Advanced Sound Program Use

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Advanced Sound Program Use

I'm not going to get extremely deep into any of these programs. Each one would be a book unto itself. But I'll cover a few more techniques and programs that you may find useful.

Acid, Sound Forge, and Vegas Video are all separate programs made by Sonic Foundry, but they all work well in concert with each other. It is sort of reminiscent of how a graphic designer would use Photoshop and Illustrator.

For instance, you can right-click on a track in Vegas and have the option to open that track in Sound Forge and edit it without even leaving Vegas. Keep in mind that this will be destructive editing; it will overwrite the original track, so you should save backup copies until you become very adept at using it and know exactly what the results of each action will be.

There are other programs like ProTools that are even deeper. I'm not going to go into them other than to mention them. ProTools does most of what Acid, Sound Forge, and Vegas do combined, but it is harder to use. There is a free version of ProTools available at Digidesign.com.

Mastering

You can master a record in Sound Forge. Mastering is the process of taking all the final mixed songs for an album and doing a last bit of fluffing and tweaking to make them perfect. Mastering is often the difference between an amateur sounding record and a professional sounding one. Even something that is recorded really lo-fi sounds more pro after being mastered.

You can add a tiny bit of EQ You can balance the volume level from song to song to make the album a more consistent listening experience. Some people add a tiny bit of compression and a tiny bit of limiting. The default settings for both compression and limiting are pretty darned good, but you can experiment with both if you find it affecting the sound too much or too little.

Figure 12.29. Adding compression in Sound Forge.

Figure 12.30. Compression dialog window in Sound Forge.

Figure 12.31. Adding limiting in Sound Forge.

Note that the drop-down menu here is the Hyperprism DX menu, which is not available in Sound Forge out of the box. Hyperprism DX is a set of third-party plug-ins. More on plug-ins in a moment.

There is some limiting available as a drop-down option from the Compression dialog window, but it is not as robust as the Hyperprism DX plug-in.

Experiment to find the best settings. You might have to do it in sections: Music has different needs than voice, and music with voice has still other needs. There are also presets you might try. For some operations, noise reduction in Sound Forge, for instance, you may need a plug-in. A plug-in is a little add-on program that extends the functionality of another program. Some are made by the same company that makes the main program; some are third-party add-ons.

Figure 12.32. Limiting dialog window in Sound Forge.

NOTE

WITH MASTERING: DON'T OVER DO IT! Too much will ruin the sound, not improve it. Start with very small adjustments and always keep backup copies you can revert to if you fuck it up. Also, as with all audio operations, don't try to do too much in one day. You will get done faster if you go slower sometimes: When you get frustrated, go outside and play in the sun and talk to actual humans . Then come back tomorrow with a fresh set of ears and no frustration.

Noise Reduction

The Sound Forge Noise Reduction plug-in can work wonders, but using this utility takes some experience and skill. Otherwise it makes your program material sound overprocessed. My friend Adam Hauck recently sent me some music taken off of one of my records, and I e-mailed him back and said "You're using too much Sound Forge Noise Reduction plug-in. He wrote back "How the heck did you know? I'm downright baffled."

Basically, I said "Because I have it, I've used it, and I've decided not to use it much. Most of the time when I use it, it sounds like there are robots whispering under the music." I used a little too much on the Maggie Estep interview on the D.I.Y. DVD, for example.

Actually, in the hands of a skilled pro, it can work wonders. I had a friend in San Fran who was making a good bit of scratch restoring bootleg tapes of sixties hip-pie music live shows for some bootleg record producer. You really have to work with it, though. It tends to work really well on constant sounds like motor or electrical hum and really poorly on non-constant sounds, like wind.

After you install the plug-in, (there is a demo on the CD) it will appear in one of the Direct-X drop-down menus in Sound Forge ( alphabetically as Sonic Foundry Noise Reduction).

You open it while you already have a file open, check the Capture noiseprint checkbox (near the bottom left of the Noise-Reduction plug-in dialog box), and you find a place in the file with no music or talking, and hold the mouse down and drag across the wave form to highlight and sample a short bit of silence by hitting the Preview button.

