How to increase volume on a clip?

hbwerner wrote on 11/27/2003, 9:40 AM
I edit movies from my DV camera, and sometimes I want to increase the sound volume for a particular clip above the origional. I can use the blue line to decrease the volume of a clip but not increase. The sound adjustments in the track headers can increase the volume, but for the entire time line and not a clip. I have Screenblast MovieStudio 3.0

Comments

IanG wrote on 11/27/2003, 10:50 AM
The volume envelope does allow you to increase the volume, but only by a few dB. You can play games with volume envelopes and the volume controls, but that's going to be a real pain if you have more than a few clips. You could try getting a copy of Audacity (a free audio editor) defining that as your audio editor in preferences and then using that to boost the volume.

Ian G.
Former user wrote on 11/27/2003, 12:56 PM
You could raise the entire track using the volume at the head, then use the blue envelope to lower back normal for the events you don't want to effect.

Dave T2
Steve Grisetti wrote on 11/28/2003, 6:18 AM
As IanG said, you can use the audio envelopes to just about double the strength of your audio, but don't be afraid to use an outside audio editor. Sonic Foundry's Sound Forge is excellent and easy to use, and GoldWave is also very good (and surprisingly cheap). GoldWave has a fully functional trial version.

When you right-click on your audio on the timeline, you'll see the option to Open in Audio Editor. In your editor, you'll be able to not only increase the volume significantly but also adjust tone, equalize, filter, etc.

The only disadvantage is that, when you're done, it will save this revised audio track as a separate file, which you have to manually place on the timeline and synchronize with the video track (which really isn't that hard).
Chienworks wrote on 11/28/2003, 7:21 AM
If that entire clip is low in volume you could Normalize the audio. This will raise the clip to have the loudest peak reach 0dB. Unfortunately this won't help much if there's even one loud peak way above the rest of the audio in the clip because this peak will be raised to 0dB. But if the clip is low overall Normalizing can help a lot.
hbwerner wrote on 12/1/2003, 4:20 AM
When I try to open an audio editor, I get the message "there is no audio editor specified in preferences". WHen I browse in "audio" under "preferences", there is no options showing. Aren't there any that come with the Screenblast? And I didn't plan to pay $400 for a special sound editor just to boost the volume on a clip. Any alternatives? I did get around it this time by moving the sound clip to another sound track and increasing the track volume, but if I want to do that several times independently I run out of tracks.
Steve Grisetti wrote on 12/1/2003, 6:15 AM
As I said, I know of at least two audio editors that are excellent values.

GoldWave (which can be downloaded as fully-functional shareware) now sells for about $40.

Sound Forge (by Sonic Foundry, makers of MovieStudio) is about $100.

Both are easy to use and very powerful.
IanG wrote on 12/1/2003, 10:14 AM
Or, as I said in an earlier post, have a look at Audacity which does what you want and is free.

Ian G.
hbwerner wrote on 12/3/2003, 5:49 AM
Ian - Thanks for the reminder. I did come across your earlier not, downloaded it, and it does the trick and more. I'm surprised it's free!
Bryan
rdavis01 wrote on 12/3/2003, 6:36 AM
How does one "normalize the audio"?
IanG wrote on 12/3/2003, 11:22 AM
Select the audio clips you want to change and right click on one. "Normalize" is an option under "Switches".

Ian G.