Blog Archives

The difference between a fantastic piece of music and a mediocre one often has nothing to do with the actual melody or music itself. Often, one music tracks sounds much better than another simply because it has a professional final mix while the other has been sloppily recorded and thrown together without skill or experience. Creating a great mix is simply a matter of knowing what to do and the following tips will assist.

In order to record sound effects for a personal or professional sound effect library one first needs a quality recorder. Personally I’ve tried all sorts of pricey gear and microphones throughout my sonic adventures only to discover that a solid $150 to $400 handheld digital recorder no larger than an old-school cassette tape box suffices to create sounds good enough for placement in any Film, TV, and media project. In addition, these units run on battery power and the recorded files can be dragged onto your desktop via USB.

The audio side of video is often not well recorded due to small production budgets and short time frames. Therefore, during post-production, producers can be assaulted by a series of previous sonic missteps. An annoying rumble or hum in the low end is a common problem in audio recorded for video.

Editing your raw audio recordings into professional quality sound effects is the step that takes place after the initial recording period. Hunt down an audio editing software that has eqs, the ability to cut audio, normalization, and fade in/out capabilites. You may use either a freeware readily found online or purchase one of the many digital audio workstations (DAW) available on the web.