Pitch Correction Software

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John Macy
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Post by John Macy »

No apologies needed--it was just a general comment... :)

Tools like autotune used sparingly to save an awesome performance is something I do whenever needed...using it on an out of tune, mediocre singer renders an in tune, mediocre singer... :) And if I was mixing a killer steel solo and it had one note that needed a little love, no problem :)
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Godfrey Arthur
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Post by Godfrey Arthur »

iZotope Nectar...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvKrzgF-180

:whoa:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aiIqTrqako

Melodyne and Autotune work if you know how to use them.

For steel maybe use the chromatic setting and finesse the amount of effect.

Again, best to re-record the out of tune part if you can during tracking because fixing in edit/mix might use more time, be more problematic, than re-doing.

La Bamba..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Gr_Wc4H5fk
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Jim Park
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Auto tune software

Post by Jim Park »

I am a big fan of Melodyne! It allows late fixes and saves many hours in the studio. Here's two real life situations Melodyne fixed. First was a drop out in a vocal track that wasnt caught until the singer was long gone, unable to return for weeks. I stretched the begining of the gap forward and the end of the gap back and there was no audible indication of the fix. The second was an ending guitar 6 note arpeggio that had three really flat notes in it that the engineer thought he could fix with Antares. I happened to stop by the studio, walked in to an engineer head in hands, as the master had to go to reproduction that night. I drove home, he emailed me the WAV, I fixed in 3 minutes and emailed it back and the CD went in on time...very happy engineer!

Jack Stoner, you certainly can run an entire song through Melodyne, set a pitch correction Macro to 93%....... you'll be surprised .......between guitar players with capos and vocalists that cant quite get the note, Melodyne is really a great tool! If anybody needs tracks fixed, I will happy to fix them😎
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Post by Stephen Williams »

Graillon, auburn sounds has a free one. It's better than all the other free ones. It's better than Autotune because then you won't have horrible problems with i-lock like i did
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Post by Godfrey Arthur »

Stephen Williams wrote:Graillon, auburn sounds has a free one. It's better than all the other free ones. It's better than Autotune because then you won't have horrible problems with i-lock like i did
I had to re install Autotune and a few other plugins.

WAVES' haste to drop support for older plugins while digging into iLok has made me drop WAVES.

Last thing I want to do is expose my DAW's iLok to the modern internet and the new iLok system which may render the rest of the plugins/daw to go into haywire mode. The way these plugin/daw software are going it's a rental more now than it is an outright ownership.

Good thing Antares (Auto Tune) kept archives of the older software and helped me re-auth code my bought and paid for $400 TDM version of Auto Tune and Mic Mod.

Auto Tune is now part of recording school curriculum
in the more expensive recording schools. In order to graduate you need to pass Auto Tune.

Producers like Howard Benson is said to have said anyone who doesn't use Auto Tune is nuts.

Many pro studios are staying with older version daw software and older computers rather than getting on the upgrade carousel.

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Gary Sill
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Melodyne Editor works great if applied sparingly

Post by Gary Sill »

My experience. can't tell when corrections are made and that is good.
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Re: Melodyne Editor works great if applied sparingly

Post by Godfrey Arthur »

Gary Sill wrote:My experience. can't tell when corrections are made and that is good.
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:lol:
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I figured my post would be misunderstood

Post by Gary Sill »

I meant to say Melodyne is so good that when an out of tune singer is corrected the voice is so good corrected, you would never know all those mistakes could be in the original recording. I love the results of Melodyne!
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Re: I figured my post would be misunderstood

Post by Godfrey Arthur »

Gary Sill wrote:I meant to say Melodyne is so good that when an out of tune singer is corrected the voice is so good corrected, you would never know all those mistakes could be in the original recording. I love the results of Melodyne!
Yes Melodyne is pretty comprehensive with pitch and time correction. If we listen to old recordings by the greats way before pitch correction, there were sharps and flats all over the place. :o
Re: I figured my post would be misunderstood
In these days of forum self-deprecating posts based on age related issues, one may be misread if not a double entendre. :)

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Post by David Mitchell »

