What sample rate should ADR be recorded at?

The project rate, which is 48 kHz for virtually all film and television work. Match bit depth too, normally 24 bit.

Can ADR be recorded outside a studio?

Yes. A quiet room with soft furnishings and a matched microphone often cuts better than a heavily treated booth, because the perspective is closer to set.

How many takes per line?

Three usable takes minimum, more for emotional lines. Editors need alternatives to find the one that sits in the cut.

7 min read

ADR recording: getting replacement dialogue that matches the set

ADR fails when it sounds like a booth dropped into a room. Matching the original perspective matters more than the microphone you use.

Automated dialogue replacement means re-recording a line the production track cannot deliver: a plane overhead, a costume rustle, a performance change, a line the director rewrote in the edit. The technical bar is not high. The matching bar is.

Decide what actually needs ADR

Modern noise reduction saves lines that would have been unusable ten years ago. Before booking a session, have the dialogue editor try the production take cleaned up, and compare it with the alternate mic. A usable lav is almost always better than perfect ADR.

Build a proper cue list

Scene, take, timecode in and out for every line.
The exact wording as delivered on set, not as written in the script.
The reason for the cue: noise, performance, rewrite, censorship.
The microphone the original was recorded on, and its distance.

Match the perspective, not the room

If the original line was a boom at two metres in a hard corridor, a close cardioid in a dead booth will never cut. Move the actor back, use the same class of microphone, and let the reverb be added in post where it can be matched precisely.

Record at least three takes of every line, and record them in the actor's rhythm rather than to a rigid beep. Streaming the original take into one ear helps performance far more than counting them in.

Technical specs that avoid problems

Match the project sample rate exactly, almost always 48 kHz.
Record 24 bit, with peaks around minus 18 dBFS and plenty of headroom.
One mono file per cue, or a poly file with the mic on separate channels.
Name files by scene, cue number and take: SC12_CUE04_T03.wav.

Delivering ADR to the edit

If your ADR was recorded as a multichannel file with two microphones, split it into mono stems before delivery so the editor can choose between them per line. Keep the sample rate as recorded: a 44.1 kHz session dropped into a 48 kHz timeline will drift or be resampled by whatever the NLE decides.

If a file does arrive at the wrong rate, convert it deliberately with a proper sample rate converter rather than letting the timeline stretch it, and check the result in an inspector before it goes anywhere near the mix.