Sound editing LAB

DAWS
DAW: Digital Audio Workstations are software or hardware programs (sometimes a
combination of the two), designed for recording and producing sound files as well as editing
digital audio.

Cubase Pro
(around £411)

Cubase pro is DAW which serves the purpose of facilitating producers

and musicians with the means to compose, record, mix and edit music
with outstanding audio quality. It isn’t as widely used as some of the
other digital audio workstations in this list, but some users still use it
as it serves its purpose well enough. I would use this DAW for audio
editing as I can effortlessly make timing and pitch perfect as well as
mixing multi-tracks. Although it is somewhat expensive compared to
other DAWs and has been criticized for other reasons, such as not having multitrack elastic
audio editing, having poor track management, no real time clip FX to help edit the audio in
correlation to visuals and having a mixer that doesn’t quite stretch or compromise to the
audio editing. These are some of the reasons which make Cubase Pro significantly less used
and less popular than other DAWs. On the other hand, it does have some useful features such
as a mix console and an integrated high-end channel strip which comes in handy when
editing.

Pro Tools

Pro Tools is another example of a music software for audio editing. It is

compatible for Mac or Windows. I would use this DAW specifically
for sound for picture, as it is very commonly used for that purpose. For
example, for sound design and audio post-production. Some of the cons
to Pro Tools is that it is quite hard to learn to use compared to other
DAWs and therefore making it very hard to get started, especially for
someone who has never used digital audio workstations. Furthermore,
another inconvenience is that it requires using the iLok hardware DRM platform, which
can definitely be inconvenient for some users to acquire. On the other hand, the vast
majority of feedback for Pro Tools is very good as it is considered very professional and
in fact, is a DAW that would be usually found in all professional studios. This is because
it is designed for traditional recording and editing audio in a studio setting and does an
outstanding job at every part of that process. Many users also praise the speed of Pro
Tools whilst working and editing high-quality files.

Logic Pro
(£199.99)
 Logic pro is a very popular digital audio workstation. I would use
it for audio mixing, especially if I don’t have original instrumental
recordings as it includes a great number of software instruments
as well as audio effects for audio editing. In my opinion the
number of pros outweighs the few cons of this DAW, for example
that many consider that moving things around can be somewhat
challenging. Furthermore, it isn’t compatible for Windows, only
for Apple (as it was created by apple), therefore it is only limited
to this platform.

Even with this said, Logic Pro is still considered one of the best digital audio stations for
a great number of reasons. It achieves the perfect balance between ease of use and
functionality. In fact, it has a very straightforward nature due to its user-friendly design
philosophy, making it quite good for beguines or for simply getting started with this
particular DAW. As mentioned before, it has a fantastic music library which is even
varied enough to cover every musical genre. This means that editing together an
original score for any film genre with the support of the royalty-free apple loops
available and music library, would be an easy task. It has really good plugins that
provide all the necessary tools for the sound editing. Lastly, and most importantly, it is
cheaper than other similar DAWs with similar functionalities, therefore it is a good
value for price. It is affordable, yet it can create professional and industry-standard
results.

FL Studio

FL studio is another example of a digital audio workstation or

a complete software music production environment, mainly
used for composing, arranging audio, mastering and mixing
professional quality music. It is very popular around the world
amongst creative artists, but mainly musicians and producers.
In fact, it is a favorite among hip-hop and electronic producers. I
would use for editing or creating original music for a soundtrack,
specially for more EDM/hip-hop or trap focused beats (mostly
used in comedy or action films), as creating background beats of
those genres in FL studio is quite easy and reliable.

