I am using a Canon EOS-650D to record video and I have a problem with wind/noise on my recordings. Can anyone tell me how can I reduce noise/wind from the recorded video. I usually edit my videos on Windows movie maker and having some knowledge of Adobe Premiere Pro too.


The best bet is to avoid getting it on the recording. The use of a wind cover can help break up the wind and prevent it from interfering with a recording. Once it is there, particularly if it is really loud, there isn't a whole lot you can do about it that will result in satisfactory audio. You can reduce it some, but it is unlikely to be able to be removed entirely and may well produce artifacts in your audio in the process.

The old adage crap in, crap out still greatly applies to audio. Once something is mixed in to a signal, it's part of the signal. The real world doesn't often fit digital models very well and thus there isn't a sure way to separate one part of the signal from another part. This is why audio recordings are done with multiple tracks rather than recording everything to one output.

As far as what you can try doing with the existing audio, any software with noise reduction or wind reduction can try to reduce it or you can try to EQ the frequencies of the majority of the noise down some to help suppress it, but short of re-recording the audio and dubbing (or just re-shooting) there isn't anything I know of that will get rid of it entirely.

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    I agree but why not mention some of the goodies like a RODE Blimp for the mic and a Dead Wombat furry cover? According to one review this camera has an external mic input. – filzilla Jul 23 '13 at 20:37
  • @filzilla - yeah, I did mention use of wind covers in my second sentence. There is no guarantee there won't be a better wind cover next week though, so I try to avoid mentioning specific products unless specifically relevant. (ie, the question asks about a particular product.) – AJ Henderson Jul 23 '13 at 20:53
  • Yes I see that but Rode has been pretty much the leader for the last 3 years or more. None the less a very good answer. – filzilla Jul 23 '13 at 20:59
  • @filzilla - yeah, I agree your recommendations are good and I'm glad you commented on them. – AJ Henderson Jul 23 '13 at 22:18

I use audacity for this not perfect but gets the job done. You will need to extract the audio and reattach it with you editing software.


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    Can you please tell me about these noise reducing terms ?? Noise Reduction(db) Sensitivity Frequency Smoothing Attack/Decay time Also please tell me which sliders I have to maximize or minimize to get my desired result – Moeed Farooqui Jul 23 '13 at 6:45

The EOS 650D does have a wind noise reducer built in. I can't say how truly effective it might be (and imagine that there is some loss somwehere because of the processing.)

Otherwise there are now DSLR focused wind deflectors called Wind Jammers and Micro Muffs. In the broadcast industry a boom microphone usually has a 'zepplin' or wind cheater covering it.

If you can get your hands on a large piece of soft foam (1m x 2m) then it could be used as a wind break if positioned between the wind and the camera.

Another way to reduce noise is to record an audio 'wild track' at the same time on another machine but keep it significantly far away from your subject's voice / the sound your subject is making e.g. presenter. This has often been done on TV dramas where shooting on location is open to the (audio) elements so to speak. I have first hand experience of this on Coronation Street where the 'whistling' sound on the newly constructed Beetham Tower nearby was causing havoc in the recordings.

Often, low and high frequencies from things like air conditioning machines, compressors, refrigerators etc might be a lot louder in the recording because of the dynamics of the recording system. Machines are fairly easy to cancel out.

If a second recorder isn't available and the noise is fairly constant then just record a good sized chunk of the background noise separately. This may not work too well with something organic like wind however. Again, a muff or wind cheater would be the weapon of choice.

The audio on the second recording can then be used with certain software as a reference for noise reduction in that it can be used to cancel out the noise in the original recording.

But, as AJ Henderson points out - if the background noise is particularly disruptive, there's a limit to what you can do with that recording material and a re-shoot or audio dub will no doubt be the only way to cope with the results.


Use Adobe Audition. Find a section where there is only wind noise (no speech) and use this to analyse the noise in the Noise Reduction effect. Then apply those settings to the rest of the audio. If you don't have 10 seconds or so of noise, you can edit some together.
A high pass filter set to about 40Hz can help too, but it's never going to get rid of all of it. Finally, manually adjusting the filters for the worst sections can also improve things.


A high pass filter might help. Set to about 100Hz, depends on the character of the wind noise.


As already mentioned, Audacity is good free audio editor that can be used for cleaning your audio. There's no magic, you have to read its manual and to experiment to achieve good results. There is also Magix Video Sound Cleaning Lab - it's not free, but you can freely use it for 30 days.

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