Delete repeats (re-takes) when reading from a script
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Khaki
I record a lot of scripted material, and I often make mistakes. When I do I pause and re-read the mistaken phrase:
"Two households, both a— both alike in dignity, in fancy — fair Venice — Veronica — in fair Verona, where we lay our scene"
I use Descript's Import feature to match the recording to the text, and then look through the waveforms for mismatches — but since Descript can recognize where the recording varies from the script, can't it also recognize these repeats?
99% of the editing work I do on the text of a scripted recording involves re-takes, and in 99% I have to delete the first utterances of a phrase or subphrase and keep the last one:
"Two households, [both a—] both alike in dignity, [in fancy —] [fair Venice —] [Veronica —] in fair Verona, where we lay our scene"
If Descript were able to recognize when phrases in a script were repeated (or flubbed) before they were finally gotten right, and delete those flubs, editing recorded scripted material in Descript would become a 1-step operation!
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Support Team
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This is a great feature request! Sorry it took us so long to get back to you on this.
"Remove Retakes" will now allow you to do just that! Check out our help center article:
https://help.descript.com/hc/en-us/articles/21908864772493-Sound-Good-Actions
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Khaki
Support Team thank you for getting back! I've used Descript's Remove Retakes feature several times and found that, because Descript doesn't actually correlate a script to a recording, it failed too often to be useful.
The feature mixed Retakes and deleted repeated, non-retake phrases, which it would have been able to get if Descript maintained any kind of relationship between the original script and the final recording.
I have found a solution though: I've stopped using Descript and switched to Hindenburg Narrator
Hindenburg Narrator has excellent punch-and-roll re-recording, and the ability to maintain a relationship between the script and the recording to determine what's a retake, rather than using severely error-prone "AI" to guess.
Switching away from Descript has made my workflow faster and more reliable.
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Shannon Wedge
Although I'm not sure I'd trust an automated process because of the number of times I've personally decided to keep at least part of a person's first take, I would love to see a way for Descript to highlight things it thinks are repeats/restatements so they'd be easier to notice and address.