In our recent coverage of the Hush Pro noise reduction plug-in, we demonstrated a few extreme examples of how it can be used to reduce both reverb and noise in dialogue recordings. In practice though, you would usually use it in a more subtle way as you work through a dialogue edit. The goal is typically not to eliminate noise and reverberation but rather to reduce them to acceptable, but natural sounding levels. Hush Pro is an adaptive processor. This means that the amount of processing applied depends on how loud the noise and reverb are in the original recording. The faders simply control the balance between the three channels, after the Hush AI has separated them as cleanly as it can.
Hush Pro works on not only static, continuous background noise such as HVAC noise but also on dynamic ambient noise like traffic or birds. With a simple adjustment of the noise fader, it’s possible to achieve highly effective noise reduction which is free from audible artefacts.
Another thing to note about Hush Pro is that you can not only cut noise and reverb but also boost the voice if required. This is useful if, for example, you have a line of dialogue recorded with a boom mic, and the actor turns away from the boom part-way through. You can select just the quiet part, and raise the voice level with Hush Pro while keeping the ambience level the same.
All three faders provide up to 12dB of boost. In the case of reverb, this is a handy feature when you want to subtly amplify the natural reflections in the room, instead of using a reverb plugin.
In the video below, I demonstrate some real world examples of how Hush Pro can be used in a dialogue editing workflow.