Working with audio

[TouchEverything]

So this is my issue. Audio.
(I had only experienced working in projects where the audio is given to me and now that I'm finally working on my project, I'm really sure how to approach it..

My main issue working with audio is timing and spacing. To me it's trail and error. But nothing but errors.

Example: I'm not animating this... I really don't care if you think this is awful writing or dumb.
:Matt: Watch your step!
:Mott: Whut...
:Mott trips, and then begins to look at matt with a face of betrayal. Mott than dies.
:Matt cries
:Matt: long... Long live the king.

The thing I have trouble with is the line 'wut', 'long live the king' and everything in between. Everything I try seems natural and very robotic. Unrealistic sound cues ect

My way is this:
Using audacity try placing them as best as I could without using effects(because that makes it EVEN WORSE) till I get a result. I go back in to the animation program to fix what I could(story board) but the audio always throws me off?

So what are your ways going about this as PAINLESSLY as possible.

[Celshaded]

I'm not exactly sure what it is that you're asking, but I'll try and help since I use Audacity too;

First, if you can help it you always want to be using wav files instead of mp3 files. I don't know if you're the one doing the recording but you can just break the lines up into depending on how you want your pauses. So for example if you were going to have someone sneeze, "ahh...ahhh.......ACHOO!", the ahh's would be one file, and then the ACHOO would be another file.

Also, make sure that you have your audio publish settings in Flash set to "mp3" and whatever the highest bitrate is (I forget what it is) and uncheck the 'convert to mono'.

Also, when you import your sounds to the timeline, go to properties and set them to "stream" so you can scrub them in the timeline and they don't keep playing forever.

Hope this helps you out.

[TouchEverything]

At 5/18/14 01:48 AM, Celshaded wrote: I'm not exactly sure what it is that you're asking, but I'll try and help since I use Audacity too;

First, if you can help it you always want to be using wav files instead of mp3 files. I don't know if you're the one doing the recording but you can just break the lines up into depending on how you want your pauses. So for example if you were going to have someone sneeze, "ahh...ahhh.......ACHOO!", the ahh's would be one file, and then the ACHOO would be another file.

Also, make sure that you have your audio publish settings in Flash set to "mp3" and whatever the highest bitrate is (I forget what it is) and uncheck the 'convert to mono'.

Also, when you import your sounds to the timeline, go to properties and set them to "stream" so you can scrub them in the timeline and they don't keep playing forever.

Hope this helps you out.

So you import each line singularly? Does that help, doesn't flash crash more frequent?
Because Ive been trying to do every line at once.

*I'm trying to say, how do people do the time and spacing. because lets say foot steps at like... 120bpm
and in my story board I have a person walking from one side of the canvas to the other side. But the person can't make A to be because of the time. so in order to make that work I would need to go back in audacity and re-edit the whole sound file or and one step (FX) at a time which seems pretty difficult and the time line would be clutter. Or is there a simpler way of doing this?

(what you said in Audacity did very much help thanks.)

[Slyhermit]

At 5/16/14 08:11 PM, TouchEverything wrote: So this is my issue. Audio.
(I had only experienced working in projects where the audio is given to me and now that I'm finally working on my project, I'm really sure how to approach it..

My main issue working with audio is timing and spacing. To me it's trail and error. But nothing but errors.

Example: I'm not animating this... I really don't care if you think this is awful writing or dumb.

Matt: Watch your step!
Mott: Whut...
Mott trips, and then begins to look at matt with a face of betrayal. Mott than dies.
Matt cries
Matt: long... Long live the king.

The thing I have trouble with is the line 'wut', 'long live the king' and everything in between. Everything I try seems natural and very robotic. Unrealistic sound cues ect

My way is this:
Using audacity try placing them as best as I could without using effects(because that makes it EVEN WORSE) till I get a result. I go back in to the animation program to fix what I could(story board) but the audio always throws me off?

So what are your ways going about this as PAINLESSLY as possible.

Ive been there. I was working on a series 3 years ago and I had friends over to do the V.O. that I couldn't do myself. Lets just say it didnt turn out so well and I decided to squash the project. I realized that it wasnt the equipment or my editing... It was a combination of the lack of talent from the actors and my own writing that made it sound lifeless and robotic. They weren't trained actors so looking back, I dont know why I expected so much from them. Maybe its your actors, or maybe its your writing or lack of direction to your voice actors. I don't know, but something to think about.

[TouchEverything]

At 5/19/14 04:00 AM, Slyhermit wrote:

At 5/16/14 08:11 PM, TouchEverything wrote: So this is my issue. Audio.
(I had only experienced working in projects where the audio is given to me and now that I'm finally working on my project, I'm really sure how to approach it..

My main issue working with audio is timing and spacing. To me it's trail and error. But nothing but errors.

Example: I'm not animating this... I really don't care if you think this is awful writing or dumb.

Matt: Watch your step!
Mott: Whut...
Mott trips, and then begins to look at matt with a face of betrayal. Mott than dies.
Matt cries
Matt: long... Long live the king.

The thing I have trouble with is the line 'wut', 'long live the king' and everything in between. Everything I try seems natural and very robotic. Unrealistic sound cues ect

My way is this:
Using audacity try placing them as best as I could without using effects(because that makes it EVEN WORSE) till I get a result. I go back in to the animation program to fix what I could(story board) but the audio always throws me off?

So what are your ways going about this as PAINLESSLY as possible.

Ive been there. I was working on a series 3 years ago and I had friends over to do the V.O. that I couldn't do myself. Lets just say it didnt turn out so well and I decided to squash the project. I realized that it wasnt the equipment or my editing... It was a combination of the lack of talent from the actors and my own writing that made it sound lifeless and robotic. They weren't trained actors so looking back, I dont know why I expected so much from them. Maybe its your actors, or maybe its your writing or lack of direction to your voice actors. I don't know, but something to think about.

I think I found my issue, however flash has never crashed so hard. But I guess its pretty worth it in the end.
What I have been doing is (A man walks from a to b and on b he says the line "Good", but that walk would be cut so short the voices would be next to each other leaving no space for action.) I found out it's MUCH better to not take the script as a bible and kind of build from it. And doing that is by using each line within flash and not use audacity to guess the time and spacing. (I was guessing, making it really robotic, not saying I'm a robot.)