How to Use Dialogue Match

Dialogue Match  is built to change the way you edit dialogue. It’s the first tool to automatically match the sonic profile of a dialogue recording to another recording with a completely different profile, providing your film, television show, or podcast with environmental and spatial continuity in just a few clicks. 

With Dialogue Match, you can:

• Automatically learn and match the sonic profiles of dialogue recorded in different spaces
• Match dialogue recorded on a lavalier to the dialogue recorded on a boom mic
• Match ADR to production audio
• Match localized or dubbed audio to the sonic profile of the original language
• Save and load global snapshots and reference profiles for ambiences you encounter often

Watch the video below to learn how to use the resizeable Dialogue Match interface in a variety of situations, or click through the list above to jump to specific tips.

How do you use Dialogue Match?

Dialogue Match  is currently supported in Pro Tools only via AudioSuite. Find the plug-in in your ‘EQ’, ‘Noise Reduction’, or ‘iZotope’ folders in the AudioSuite menu. 

Here’s how to capture the ambience of one dialogue track—your reference profile—to apply to another dialogue track with different ambience.

1. Select a dialogue clip of any length and have Dialogue Match learn that clip’s ambience by pressing ‘Capture’ in the top left Reference section. This is your reference profile.

2. Next, load up the clip you’d like to apply that profile to, and click ‘Capture’ in the top right Apply To section for Dialogue Match to learn that clip’s sonic profile.

3. Now that Dialogue Match has learned the EQ spectrums, reverb, and general ambience of each track, Dialogue Match will apply settings unique to these tracks to create the perfect match.

4. Preview the changes that will be applied, and feel free to modify the settings in real-time while previewing. If you’d like to hear the original reference clip, click and hold the Reference Preview button.

5. Feel free to tweak the setting in the Advanced control panels.

• EQ: Add and remove nodes, choose filter shapes.
• Reverb: Tweak early reflections, reverb tail, reverb type, Density (the amount of absorption in the simulated ‘room’), and output filter cutoff frequency. The Low Pass and High Pass filters here have the same function as EQ filters, but are applied to the output of the reverb instead.
• Ambience: See a spectrogram of the ambient noise and room tone.

6. When you’re happy with the changes, hit Pro Tools’ Render button to apply that processing to your target dialogue clip. Depending on how you like to work in Pro Tools, you can duplicate your playlist before rendering so you have a backup of the original for safekeeping. 

7. At this point, you can save this applied profile as a Snapshot, Dialogue Match’s version of a preset. This is especially helpful if you work with the same actors in similar spaces often.

How to Match Boom and Lav Audio with Dialogue Match

In the video below, learn how to make your lavalier mic dialogue sound like the dialogue recorded on your boom.

1. Capture a reference profile of your boom track. Select a boom dialogue clip of any length, and click ‘Capture’ in the Reference section for  Dialogue Match  to learn that track’s sonic profile.

2. Next, load up the lav clip you’d like to apply that profile to, and click ‘Capture’ in the Apply To section for Dialogue Match to learn that clip’s sonic profile.

3. Now that Dialogue Match has learned the EQ spectrums, reverb, and general ambience of each track, Dialogue Match will apply settings unique to these tracks to create the perfect match.

4. Preview the changes that will be applied, and feel free to modify the settings in real-time while previewing. If you’d like to hear the original reference clip, click and hold the Reference Preview button.

5. Feel free to tweak the setting in the Advanced control panels.

• EQ: Add and remove nodes, choose filter shapes.
• Reverb: Tweak early reflections, reverb tail, reverb type, Density (the amount of absorption in the simulated ‘room’), and output filter cutoff frequency. The Low Pass and High Pass filters here have the same function as EQ filters, but are applied to the output of the reverb instead.
• Ambience: See a spectrogram of the ambient noise and room tone.

6. When you’re happy with the changes, hit Pro Tools’ Render button to apply that processing to your target dialogue clip. Depending on how you like to work in Pro Tools, you can duplicate your playlist before rendering so you have a backup of the original for safekeeping. 

7. At this point, you can save this applied profile as a Snapshot, which is Dialogue Match’s version of a preset. This is especially helpful if you work with the same actors in similar spaces often.

