MediaSlap blog

“But it’s a digital recording” – have you ever hear those words from one of your clients?

You got the phone call last week. A young lady is being dismissed from her job because of what appears to be sexual harassment.  Of course, there is the little problem of her words against those of the harassing supervisor. Then you hear the magic words, “I recorded the whole conversation on one of those tiny digital recorders.”   Well, all right then – We have a case and who could dispute the incident when you can hear it as it happened.  So you ask the lady for the recording in order to educate yourself to the specifics of the incident… And that’s where the trouble starts.  Sure, you can hear every word your client says but, unfortunately, not the supervisor who makes the offending statements.  Well, “it’s a Digital recording isn’t it? – Why is it not perfect?”

Here is where a little knowledge can be dangerous.  Yes, digital recording is a way to ensure “perfect” storage of the sound and/or picture that you are recording. However, this has nothing to do with the initial quality of the recording.  The problem is that you can have a wonderfully pristine recording of bad sound.  The device doesn’t know any difference; it will record and save “perfectly” both the good and the bad.  So, what can you do now?

You could see if the incident could be repeated and, perhaps, catch the supervisor in the act yet again and maybe get a better recording.  Or you could have the present tape transcribed and let the transcriber use their best judgment as to what the hard-to-hear sections contain. However, the best choice is to use an expert in “enhancing” low-quality recordings.  Whether you call it Audio Forensics or Audio Enhancement, it all boils down to the same thing – an experienced, sound technician with not only the right tools to create a usable piece of evidence, but the subjective knowledge to give you the best possible product. Today, everybody seems to have some software they got for free off the internet and is more than willing to work for next to nothing.  Beware! – As the old saying goes, “You get what you pay for.”  And you can’t substitute technology for intelligence.  Much of the time, the real problem with the recording IS the microphone is “stupid” (it doesn’t make a decision to tune-out the background noises from the voices you are trying to hear) and it is not a human brain.  Think of being at a cocktail party with a hundred other folks – You are still able to have a conversation with one other person, ignoring all the other sounds around you.  This is the miracle of the human brain’s audio ability.  It takes an experienced and trained engineer to act as the “brain” after the fact and uncover the hidden audio.

You well know that there is nothing better than a good eyewitness and what better a witness than a clean and intelligible recording of what really happened.

by Mark Meyer

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