THE AUDIO TOOL

• Under the Tools Menu. Apple + 1
• For Master Output Lever Slider, click on the small speaker icon. Don’t use this for changing your monitoring level as your output levels will be changed too.
• To globally adjust Input levels, click on the microphone icon
• To reveal your Output Options, click on the rightmost icon. The default output is Stereo mix CH 1 & 2.
• It is possible to map timeline tracks to particular output channels when using Direct Out. All systems will monitor up to 8 tracks.
• The output options let you bypass or override EQ, Clip Gain and Automation Gain.


THE AUDIO MIX TOOL

• The first main way to adjust audio levels in a sequence.
• Allows you the adjustment of audio in the Source Monitor, before dropping it into the timeline.
• Track lights don’t need to be set when using the Audio Mix
• Levels can be adjusted in small increments by using the keyboard cursor keys and values can also be typed in using the Numeric Keypad
• Pan can be adjusted by clicking in the box below the channel and dragging the slider
• To quickly set the pan to a mid-point, Option/Alt + Click on the slider and this sets the slider back to 0 dB.
• To adjust more than one channel at once, click on the Gang Buttons on each channel (they turn green)
• Only the clip(s) at the position indicator will be affected.


TO ADJUST ALL THE CLIPS ON A TRACK

• First make the adjustment on one clip and then click on the gang button on the appropriate channel or channels.
• Then click on the Audio Mix Fast Menu and use the options for setting the level or mix globally (ie. for the whole track)
• The fast menu may only be operational if the track selectors (the boxes indicating the track number in the Audio Mix window) are clicked. When selected they turn purple.


TO ADJUST A NUMBER OF CLIPS, BUT NOT THE WHOLE TRACK

• Set an In mark somewhere in the first clip and an Out in the last clip (the marks don’t need to be set at the beginning or end of the clips) and the options in the fast menu change to “Set…In/Out”. Another choice is Adjust, which will display a dialogue box allowing overall adjustments of volume and pan.


TO SEE A DISPLAY IN THE TIMELINE OF THE AUDIO LEVELS YOU SET

• Choose Clip Gain in the timeline fast menu
• If you have many source clips that need the pan centering, this can be done by selecting them in the bin and choosing “Center Pan “ from the Clip Menu. THERE IS NO WAY OF REVERSING THIS OTHER THAN LOADING EACH CLIP INTO THE SOURCE MONITOR IN TURN AND ADJUSTING THE PAN WITH THE AUDIO MIX TOOL


USING AUDIO KEYFRAMES – TO ADD ONE MANUALLY

• Prepare the timeline view with one or more wide audio tracks with the Auto Gain. If the tracks are wide enough, dB levels will show.
• Select a track(s) and press Add Keyframe button. If you don’t see the keyframe, widen the tracks more.
• To move a keyframe left or right, Option/Alt + Click + Drag.
• To delete a keyframe, put the mouse over the keyframe, wait til the pointer turns into a hand and press Delete
• To adjust the level of multiple keframes, place an In mark upstream and an Out mark downstream, all keyframes will move together when one is dragged.


AUDIO PUNCH-IN (VO directly in the timeline)

• Allows recording to the timeline while the sequence is playing (usually for laying narration to picture).
• You can record to an existing audio track or add a new one
• You’ll need to connect the microphone or mixer to one of the inputs on the audio interface or audio card
• To change the channel, Option/Alt + Click on the channel pop up window.
• Set your Bin and Hard drive
• Set a Pre & Post Roll before pressing the red record button
• The Trash Icon will abort the recording
• To solo one or more tracks in the timeline before recording, Apple/Ctrl + Click on one or more of the audio monitors to solo those tracks.
• When the recording is finished, the clip will appear in the Bin and in the timeline


AUDIO MIXDOWN

• Contains on timecode and there is no way to match back to the original clips
• Good for simplifying your audio prior to exporting to a Quicktime file


IMPORTING CD TRACKS

• Insert a CD, choose a Bin and choose File – Import. Navigate to the CD and choose your tracks

THE AUDIO SAMPLE RATE OF A CLIP CAN BE CHANGED. Highlight the clip and go to Clip – Change Sample Rate and choose. I can delete the original media when done
CD is 44.1 khz and most projects should be 48 khz


AUDIO PROJECT SETTINGS

Sequences CANNOT be outputted with Mixed Sample Rates. They can be edited but not outputted. They need to be converted.

