DaVinci Dialogue Cleanup

The user expects quiet pauses as well as suitable speech loudness. Loudness normalization alone is not completion: it can expose room noise. Use this stage when preparing dialogue for the editing workflow.

Build and calibrate an editable native Fairlight chain on original media, then follow the pre-cut rendering workflow below. Read native-fairlight-chain.md for adjustable starting settings and local preset creation. Avoid rebuilding an already verified chain or duplicating processing on continuation.

Pre-cut audio workflow

For new dialogue edits, complete dialogue cleanup before the first editorial cut, then render the processed dialogue back out and use that rendered audio in the working timeline for smooth playback. This is the skill's default workflow, even when live effects work correctly; a QC-only render does not satisfy it.

Preserve a recoverable preparation timeline with the original audio and editable Fairlight chain. Render full continuous dialogue coverage before cutting, including the source coverage needed for later trims, as a project-local 48 kHz, 24-bit PCM WAV with a descriptive versioned filename. Preserve channel layout, duration, and established sync, including any section-specific offsets caused by OBS pauses. Verify actual rendered duration, levels, and alignment before placing it in the working timeline. Keep the rendered audio as ordinary trimmable clips linked to the corresponding picture; retain access to the original recording and live chain for revisions.

Bypass the effects and gain already baked into that rendered audio in the working timeline so it is not processed twice. Verify smooth playback, then begin the dialogue cut and add the usual two-frame audio crossfades afterward. Preserve any existing manual edits when joining a project already in progress; do not undo or rebuild an existing cut solely to impose this order retroactively. An explicit request to keep effects live overrides this default.

Preserve speech for the word-timed cut

Prepare or reuse a word-timed transcript aligned to the original dialogue and compare its word spans with both the original and processed waveforms. Follow the shared waveform and word-timing audit. During cleanup, check quiet word onsets, endings, and speech-to-pause transitions across the recording; investigate any processing that gates or suppresses a phoneme. A quieter pause is not an improvement if part of a word disappears. Preserve meaningful pauses and continuous source coverage rather than deleting time in this stage.

Verify the processed WAV's timing against the original signal, account for filter latency, and retain the transcript-to-source mapping with the audio preparation record. Hand this evidence to the first-cut stage, which must check every proposed join against the waveform and word times, then recheck the assembled result. Cleanup measurements alone do not establish safe cut points.