Figure 12.33. Opening the Noise-Reduction plug-in in Sound Forge.

Figure 12.34. Noise-Reduction plug-in dialog box.

Figure 12.35. Capture Noiseprint pane of Noise-Reduction plug-in dialog box.

A quarter-second to two seconds is good. It takes a noiseprint of the background noise in that selection. Then you Save As and name it (you might want to use the same preset again) (see Figure 12.36).

Figure 12.36. Saving noiseprint settings.

Then close the plug-in, deselect the silent part, and click anywhere in the file. Reopen the plug-in, and click OK to apply it to the whole file.

You can control the amount of noise reduction with the Reduce Noise By slider at the top of the Noiseprint pane. Too little, and it doesn't do much. Too much, and you get the "whispering robot" digital artifacts. Experiment until you find the right amount.

Pitch Change

You can change the pitch of a file in Sound Forge (Effects/Pitch/Shift). (See Figures 12.37 and 12.38.) Note that the Set the Sample Rate Only box must be checked.

Figure 12.37. Opening the Pitch/Shift dialog box.

Figure 12.38. Pitch/Shift dialog box.

Usually bringing it up or down 2 semitones (use the slider, or type 2 for up and -2 for down) will correct this when going from 44.1k to 48k or vice versa.

Experiment with the right number of semitones to raise or lower until it sounds like it did before resampling. Be sure to save a copy of the original file to revert to, especially if resampling and shifting changes the file length, which it sometimes does. This may or may not matter, depending on what you're doing with it. It won't be by much. It will probably only matter if you need to synch it up to existing audio or video files.

You can see the exact length of a file, as well as the sampling rate, file size, and other properties in Sound Forge by looking in the bottom right corner of the main display in Sound Forge.

Figure 12.39. The Properties display in the bottom right corner of Sound Forge.

Making Audio Loops in Sound Forge

As we've seen, loops are good for importing into other programs like Acid. You can then construct rhythms and soundtracks out of them by combining other sounds.

In Sound Forge, select part of the waveform by holding down your mouse cursor and moving it along the file.

Figure 12.40. Select part of the waveform.

Figure 12.41. Sound Forge's Loop Tool button. Loop tool button

Click the Loop button, and move the mouse curser back and forth while holding down the left mouse button. Play around until you find a section that loops well. Then copy that section to a new file and save.

This is how I did the looping menu audio backgrounds for the D.I.Y. DVD menus and the "Acid files" on the CD used in the tutorial at the beginning of this chapter. You can also make drum loops from drum parts on records.

Video in Sound Forge

You can open a video file in Sound Forge and in Acid; it's just like opening an audio file. You can't do much to edit the video, but you can edit the audio and then resave it. The video will display key frames at the top of the window so you can follow where the video is in relation to the audio.

Multitracking in Vegas

Vegas Video is an NLE (non-linear editing) video editing system that also supports multitracking audio capabilities. You can record a whole band one instrument at a time. Or bring in existing files and add vocals.

Figure 12.42. A Quicktime file of director Burke Roberts opened up in Sound Forge.

Figure 12.43. Vegas interface. Stop Record button Timecode window Mute button on original vocal Scribble strip Arm for Record button

Vegas Video can be used for editing video, audio, or both at the same time. The audio portion is easy to use, with a very intuitive interface. Basically, the audio portion has all the tools that you would have on an analog multi-track recorder combined with a mixing board. Vegas Video just adds an extra line to the timeline and two editing windows , just like any other NLE system.

Figure 12.44. Inserting a new audio track in Vegas.

Add a new audio track and name it by double-clicking on the scribble strip (see Figure 12.45) and typing a descriptive name (like "Squawk 2").

Figure 12.45. Adding an audio track in Vegas Video.

Click the red Arm for Record button (see Figure 12.46).

Figure 12.46. Click the red Arm for Record button.

Vegas will ask you where to save the file. Pick a location from the Browse button and name the file.

Figure 12.47. Pick a location and name the file.