I bought Antares Autotune 10 years ago and never like it for pitch correction. Instead I prefer doing it by hand a note at a time with the built in pitch correction in my DAW which is Steinberg Nuendo. I do use Autotune for that gurgling effect on pop and hip hop artist. Some bands have booked time simply because I had autotune. Lol!
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Post by Mark Wayne »

Melodyne is very useful.
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Tony Prior
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Post by Tony Prior »

Which of the Melodyne single channel packages is recommended, Assistant or Essential ? Whats the difference? Yeah I did read the stuff on the website and am still confused ! I am thinking for pitch and timing only Essential will do the job.
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Mark Wayne
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Post by Mark Wayne »

It may be true, Tony, that you might get away with Essential, but if that program just centers the pitch, you may be in trouble because most singers' pitch is not centered to begin with throughout the whole note (short notes yes, but not longer notes).

What I'm saying is that you might want Assistant because it definently allows you to 'transition' or drift the pitch anywhere you want, allowing a more 'grooving' effect up to the correct pitch, making it more natural sounding. If I wouldn't have that option I know that it wouldn't give me the best result.
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Jack Stoner
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Post by Jack Stoner »

I've got a couple of Antares plug ins and they all have latency (delay). I have Melodyne, have the free Essential version that came with Sonar Platinum but recently upgraded with their Black Friday price to Assistant.

For just correcting a note here and there the Essential will do that.

Melodyne version comparison:
https://www.celemony.com/en/melodyne/ed ... al-matters
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Tony Prior
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Post by Tony Prior »

THX ! Sounds like assistant is the way to go.

:D
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Post by Tony Prior »

Kinda odd, I ordered the BOX Essential, $99, then the Assistant upgrade, on sale $49.

But If I ordered Assistant by itself it would have been $199 ! Now I'm not the worlds smartest Math person But I think I saved $50 ! :D
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Bill Terry
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Post by Bill Terry »

[Edited:] I just realized I'd already said this on this thread 3 years ago. LOL Ah well...

Did you check out the Melodyne Editor and Pro versions and take a look at the Polyphonic correction. It's unbelievably useful in some situations.

I had some live tracks I was mixing and the electric guitar player had a flat B string. In most of the song it was fairly unnoticeable, but in one short double-stop fill it was really rubbing to my ear. I used polyphonic mode to read in the track (or just a piece of the track in this case). It separated the polyphonic information into the two discrete notes.

It's incredibly accurate at doing the 'split' (even with poly material with a lot more simultaneous notes), and I literally re-tuned the guy's guitar in the mix by pitch correcting the B string. I'll confess I've also fixed a couple of 'not quite in tune' notes on some steel parts here and there. LOL..

Polyphonic mode comes at a premium, but it's one of those things that you dont need it until you need it.

This guy has a fairly good video that illustrates some of the poly mode features:
https://youtu.be/jXZ0TH72ui8
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Post by Tim Kowalski »

I purchased Melodyne Assistant and upgraded to Editor version within about a month. The polyphonic feature is worth the extra cost.
Also, Izotope software offers a vocal plugin called Nectar 3 which includes Melodyne essential. Nectar is a great vocal processing package on its own!
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Charles Kurck
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Melodyne Editor

Post by Charles Kurck »

Bill Terry, thank you for the YouTube link.
I have Melodyne Editor and I’ve used it to remove string noise and to add sustain to a note.
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Post by Tony Prior »

I have been messing with ( learning ) the different features with the FREE download, which allows for switching versions.

I did buy Essential BOX but it's a Christmas present to me , so I have to wait. But learning ahead of Christmas is not part of the deal !

Essential will indeed do many things and is very easy to use, it is the basic pitch tool with a few options. There are many excellent UTUBE tutorials for this tool . I have started a notebook.

I will be getting the upgrade to Assistant which offers another group of features not found in Essential, it's $49 on sale until Dec 31. Corrections and adjustments inside the envelope which are indeed handy. No, Polyphonic features are not part of Assistant, just Monophonic . At this point I don't see me using this correction tool often so the upgrade to Assistant will most likely be it for now.