Convert Sample Rates when playing, Set to NEVER so I’ll convert it Immediately

ADVANCED AUDIO

Bring up the Audio Editing Toolset and I can customize it to be the way that I want it to be. Make my Video track tiny and color my audio tracks to separate things such as VO on track one and make it green, and SOT on A2 with music on A3 and A4 on different tracks with different colors.


TO RECORD A VOICE OVER INTO MY SEQUENCE, go to Tools - Audio Punch-In. I can mark an in point in my Sequence where I want the punch-in to start and then an Out point where I want it to end. I can set my pre-roll time and a post-roll so I can listen to the sounds while I am recording. I will most likely on want to record to one channel (Ch 1) and record it to only one track (A1), which will probably record over the existing VO, although I do have the choice of putting it on a new track. I'll need to pick which harddrive to record it to. When I click on the Red Record button, it'll pre-roll and then ready to record. If I want to practice it a few times, click on the Green In-Out button. Make sure my Microphone is patched into either the Mojo or mixing board. Also, open up the Audio Tool to make sure the levels are recording ok.


TO ADD SPECIAL EFFECTS/FILTERS TO MY VO, I can go to my Audio Suite Plug-Ins. One would be to speed up the read a little bit if I needed it while keeping the pitch the same. To add that plug in, with the Audio Mix tool still open, click on its drop down menu and choose AudioSuite. I will need to pick which track I want to affect by clicking on the far left button to the left of the Plug button and choosing none and then selecting which track i want. If I want to Solo my VO track so I can hear it better without the SOT and music and what not, hold down Apple or Ctrl and click on the little speaker to the right of the Audio track in the timeline area. The little speaker will turn Green letting me know that that track is solo. Then to add the plug in, click on the None drop down menu and add Time Compression Expansion and then click on the Plug Icon button to open up the interface. Go to the Ratio slider and to make it go a little bit faster drag the slider to the left and then click on Render and OK. Then play it in the timeline to see if it's better. If I want to Pan the VO to the Center, go back to the drop down menu and change from AudioSuite to Audio Mix and in the Audio Mix Tool in the A1 track hold down Option/Alt Key and click on the bottom where it says L100 and it'll change to MID and it'll put that track to the center. If my VO sounds kind of lame, I can go into the EQ plug in and make it better by punching it up a bit by clicking on the drop down menu in the Audio Mix tool and selecting EQ and then going to the Fast Menu in the EQ Tool and selecting a preset such as Male Voice with Presence and then going to the timeline to preview it.


TO UN-SOLO MY AUDIO TRACK JUST CLICK ON THE GREEN SPEAKER ONCE.


TO RIDE MY AUDIO LEVELS IN THE MUSIC TO GO UP AND DOWN, IN THE AUDIO TOOL'S DROP DOWN MENU, select Automation Gain as I can do this on the fly. Select the tracks I want to affect by clicking on them in the Tool making them purple and if there are more then one track such as a stereo pair and I want to control them at the same time, I will Gang them by clicking on the buttons below the track numbers making them Green. They should remain panned Left (L100) and Right (R100) instead of in the middle (MID). In the timeline, I will go back to the beginning and set an In Point and make sure I set in a pre-roll amount so it won't just start abruptly and then click on the Red Record button in the Automation Gain Tool and when it plays, I can pull the levels up and down of the tracks in the tool following the VO and audio cues. After I'm done I should listen to it to check it out and to look at it to see how it looks by showing the keyframes I've made by going to the Fast Menu in the Timeline and choosing Audio Auto Gain. To make adjustments to the keyframes in the timeline hold down the Option/Alt key and click on the keyframe in the timeline and I can adjust it.


IF A SFX ISN'T LOUD ENOUGH, park my playhead over the clip and select the track it's on and go to the Audio Mix Tool to raise it's level and if it's already all the way to the top, I can try to add some Reverb which will echo the sound. Change the Audio Mix tool to the AudioSuite tool and change from None to D-Verb and then click on the Plug Icon to open it's parameters. It will be at 100% Wet. I need to pick what type of room I want the effect to sound in, so for example pick Church and then click on Render and then go in the timeline to check it out.