Hearing two copies of your voice during recording can come from monitoring the same microphone through two paths: the interface's direct monitor and the DAW's delayed input monitor. The saved file may still contain a single clean take. Isolate the monitor paths, then replay the recording without a live input before applying echo removal or rerecording the narration.
Trace one microphone through two listening routes
Direct monitoring sends the interface input toward its headphones or output without waiting for the computer's normal round trip. Software input monitoring returns that input through the recording application. Focusrite documents that hearing both can create an echo or a phase-like thin sound. Its support guidance distinguishes disabling software input monitoring from preventing the input being recorded.
Use the actual interface and DAW manuals for control names. Do not assume a track's mute button behaves identically in every recording application, especially when recording a bus or loopback feed. Identify the physical microphone input, the armed recording track, and the headphone mix before changing a route.
Run a listening-only isolation first
At a comfortable headphone level, speak one short phrase with both existing monitor paths active. Disable software input monitoring while retaining the verified direct route. Note whether the duplicate disappears. Alternatively, use the software path alone by disabling direct monitoring if you need to hear an effect during performance.
Change only one path at a time. Closing both can make the headphones quiet without proving that recording stopped or that a microphone failed. Raising input gain to compensate for a missing headphone mix can create a separate level problem. Keep recording gain and listening level as separate decisions.
A proposed saved-file check
This is a reproducible test plan, not a test performed on your equipment. Record a short spoken identifier and a single finger tap with one documented monitor path. Stop recording. Disable the live microphone feed to the headphone mix, then play only the saved file from the beginning. Check whether each spoken syllable and tap appears once.
If the saved file sounds clean while the live two-path monitor sounded doubled, document a monitoring fault. If the duplicate remains in the file, inspect the selected recording source, loopback, bus routing, and recorded effects. A room reflection is another possibility, but it should be diagnosed from the file rather than assumed from the original headphone experience.
Make the setup repeatable for the narrator
Save a brief note naming the input, recording destination, and chosen monitor path. For a remotely directed session, ask the narrator to confirm the listening state after reconnecting the interface. A new project template can silently re-enable software monitoring even though the interface's direct mix was unchanged.
Accept the setup when the performer hears an intelligible single monitoring path and the independently played recording contains the intended take. Use that approved recording in an external audio edit for an Imagild film. These interface controls are not Imagild features, and a clean monitor does not by itself verify final mix balance or picture synchronization.