Assistant and Essential are single channel so there are other tasks that need to be done to use it on more than 1 track in a session. It can be done it just takes a bit more time. We correct a track, then create an additional MONO track and send that corrected track to the new track. Then HIDE the initial track ( preserve processing ) and use the NEW track in the session. If there is only a single track needing correction, no big deal, keep the insert active. If we think about it, this is perhaps the right way to use this tool anyway, send the corrected track to it's own NEW track thus not keeping extra inserts active, preserving CPU resources.

Like any correction tool it can be way overdone or used in simplicity.

If it wasn't for this thread and those that posted above, I would not have considered Melodyne, thx to all , it's an exceptional tool at a very reasonable price point.
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Post by Bill Terry »

For pure entertainment value.. another Melodyne poly testimonial. Same guitar player as above, on another live gig, but in this case he just blew the line. Seems I've saved his butt a few times, but I've been there too many times myself to give him any grief about it. Maybe this should have been posted in the Jokes section???

Before and After.

My favorite part of this clip is the drummer yelling 'whoa...' and then the singer chuckling right after the clam. All that said, pretty amazing that you can fix something like that.
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Tony Prior
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final day for discounts in 2018

Post by Tony Prior »

Today is the last day ( 12/31) for upgrades with serious discounts. Be it Sweetwater, MF etc...

I did purchase Essential, it loaded no problem, then I purchased the UPGRADE to Assistant, it showed up on my account but took 3 or 4 downloads and resets to have the UPGRADE activated on my PC. The initial version kept appearing, not the UPGRADE.

The procedure is to remove the existing version then start over again with the UPGRADE version. I suspect every download is the exact same FULL version but the license number determines which version is activated.

We have an account on Celemony, we register the versions and when the licenses are confirmed there is a download link available . Once it is downloaded and we open the the program, an activation link appears which communicates with our account on the website , then BINGO, all is well.

All in all, and about 45 min of messing around , all is good !

When the activation of the upgrade takes place the S/N of the installed version changes to the UPGRADE S/N.

Its a nice package, I'm not sure how much I will use it but for my purposes of slight correction it will work out well.

$149 total which is a bargain. I just sold a hardware Antares system for $250 !

If I see a full upgrade for reasonable cost I may jump in the pond !


It was kinda odd, the Essential package I have is the CD version, even after loading the program by CD it never asked for an activation code, it jumped me to the Celemony website looking for the latest version. I suspect if I didn't have NET access it would have just reverted to the the version on the CD. Seeing that the ASSISTANT upgrade was a DOWNLOAD version it all makes sense.

My account with Celemony has two versions listed, so if something happens to the PC I can grab the download, no issues. This is very common now even with DAW's.
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Post by Gary Newcomb »

Melodyne. I don’t have it on my logic rig at home but used a few times on a record that had so many doubled acoustic tracks and tuned, doubled vox (harmonys doubled as well). On huge sustained whole note chords we used it to tweak certain notes of the chord-mainly pesky thirds to match the pitch center of the track. Melodyne is really incredible.
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Post by Mike Neer »

I did a session once as a backing vocalist and Ben Wisch was the engineer. I was so bummed when I heard the release because of a very audible and obvious pitch correction. It spooked me from ever wanting to deal with any of that kind of software. Call me old skool.
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Rick Campbell
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Post by Rick Campbell »

Mike Neer wrote:I did a session once as a backing vocalist and Ben Wisch was the engineer. I was so bummed when I heard the release because of a very audible and obvious pitch correction. It spooked me from ever wanting to deal with any of that kind of software. Call me old skool.
I know what you mean. Pitch correction software is a tool that an engineer can use to touch up problem areas and save a lot of time and travel, which equates to money. In experienenced and competent hands it can work wonders. Overused, it can produce a negative effect, but so can reverb, compression, and other effects. Some people seem to talk about it as something bad because they think its cheating, or something. These people are just misinformed and don't understand the recording studio processes. Pitch correction has been around since the 70's when engineers used the Eventide Harmonizer to fix problem notes. I'm sure it's present on a lot of recordings and even the artist doesn't realize it was used.

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