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Friday, September 18, 2009

Demonstration: Editing an Audio File. Podcasting for E-Learning

Today's post is a demonstration describing how to edit an audio file using the Audacity open-source non-linear sound editor.

Click on the play button on the YouTube video to view the demo at 240x320 size (which will give you an overview of the editing techniques I'm using), or click here to view the demo(1024x768, broadband connection recommended) to see the editing techniques in detail. The demo is about six minutes in duration, and requires Flash Player version 7 or better.

Now, some context: in my previous post in this series about Podcasting for E-Learning, I described the pre-edit stage of post-production.

In that post I discussed audio has been recorded, the master file was saved and imported into your audio editor. Next I described how the sound file was to be “cleaned up” by ensuring the file was:

  1. Topped & tailed
  2. Normalized
  3. NRed
  4. EQed
  5. Saved as an "_edit" version.

Now, you can actually edit the audio content. mhc_elearning_curve_podcast_150x150

Broadly speaking, this means applying edits to remove “umms,” and “ahhs,” coughs, bad (or repeated) takes, clicks, pops, and bangs – there will be many!

Today’s demonstration is a section of the master file from my E-Learning Curve Podcast episode Flash and Captivate. In this section of the narrative, I'm discussing the Flash format and its uses. In the demo I undertake the follow activities:

  1. Open the ‘_edit’ file
  2. Play back the narrative to understand what edits need to be made (the clip is about 15 seconds in duration)
  3. Make a note of the edits to be made (see bullets below)
  4. Use various Audacity controls including the Rewind and Play buttons, Selection, Envelope and Zoom Tools, and the Crossfade Out effect to make edits in the file
  5. Play back the complete narrative with edits implemented (about 13 seconds in duration)
  6. Save the edited file

The master file includes the following elements to be modified or elided:

  • One repeated phrase
  • Two audible inhaled breaths
  • A series of small audible oral clicks
  • One large audible oral click
  • Noise at the end of the clip

More...

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