Although, it would be harder to edit general sound for a film, such as speech and
background sounds, FL studio has a great variety of sound effects which can be used for
film sound editing. Although some users claim that it is easy for audio tracks to become
unorganized and sometimes it can be hard to set up and arm mixer tracks, this DAW has a
lot of pros, if used for what it is for. For example, it has great interfaces can get the user to
start making beats right away and therefore it is great for beat making as well as loop-
creating. It also provides a lot of sound editing and organizing freedom and comes with
great variety of native plugins which a lot of users consider quite useful. Furthermore,
once you purchase FL studio, it comes with a free lifetime updates to the program,
meaning you won’t every have to pay for the next update of the DAW.
Premiere Pro

Unlike most of the DAWs on this list, Premiere Pro isn’t specifically
made for audio editing and music composing and mixing. Instead it
is more focused on video editing as it is a comprehensive video
editing software used for film, commercials and any other type of
audiovisual content. Therefore, it is great to use for straight-forward
editing pre-existing audio files to go along with visual content, such
as for a film. It is not worth the investment if you only want a DAW
for detailed audio editing or composing alone, especially since it is also somewhat
expensive. Another con for Premiere Pro is that it has resource-intensive requirements,
which may be an inconvenience for some users. Nevertheless, it is conveniently works
with various operating systems such as MacOS and WindowsOS. It is also known for
high quality audiovisual editing as well as high quality exported results in many
formats.

Final Cut Pro

(around £280)

Final cut pro is primarily a video editing application for MacOS

users, similarly to Premiere Pro. Meaning that although you can
do some basic sound edit sound with it, it isn’t as in depth as the
other DAWs with their main focus point being sound editing and
mixing. Therefore, I would use it for the same type of sound
editing, that I would use Premiere Pro for; film, commercials and
any other type of audiovisual content in which both diagetic and
non-diagetic sounds must accompany and be in sync to footage.

This DAW is advanced yet affordable, creating a good balance between quality and cost.
It is also widely used by professionals and many praise it’s non-linear editing which
feels very intuitive, it has also been criticized on a number of aspects regarding sound
editing specifically. For example, clipping correction isn’t really good, and the audio
sometimes can bleed into transitions. It is also somewhat difficult to view audio tracks if
you have multiple channels such as stereo and mono on the timeline, and this is a slight
complication. It is also an overkill for casual users. In conclusion, although it is a great
digital audio workstation, due to the fact it is primarily a video editing application, the
sound editing features are oversimplified and therefore aren’t as robust as the
competition.

Evaluating sound editing techniques and procedures

 Selecting clips:
 In and out:
  Manipulation of volume
 Fades with effects and/or keyframes:
 Raising/lowering gain
 Listening to clips and selecting appropriate ones/removing any errors: (how)

Changing music to change meaning

https://youtu.be/S_kLv2ZrOSI

In this video I show the same scene (final scene for my short movie “Dissimilarity of Mind”)
and change the music of a completely different tone and juxtaposition it with the original
version. This is in order to show how impactful sound editing, specifically with music, can be
in a scene and how much it can change the atmosphere and meaning to the scene.

This scene is supposed to be sad in nature, as the main character leaves the house after
witnessing her father drink and pass out on the floor, and it is insinuated the father is left to
die alone. But regarding the actual visual content of the scene, the atmosphere can be
manipulated into being fun and almost comedic through changing the song through the sound
editing.

How I’ve used sound editing in my work

Teen drama scene

Since my group weren’t quite doing the logging procedures whilst recording, in order to
carefully listen to the quality of the audio and review if there was any errors and omissions,
this problem was dealt later in post-production either during clip selection or through careful
sound editing to fix these small sound problems for that clip.
As we used the same microphone and recoding process for this whole scene, some scenes
came out sounding louder than others. Therefore, this accounted for some review procedures,
in order to check which specific clips containing sound level issues due to poor recording
perhaps, in preparation for the sound editing. Without any audio editing, these changes in
volume would interrupt the continuity of the scene. This is why volume manipulation was
necessary. For example, there are different shots of the shower scene which play next to each
other; as some of these were recorded closer to the shower than others, the difference in
sound level was quite significant. If these two recordings were placed next to each other
without any volume manipulation, it would become disruptive for the audience as it would
not be a smooth sound transition.
When I was editing a section of a TV programme, an important part to making a successful
edit, is making sure that the audio and video tracks are synchronised as this adds to the
continuity, and ensures the footage seems real or believable to the audience. This is in the
case in which I would have to unlink the video to the corresponding audio, in case I needed to
edit the audio somehow, after the audio is edited, it still is synchronised perfectly to the
footage to not interrupt the continuity.
Not all of the original audio is used, in some cases, the audio from the previous or next shot
cuts into the audio for that specific clip (also referred to as L-cuts or J-cuts). For this to be
executed effectively, the audio must be synchronised to the movements or actions on screen.
This requires the audio to be placed very carefully so that the L-cut or J-cut doesn’t eliminate
any speech or important sounds, which can happen if not done carefully.

