as presets. Sound Forge
supports any DirectX plug-in, as well, so you're only limited by your
budget.
Some new features have been added, as well. A batch file converter
(previously sold as a $200 plug-in) can convert or process up to thousands
of files in a single batch. Let's say you're creating audio for a large
multimedia or Web project. Audio real estate and/or bandwidth will be
scarce, but you don't want to lose too much quality. Create your files, tweak
your processing to compensate for lower quality, then set up a script that
will, in one fell swoop, apply your settings, convert stereo to mono, and
downsample from 16-bit to 8-bit. You can swill a couple of beers while it
churns.
Spectrum Analysis (also once a plug-in) allows detailed exploration of
waveform frequencies. Real-time monitoring during playback or recording
really helps zero in on problem frequencies like bass rumble, mike pops, or
heavy breathing.
Sound Forge 4.5 also includes a set of tools to support their powerful ACID
looping and sequencing package. It steps you through everything you need to
do to optimize ("acidize") loops for ACID - assigning root notes, number of
beats and tempos that will make ACID's pitch and time-shifting that much
smoother. Another function reverses the loop's rhythmic feel, which can
freshen up some otherwise standard beats.
In addition to the ongoing AVI video support, the program now supports
Microsoft's NetShow 3.0 and RealSystems RealVideo 5.0.
Musicians and sound designers will find Sound Forge easy to use. Recording
is simply a matter of opening a new file and defining parameters (stereo or
mono, sample and bit-rate). Hit record (or CTRL-R) and you're in preview
mode where you can monitor levels, set pre and post-roll, and punch-in
points. Hit record (or R) again and you're wailing - hit the space bar to stop.
Editing is just as easy. Selection dragging is enhanced by Sound Forge's
ability to fine-tune selection boundaries on the fly. Put a recorded sample
into loop mode, for example, and you can subtly grab and drag either
selection boundary back and forth on the fly. This is exceptionally useful
for quickly tuning up loops when you don't want to hassle with
sample-by-sample adjustments or endless delete-undo cycles.
The manifold processing and effect options are previewable and tweakable in
real-time - and there's a handy bypass toggle for on-the-fly comparisons
between effected and uneffected sounds. This ease and high degree of
configurability encourages experimentation. Even the reverbs process faster
than usual. Of course, with multiple levels of undo, you really don't have
to worry about messing up.
You can also transfer samples to an internal or external sampler via
SCSI/MIDI or MIDI/SDS. Sound Forge generates stable MIDI timecode at all
frame rates for hooking up with midi/audio sequencers such as Cakewalk Pro Audio.
I test-drove Sound Forge on a small sample-creation project. Part 1 was a
collection of guitar loops and one-shots, part 2 a batch of drum loops. The
guitar samples ranged all over the place - from quiet and intimate Joe
Pass-like turnarounds and vamps to heavily distorted chunks and riffs to
highly-syncopated afro-pop arpeggiations. When I encountered ugly
zero-crossing pops, I invoked the "Loop Tuner" - make a selection, invoke
the function and you'll be presented with a display that juxtaposes the
start and end points of the loop. You can immediately see where the
pop-causing discontinuity lies. Bring out the Pencil Tool, draw the starts
and ends together and the pop's history.
Even on highly syncopated samples I was able to easily arrive at perfect
loops by repeatedly making fine dragging adjustments of the selection
boundaries on the fly. Pretty nifty. The metal samples suffered from amp
buzz and line noise. No problem: the intelligent noise gate took care of it
without ugly chattering or signal loss. On several samples I realized my ax
was almost 1/2 step out-of-tune (Doh!). I pitch-shifted the track back into shape
with no noticeable weirdness.
The drumbeats - primitive, dirty beatbox stuff created several years
back -suffered from heavy clipping and rumbling. Again, no big: a combo of
EQ and downward normalization evened out the beats while preserving their
oomph. In short, Sound Forge worked for me.
Multimedia and Internet developers will be glad that Sound Forge
supports all major file and audio/video compression formats, including
Internet-specific encoders like RealMedia, NetShow3.0, and Java AU files.
And they'll dig the batch converter. Integrating audio with multimedia video
presentations is enhanced by frame-accurate support of AVI, NetShow and
RealMedia video.
Broadcast producers and engineers will love the processing and effects,
especially the time compress/expand function which, for example, can
accurately and smoothly compress 33 seconds of narration into 30 seconds -
without pitch-shifting. Three equalizers - graphic, paragraphic, and
parametric - plus graphic and multi-band dynamics processing make it easier
to add fullness, compress dynamic range, and contour individual regions. The
result is consistency across the board.
Sound Forge 4.5 continues to be the unchallenged industry leader in PC audio
editing and processing. It's full-featured for truly professional use but
easy enough to use for anyone who just wants to get a few things done
quickly. I'd highly recommend it to anyone who needs high-quality audio recording and processing on a PC. I can't really find
anything wrong with it - it does what you tell it to do - very well.
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