That to Than

I was cleaning up some audio from a phone recorded podcast yesterday. Nothing big. But I decided it would be nice to get rid of as many word fumbles as possible. Everyone likes to sound more intelligent (at least, I'm pretty sure that is the normal state of things).

So, I ran across this sentence:

"Perhaps you think it requires more education that you have ...than you have."

I felt that having a solid sentence while talking about education would be ideal, so I started playing with it. First, I tried deleting the "that you have" and sliding over the "than you have"... but the vocal inflection was all wrong.

So, I selected from the second half of the "t" in "that" and deleted everything up to the first half of the "t" in "than", and... ta-da! Perfection.


Selection Between the "T"s

It may be easier to hear how this worked than to read about, so, for your viewing pleasure:


That to Than

The reminder/lesson to be taken from all this is that it may be possible to get a completely seamless fix to a major audio bobble. Don't confine yourself to think only of whole words or phrases, but rather consider the sounds, how they are shaped, flowing, and the tone and inflection of the voice. Let yourself think outside of the patently obvious, and you just may find yourself amazed at what works.

The other thing to keep in mind from this is that it is a good idea to give yourself the freedom to try things. Don't just write off something thinking, 'That will never work'... because you don't know. In this digital age it is prudent to take a moment and try something. There is always "Undo"*.

~Luke Holzmann
Your Media Production Mentor

*Well, almost always. If you save and the computer crashes right after that before you get a chance to undo then you'd be stuck with your change... which is why I recommend saving a new copy of your project every day (i.e. "Luke's Blog1", "Luke's Blog2", "Luke's Blog3"...).