How to Match ADR to production dialogue with Dialogue Match

In the video below, we’ll make dry ADR sound like boom or lav dialogue. ADR, sometimes referred to as “looping,” is the process of re-recording dialogue by the original actor after the filming process to improve audio quality or reflect dialogue changes. Making ADR sound like production dialogue is a challenge dialogue editors and re-recording mixers are all too familiar with.

iZotope’s  Dialogue Match  allows you to apply the reverb, EQ and ambience from the original performance to the ADR, meaning you’ll be able to create the most authentic-sounding ADR take, and keep your audience locked into the story. 

1. Capture a reference profile of the production dialogue you’d like to match the ADR to. Select a clip of any length, and click ‘Capture’ in the Reference section for Dialogue Match to learn that track’s sonic profile.

2. Next, load up the ADR clip you’d like to apply that profile to, and click ‘Capture’ in the Apply To section for Dialogue Match to learn that clip’s sonic profile.

3. Now that Dialogue Match has learned the EQ spectrums, reverb, and general ambience of each track, Dialogue Match will apply settings unique to these tracks to create the perfect match.

4. Preview the changes that will be applied, and feel free to modify the settings in real-time while previewing. If you’d like to hear the original reference clip, click and hold the Reference Preview button.

5. Feel free to tweak the setting in the Advanced control panels.

• EQ: Add and remove nodes, choose filter shapes.
• Reverb: Tweak early reflections, reverb tail, reverb type, Density (the amount of absorption in the simulated ‘room’), and output filter cutoff frequency of that output filter. The Low Pass and High Pass filters here have the same function as EQ filters, but are applied to the output of the reverb instead.
• Ambience: See a spectrogram of the ambient noise and room tone.

6. When you’re happy with the changes, hit Pro Tools’ Render button to apply that processing to your target dialogue clip. Depending on how you like to work in Pro Tools, you can duplicate your playlist before rendering so you have a backup of the original for safekeeping. 

7. At this point, you can save this applied profile as a Snapshot, which is Dialogue Match’s version of a preset. 

How to Localize or Dub ADR with Dialogue Match

When productions are ‘dubbed’ into other languages, it can be difficult to keep the audience in the world of the original production because new voice talent has to perform the lines in a different language and in a completely different recording environment. In this video, we’ll cover steps to make localized, dry ADR sound as authentically a part of the original production’s world as possible by matching it to production dialogue with Dialogue Match. 

Dialogue Match  allows you to copy the reverb, EQ, and ambience from the original performance and impart that unique sonic fingerprint onto the localized ADR, meaning you’ll be able to create the most authentic-sounding ADR take, and keep viewers locked into the story, even if the lines are performed in a different language by a different actor. 

1. Capture a reference profile of the production dialogue you’d like to match the localized ADR to. Select a clip of any length, and click ‘Capture’ in the Reference section for Dialogue Match to learn that track’s sonic profile.

2. Next, load up the localized ADR clip you’d like to apply that profile to, and click ‘Capture’ in the Apply To section for Dialogue Match to learn that clip’s sonic profile.

3. Now that Dialogue Match has learned the EQ spectrums, reverb, and general ambience of each track, Dialogue Match will apply settings unique to these tracks to create the perfect match.

4. Preview the changes that will be applied, and feel free to modify the settings in real-time while previewing. If you’d like to hear the original reference clip, click and hold the Reference Preview button.

5. Feel free to tweak the setting in the Advanced control panels.

• EQ: Add and remove nodes, choose filter shapes.
• Reverb: Tweak early reflections, reverb tail, reverb type, Density (the amount of absorption in the simulated ‘room’), and output filter cutoff frequency. The Low Pass and High Pass filters here have the same function as EQ filters, but are applied to the output of the reverb instead.
• Ambience: See a spectrogram of the ambient noise and room tone.

6. When you’re happy with the changes, hit Pro Tools’ Render button to apply that processing to your target dialogue clip. Depending on how you like to work in Pro Tools, you can duplicate your playlist before rendering so you have a backup of the original for safekeeping. 

7. At this point, you can save this applied profile as a Snapshot, Dialogue Match’s version of a preset. 

As you can see, iZotope’s Dialogue Match gives your scenes environmental and spatial continuity with just a few clicks from a clean, easy-to-understand interface.

Be sure to check out our other Dialogue Match articles and tutorials to learn more about post production workflows, and download your free trial of Dialogue Match.