Recording Software for Voiceover: Do You Need “Non-Destructive?”

The phrase “destructive” appears frequently when we start talking about processing and editing with various recording software choices. It can be a little confusing. “Destructive” is scary. It sounds like you are doing something very dangerous to your audio. Heck! Why would you want to destroy your audio? That’s a fair question. 

While there are certainly benefits to “non-destructive” processes in the voiceover studio, “destructive” shouldn’t be a deal-breaker when choosing your working environment. It just means a slightly different workflow. 

The simplest way to think about “destructive” editing or processing is that anything you do makes changes to the underlying audio. In recording software that uses a direct or “destructive” process, if you delete a chunk of audio, it goes away. If you apply a High Pass Filter to your audio, the audio result is different than what you started with. 

“Non-destructive” applications such as Pro Tools or Studio One essentially isolate the complete original recording into a separate stored file. It then uses that original to generate “versions” that you either hear in real time when playing back, or render into a separate exported file. (The separate exported file will have all the edits, changes and processing baked in just like the results of a “destructive” process). With non-destructive systems, any “changes” you make – cutting/pasting, applying Effects, edits, etc. – are essentially put into a “to do” list that the application remembers when you play back the audio. 

For example, in a non-destructive recording application, when you press play on a track consisting of a few different takes, the computer might have to jump to the separate file with the better opening, zip back to the point seven seconds in the third take so it can play the strong middle section, then hop over to pick up the last couple lines from the first take, all while running the processing for your High Pass Filter and EQ, plus the light Compression you implemented and the final Gain you used to make it competitively loud. 

The downside with this approach is that some more complicated tools – such as Izotope’s RX Mouth DeClick – can cause lagging during playback. Those processor-intensive Effects use complicated calculations in the algorithms. This can cause delays on playback or even audible glitches.

To hear how those Effects work, it’s often necessary to save a separate processed file, as the complete results will be heard only in that exported WAV. 

There are certainly good reasons to leave the original audio untouched as is done with the non-destructive approach. It works well for multiple looped passes – as you might do for singing or playing a difficult musical passage. All the various takes are there. Though it adds a potentially time-consuming step for “comping” the various takes to decide which you want. I do like the ability to “slide” the ends of a take to reveal or conceal specific parts. (Although Twisted Wave gives you the “bow tie” tool to accomplish this on any cut/deletion, and you can play with the “skip selection” option in Adobe Audition to mimic a similar approach). 

The question remains – do we need “non-destructive” workflows for most voiceover tasks? What I’ve found over the years is that while a so-called “destructive” application (such as Twisted Wave) runs and the file is open, almost nothing is unfixable. That power exists through the programming miracle which is “Undo”. Though initially implemented as kind of a one time fix when you pressed the wrong button, “Undo” is probably your best friend in the studio, allowing you to sequentially step back every individual command, generally even past the point of a “SAVE”. 

Being able to reverse almost any step provides a strong degree of safety as long as the file remains open. Then simply using “Save As…” creates a “waypoint” version I can retreat to if there’s a problem later on. I do this any time I don’t want to have to redo a step – certainly the original raw recording, then at any major step in my project process.

You may recognize this as the “iterative save” workflow I recommend. It gives you a solid version. For daily auditioning, I find that simply hitting SAVE when I finish a pass means that the audio is locked down before I go on to the next take.

For me, the simpler interface and detailed waveform views serve that process very well.

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