Course overview

Skills: simple audio editing, exporting the result, finding free sound effects and musicConcepts: audio editing operations, audio effects, audio utility software, Creative Commons This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License. Editing speech with Audacity1This presentation introduces the user interface of the Audacity audio editor, illustrated with several important editing operations and audio effects.

We will also see how to save projects and export audio files.

These operations and effects are found in other audio editors as well.

While this presentation is sufficient to get you started and do assignments for this class, there are many editing operations and effects that are not covered.

You will have to play around on our own to learn those.Where does this topic fit?Internet conceptsApplicationsTechnologyImplicationsInternet skillsApplication developmentContent creationUser skills2This presentation is concerned with the creation of audio content.

Shift track left/rightZoomSelectMake fine adjustmentsDraw envelope for fadesMulti toolEditing toolsShiftPause/play (selection or entire track)

3You will make use of six editing tools, as shown above.

You select a portion of the audio by dragging the select tool over it like selecting text in a word processor.

You can make fine adjustments to a selection using the left and right arrow keys wile holding the shift or ctrl+shift keys down.

You can zoom in or out using the zoom tool or the zoom tool with the shift key held down.

The two arrow tool allows you to shift a track left or right.

The pencil can be used to make fine adjustments to your recording.

Use the envelope key to specify how quickly a fade should drop off.

The multi tool automatically adjusts its function depending on what you are doing.

Last, but not least, the space bar is handy for pausing and resuming play.

In practice, you will find yourself using the select and zoom keys and the spacebar more than the others.Ctl-z: undo last edit

Ctl-y: redo last undo

Save project (all the history): File > Save

Save audio (several file formats): File > ExportThe rest of this getting started manual4As with many Windows programs, Ctrl-z and Ctrl-y undo and redo any previous steps.

This capability makes experimentation with Audacity safe.

If an experiment accidentally messes up your work, you can undo it.

SelectCut:Ctrl-XRemoving an uhmthen5Here is a simple editing demonstration.

As you see, Audacity displays the current recording in a timeline.

(Other audio and video editors do the same).

One can select, copy, cut, delete, move, and paste sound on the timeline.

These are analogous to the same operations in word processing.

As shown here, I selected the first uhm from the timeline and deleted it by typing control-x.

Zoom in, select, cut and pastePaste:Ctrl-V6Here I zoomed in to have finer control over selection. I selected and cut the b then pasted it at the end.

Audio effects7Audacity includes many audio effects.

The only way to learn what they do is to try them.

Remember that you can undo any change you make so there is no risk in playing around.

Lets look at the Amplify effect as an example.

The amplify effect8Here is an example effect, Amplification.

Like the other effects, it has several parameters which you set in a dialog box.

Note that you can increase or decrease the amplitude of the waveform, thereby increasing or decreasing the volume.

Note also that if you want to increase the volume a lot, you may have to allow clipping.

Finally, you can preview the change from the dialog box before you accept it.

When your editing is complete, you will want to save the project in case you want to make future changes and export the finished audio file.Multiple tracks

You can record multiple tracks with Audacity.

You can record the first track, stop recording, and restart recording again.

If you are playing sound through open speakers, remember to mute the first track when you are recording the second.

You can also import tracks, for example, record a person speaking then add a second music track or import a sound effect to be used in a recording.9

Save projects; export filesWhen you save a project, new audio file is not created.

Instead, your original audio is saved along with a list of every change you have made.

When you reload the file, you can pick up where you left off.

To save a sound file for distribution and sharing, you export it.

In order to export .mp3 files, you will need to download an encoder and configure Audacity to locate it in your computer storage.

There is a link to the encoder and a topic module on configuring Audacity to use it at the end of this presentation.

10Audio utility programs

LevelatorGizmosThere are many utility programs for processing audio data.

For example, Levelator will take a recording with low and high volume passages and adjust them to have relatively uniform volume.

This is just one example and there are many more at Gizmos Best Freeware site an excellent place to find all kinds of free software, including audio utilities.11

http://www.findsounds.com/Would you like to include some sound effects in your project?

You can find a number of sites with sound effects (some free, some not) using Google.

FindSounds is one to start with.

Notice that you can search for sounds in a given format -- .wav, .mp3, etc.

You can also specify minimum quality -- sample rate and sample size (resolution)

http://www.findsounds.com/12

You may also want to include some music, without violating someones copyright.

There are many online collections of free music you can search for them.

One such collection is at the Creative Commons music site.

Many musicians release their music with a creative commons copyright license, which enables you to use it as long as you comply with the license terms.

There are several different Creative Commons licenses.

One allows completely unrestricted use of the material.

Others impose conditions like no commercial use or attribution to the original is required.

There are links to Creative Commons in the resources slide of this presentation.

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Shift track left/rightZoomSelectMake fine adjustmentsDraw envelope for fadesMulti toolSummaryShiftPause/play (selection or entire track)

14We reviewed the functions of the six basic editing tools in audacity and saw a long list of audio effects.

We saw examples using the select and cut operations and the Amplify effect.

We also saw several keyboard shortcuts and the difference between saving a project and exporting an audio file.

This is enough to get you started on simple editing of spoken material.

You will need to explore and test to learn the other operations and effects in Audacity.

There are also links to other tutorial and reference material at the end of this presentation.Self-study questionsWhat is the difference between the Change Speed and Change Tempo effects?

How do you switch from zooming in to zooming out?

What happens if you zoom in repeatedly?

The following are on the Audacity command menu bar. What does each do?

ResourcesAudacity audio recorder and editor: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/Topic module on configuring Audacity to export .mp3 files: http://cis275topics.blogspot.com/2011/03/configure-audacity-to-export-mp3-files.htmlAudacity audio recorder and editor, portable version: http://portableapps.com/apps/music_video/audacity_portableAudacity "how to" videos: http://www.wonderhowto.com/search/audacity/Audacity keyboard shortcuts: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/manual-1.2/keyboard_shortcuts.htmlAudacity how-to presentation: http://pa.gigavox.com/shows/detail1595.htmlAudacity Wiki: http://audacityteam.org/wiki/Audacity threaded discussion forum: http://audacityteam.org/forum/Audacity tutorial (on Mac, but good for Windows too): http://homepage.mac.com/s_sloan/apsc_2007/audacity_jmc.pdfAudacity on del.icio.us: http://del.icio.us/search/?fr=del_icio_us&p=audacity&type=allAudacity tutorials: http://manual.audacityteam.org/index.php?title=TutorialsEditing voice tracks like a pro, Jay Rose: http://www.dplay.com/dv/0104edit/Sound effects you can use: http://www.findsounds.com/Creative Commons licenses: https://creativecommons.org/choose/Creative Commons music: https://creativecommons.org/legalmusicforvideosCreative Commons licensed work: http://search.creativecommons.org/