Teen drama title sequences

Before starting any editing process such as this one, I always ensure I have eliminated the
invalid shots or audio files and place all the final valid footage onto a folder. This is always
followed by the naming of all the files and folders. This is done in order to ensure easy access
and guard against loss of clips. In the case of this small project, since it was a title sequence
formed of random individual shots and there were no scenes, it was easy to name all the
footage and put it into one folder along with the audio clip of the chosen songs.
There was quite a big amount of footage to choose from for this project, as there wasn’t set
shot list of the order and exact shots needed. Therefore, a big part of my process of selecting
clips, was testing which clips went accordingly with the music, therefore revolving my visual
edit to the sound. I believe this was a useful method to use according to the needs of this type
of media project.
The soundtrack for both of the title sequences were way too lengthy for me to use and
therefore I had to cut down the soundtrack songs for both of the title sequences. Furthermore,
in one of the occasions, I decided to cut out a whole section of the song and add the actual
ending to the song, somewhere where it didn’t originally belong in the track, in order to add a
sense of ending to the title sequence. I had to cut into the soundtrack in order to do this and it
had to be cut to a very specific time (on beat) so that this cut would go unnoticed and would
be seaming less to the audience.
Since there was no dialogue in the title sequences, it wasn’t necessary to cut into the
soundtrack to allow any other audio to be heard as music is in most cases the predominant
sound in a title sequences, apart from occasional sound effects as the title appears for
example. Although this wasn’t necessary on my case.
Whilst I was working on Premiere Pro in order to edit these title sequences, I found that using
keyboard shortcuts to carry out some tasks, instead of having to manually do it manually
using the mousepad to find the option to achieve that action, was less time wasting and a lot
easier. For example, when setting in and out points or markers to select a certain section of
the audio to crop it for example, I had to use Ctrl+Shift+I for in and Ctrl+Shift+O for out.
This is just one of the many shortcuts which help sound editing be more time efficient.

 Sound effect like dissolves etc

Sound editing techniques

 Selecting clips to be edited according to the needs of the media project

 Manipulation of volume /
 Use of keyboard shortcuts versus use of mouse, mousepad or trackball /
 Duplication copying and saving
 Use of multiple screen add-ons
 Use of breathing spaces in editing speech, pauses to replicate true essence of
sounds

Sound editing procedures

 Review procedures: Reviewing recorded sound material before editing by listening

to each clip and checking for errors and omissions, sound level issues, faults, poor
recording /
 Logging procedures while recording: Listing each recorded clip and listening good
clips and bad clips with a view to deciding which to use and which to discard /
 Importing into software, pre-recording digital sound clips, e.g. AIFF or WAV
from standalone recorders, use of dedicated MAC editing keyboard
shortcuts, use of mouse over icons /
 Naming of clips and folders: This is done in order to ensure easy access and guard
against loss of clips /
 Dragging or importing of selected clips to audio timeline: This is in readiness
for editing
 Reviewing clips in light of needs of finished product
 Inserting start and finish edit points and deleting unwanted audio
 Merging and repositioning sound bites and edits to make a cohesive single
edited clip: This is in readiness for exporting back to folder bin before use in
mixing finished product
 Using normalizing function to ensure that recorded level of each clip is the
same with respect to full coding point.