When you are ready to record, you still need to set the audio levels. Have your subject speak into the microphone while you watch the meters where it says Master. You want to have the average rate come as close to going into the red without going up into the red very often. Red means clipping (distortion). You don't want distortion. Conversely, if it's too far below the red, you don't have a high enough signal-to-noise ratio, which will result in poor sound.

When you get a good level, hit the red Record button and have the singer sing (or guitarist play, or whatever). As with hardware recording, it's best to start with drums, or at least a click track if you're recording one instrument at a time.

NOTE

If you get a multi-track soundcardabout $150 to $1000; at least $300 for a good oneyou can record the whole band on separate tracks at the same time. Get one that's at least 20-bit and has a breakout box.

The singer will also be able to hear any previously recorded audio on the other tracks in the headphones unless you press the Mute button on that track. In that case, he'll hear only the new music as he records it. You can build a whole band one track at a time this way.

When you are done recording, click Stop. A dialog box will appear, and you can save the new take (see Figures 12.48 and 12.49).

Figure 12.48. New track of music.

Figure 12.49. Save Take dialog box.

If you don't like it, you don't need to save it. Click Done to save (see Figure 12.49).

Then you can mix and replace between the old and new vocal take and export to a new track. You can try as often as you need and save the new takes or record over them.

You can use the numbers in the Timecode window to mark a particular part so you can come back to it exactly.

Figure 12.50. Timecode indicator in Vegas.

Timecode is a way for finding specific points in an audio or video timeline. It consists of hours, minutes, seconds, and frames (resets at 30; it's a video thing), separated by semicolons. This:

00:04:28:21

means that the point where the cursor rests in the timeline at that instant is zero hours, four minutes, twenty-eight seconds, and twenty-one frames from the beginning of the song.

NOTE

You can download Vegas Video 3.0 LE, a free, working lite version. It has four tracks of audio, and you can bounce one track to another.

They move the download page sometimes, so search "Vegas Video 3.0 LE, a free" on Google.

Vegas Video 3.0 LE also comes with Sound Forge in some cases.

Mixing in Vegas

To mix down your song, change the settings of the track volume and track pan for each track until you have a good balance that you like. Then go to File/Render As and pick the wave format default (unless you want to export as one of the compressed formats from the drop-down menu). Hit Save and it will render.

Figure 12.51. Rendering in Vegas.

Figure 12.52. More rendering in Vegas.

Recording in Acid

You can also multi-track in Acid. It's not as robust for this as Vegas, but the interface and process are almost identical. The above info will work for Acid, except that you needn't create a new audio track. Just hit the red Record button, and a new track will automatically be created.

Figure 12.53. Record button in Acid.

Pro Tools

I'm not offering a tutorial of ProTools because they did not respond to my request for a working copy of the program to review, and their free version runs on just about every operating system in use except mine (Windows 2000 Professional the BEST OS for media production, hands down .

But all these programs, even from different companies, have very similar actions and interfaces. The ProTools Web site, www.protools.com, offers a free working version (and a downloadable manual!) that is limited to eight tracks. But you can still bounce several tracks down to one or two to free up more virtual tracks, just like you can do on a hardware four-track or eight-track recorder. This is very in keeping with the $30 Way and is also a good alternative to bootlegging the programs we mention here, no matter how easy it is to bootleg them. Nod nod, wink wink.

NOTE

A lot of times, when you go to type in the serial number to register a piece of software, you'll have the issue of "Is that a zero or the letter 'O'?" They do look a lot alike, but in my experience, it's always a zero. I've never found a letter O in a serial number yet.

A call to programmers: Go one further and eliminate zeros from serial numbers. Installing your damn software is time consuming enough without the extra confusion.

FL Studio

FL Studio (formerly Fruity Loops) from Image Line Software is a pretty amazing piece of software. People with no musical experience can do sequencing and looping and produce pretty robust pieces of music in minutes. People with musical experience can create masterpieces with it.

The full product, FL Studio Fruityloops, is available for $99 from www.Flstudio.com. Their e-mail is [e-mail].

