VO Pro Tip: Some tips on De-Essers

Published about 1 month ago • 1 min read

De-Ess'ing

Hey Reader,

When you're editing voice-over, it is incredibly tempting to just throw a de-esser onto your track, dial in a preset, and call it a day. After all, harsh sibilance—those piercing "S" sounds—can ruin an otherwise perfect read.

But relying too heavily on an automated de-esser can sometimes backfire, turning your clean performance into a lispy, muffled mess.

Treat de-essing as a targeted correction, not a set-it-and-forget-it background tool.

Before you let a plugin do all the heavy lifting, try these steps to keep your audio sounding natural:

Edit manually first: If you have a few specific "S" sounds that are absolute ear-piercers, highlight them in your DAW and manually drop their volume or gain by a few decibels. Often, taming the worst offenders by hand means you won't need to push your plugin nearly as hard.
Check the "S" to "TH" transition: The absolute clearest sign of over-de-essing is when your "S" sounds start sounding like "TH" sounds. If you notice yourself sounding like you have a slight lisp, back off the threshold or reduce the reduction amount immediately.
Experiment with putting the de-esser at different points in your chain. Maybe taming that sibiliance right up front is the best move, before your audio travels through the rest of your processing chain. Or, maybe it's best towards the end, after some of your other processing may have accentuated it. See which plugin order works best for your voice and studio.

Every voice, microphone, and acoustic space reacts differently to sibilance, so there is no one-size-fits-all setting. Use your tools gently, trust your ears over the plugin graphics, and protect the natural clarity of your performance.

Have you noticed your de-esser changing the character of your reads lately? Drop your settings back a bit on your next audition and see if you notice a difference.

-Michael

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