Audio levels for voice overs?

Hartmanfx wrote on 6/12/2004, 7:48 PM
Hi, I'm a newbie at a lot of this and need help. I have been reading the forums for the past few weeks and have learned a lot.

First of all, I'm fairly familiar with Movie Studio and have been using it for several months. I'm working on a project with MS3 and have to do voice overs and music. Unfortunately, I do NOT have much knowledge of audio and its properties (so please excuse my lack of technical jargon).

The problem is when I recorded the V.O. (during dozens of separate sessions) using a mic/headset - the audio level seems to be different on a lot of the clips (I'm assuming the mic was in a different position each session or some other setting difference).

Anyway, is there a way to adjust the clips (voice overs) to each have the same level. I've tried to go through each one and pull the lever doo-hickey up and down and adjust by ear (not very accurate) and with a hundred different audio clips this is getting hard to do. I look at the meter on the bottom (V.U. meter?) and visually I can't tell if I can match them up or not. I guess I'm not sure what an acceptable level is suppose to be (all I see are numbers). Is ther suppose to be an easier way? What numbers or levels of dbs are acceptable?

I'm also worried that if I adjust by guessing that the final rendered video will be too loud or soft when it's played on a dvd player.

I really don't want to have to use an external audio editor for this (since I would have to learn something way more complicated for a simple problem).

I would appreciate any suggestions. Thank you so much.

Steve Hartman

Comments

JamesMessick wrote on 6/14/2004, 9:33 AM
You could _try_ exporting the entire audo track and then using something like Audacity (a pretty good, open-source, audio editor) to try and normalize the volume. If this doesn't produce good results, then you might just have to adjust track by track.

P.S. I'm no expert, either. :-)
MrSpeed wrote on 6/14/2004, 11:22 AM
I think what you really need to do is run the audio through a compressor. You want to decrease the dynamic range so the apparent loudness is the same for all the clips. If you use audacity it has a compressor under effects.

If you only have one event on the timeline you can right-click on the sound track and I think there is an option to edit a copy in your default sound editor.

If you have multiple events you need to render audio only: Make Movie / Save it to your hard drive / Advanced Render / Save as type: Wave (Microsoft) (*.wav). This will let you create a .wav file

I would try something like a threshold of -12db with a ratio of 3:1 or 4:1 You may need to go to a higher ratio for voice only, anything up to 10:1 is considered soft compression. Sometimes you need to examine the wave file to determine the best settings and let your ears be a guide.

Make sure you have the "Apply gain after compressing" checkbox checked. If you don't use audacity thne make sure you normalize after the compressing to bring the overall db's up again.

After you're done you simply import the new wav file onto the timeline or create takes.
Hartmanfx wrote on 6/14/2004, 5:12 PM
Thanks! At least I have a direction to go now, I really appreciate the detailed instructions. I was a little scared but now I'll give Audacity a try - at worst I may learn something (which is never bad).

Like I said in my post, audio is my weak point and unfortunately the manual doesn't go into detail about much.

I did try (in MS3) right clicking each audio clip and "normalize" then adjusting each clip with the bar thingy (what a pain in the neck - over a hundred clips) but I'm not sure that was the correct solution, but it did sound a little better.

I'll try learning Audacity and see what that does.

Thanks again... and have a great week!

Steve Hartman