It is especially well suited to producing electronica and dance music and industrial, but with a little finesse, can produce mellower trippy very rhythmic backings for hip-hop, trip-hop, rock, jazz, in short, anything.

This is a very deep program. We'll just get you started and let you see how to do a simple beat (that you could then import into any other program to record over top of) to inspire you. Then you can run with it from there.

The Web site contains a demo, but the Save function is disabled.

Try to get a full version somehow.

Begin by opening the program. Close the demo that automatically opens. Hit File/New to open a new project. Go under File/Templates and pick a drum machine emulator. I've picked the old reliable 808 (simulating a Roland 808 analog drum machine).

Figure 12.54. Pick a drum template.

What looks like a switchboard will pop up. Make sure you are in pattern mode (pat) not song mode (song) and that pattern 1 is lit up on the pattern number chooser. If these aren't showing that value, click once on the buttons until they are.

Figure 12.55. Drum emulator switchboard in FL Studio. Volume Pitch Mode indicator Tempo Pattern number chooser

Notice the sliders at the top to change the pitch of the project. And you can right-click on the tempo display to change the tempo options.

Figure 12.56. Right-click tempo numbers to change tempo.

Click on various squares in the switchboard to enable that tone and beat to activate. Left-clicking a square adds the tone there; right-clicking removes it. Then hit the spacebar to play what you've got. Hitting the spacebar again will stop playback. You can turn a track off by clicking the little green button on the far left of the track.

The horizontal rows represent different components of the beat. Left-to-right represents time. The whole sequence, left to right, represents one measure.

Experiment with different combinations. When you get one you like the sound of, hit Save and go on to define your number two pattern. Click the pattern number chooser over to 2, and start over.

Figure 12.57. Pattern number chooser set to 2.

This time, click the little icon near the upper-right corner that says PR to reveal the piano roll. This will allow you to assign actual notes to different voices.

Figure 12.58. Piano roll.

Click some different patterns on the switchboard and also on the piano roll and hit the spacebar. Make changes until you're happy and move on to define pattern three. You can choose which voicing is controlled by the piano roll by right-clicking on that voice name in the switchboard and then hitting Send to Piano Roll from under the right-click menu.

A very useful technique is to copy one pattern to another and then make small variations in the new pattern. Copying makes it so you don't have to reinvent the mousetrap each time. To copy a pattern:

Figure 12.59. VT_SD enabled to send to piano roll.

Hold your mouse down and scroll down this row of green buttons until they are all lit up.

Figure 12.60. Light up this row of green buttons.

Then click anywhere on the pattern switchboard and press Ctrl + C to copy. Enable a new pattern number, click anywhere in that pattern switchboard, and press Ctrl + V to paste it in. Then alter as needed.

Repeat all these above steps until you have six or more patterns defined.

Then click over to Song mode on the mode picker and start stringing these patterns into songs.

Hit the button near the upper-right corner labeled PL to reveal the playlist.

Figure 12.61. Playlist revealed.

Now you are using the patterns you created previously to string together into longer units that will be used as the basis for songs. Try to hear the other instruments over the top of them as you are going along, and remember the basic precepts and tenets of good songwriting we learned earlier, particularly finding a good balance between repetition and variation, and building and releasing tension as you go.

Note that the metaphor is again time equals left to right, and patterns equal up and down. Also note that you can have more than one pattern play at a time.

Left-clicking a square adds the pattern there, right-clicking removes it.

Play and change until you're happy. When you're happy, save the song, then export by going to File/Export Wave and then hit Go in the bottom right of the dialog box to render.

Figure 12.62. Exporting the final song in FL Studio.

Figure 12.63. Hit Go to render.

In the Noises folder of the CD, I've included the final mixed version, meow_rendered_from_FL_studio.wav. Also there is Skinny_dippin_in_the_Gulf_with_ my_Tiff_Kitty.wav. It's kinda cool. (Both are used as background music on "I Left My Band In San Francisco" on the CD.)

My forte is rock instruments, not electronic compositions. There's a very good chance you'll be making stuff much cooler than these two humble efforts within very little time of working in this program.

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