What Is a Program I Can Upload Instrumentals to and Add My Voice
The methods below are suitable for producing a podcast of the very mutual type where you talk over a music background or have talk interspersed with music.
This tutorial assumes that you take figured out how to connect your microphone to your computer and get the sound from the microphone into Audacity. If you take non got that far nevertheless, delight read the Your First Recording tutorial first.
 | If you have just fabricated a recording it is strongly recommended to it immediately to WAV or AIFF (ideally to an external drive) as a prophylactic re-create before you first editing the project. |
Introduction
The objective in this tutorial is to record a simple narration, add together some background music, cut the narration to fit the music, lower the volume of the music during the narration, and finally mix and consign the final product.
Give yourself an hour or then to complete this tutorial.
On your showtime attempt:
- do not try to create a masterpiece
- do not work on something critical.
Y'all are learning and experimenting, exploring the many tools Audacity offers you. Exercise not expect to get it perfect the showtime fourth dimension.
It actually does not matter what your narration is almost, and whether you read information technology or ad lib. Information technology also does not matter what the music is, just an instrumental rail is preferable.
| | Save your work often!
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Step 1: Record the narration
Consider where your microphone is going to be in relation to everything else in the room. Try to place it so that it picks up a minimum of estimator racket (hard drives, fan). When speaking into the microphone, point the microphone at your mouth but do non bespeak your oral fissure at the microphone. If yous can, place the microphone so that you are talking by it - retrieve David Letterman and that microphone he has on his desk: he's always talking over it. Setting up the microphone so that information technology is level with your mouth merely a little off to the side also works. This avoids "popped p'due south" and other breath furnishings from ruining your recording. Finally, try to set up the microphone so that information technology is 4 to 6 inches away from your mouth.
While you are talking, try to keep looking in one direction - moving your head left or right, up or down, while you are talking will change the tonal quality of your vox, and may be distracting to your listeners. Speak in a normal, conversational tone of voice, only also speak clearly and verbalize carefully. Your listeners cannot meet y'all and so do not take the visual cues they would have if your were speaking to them in person.
If you need to listen to the groundwork while recording your narration (for instance to record a commentary), you lot should:
- make sure that is checked
- utilize headphones (to mind to the background track) so that your microphone will pick upwardly only your voice.
If yous do not demand to hear yourself in the headphones you can continue with this tutorial. Otherwise please read the tutorial on overdubbing for details on how to ready upwards Audacity so yous can hear both the background track and yourself in your headphones.
If you are overdubbing your narration sure parts of the work period presented below will change or be eliminated. For example: your first step will exist to import the audio that you will be recording your narration against; you will not demand to cut the narration to fit the background runway.
So let the states begin ...
Showtime Audacity: a new untitled project window opens. Click on or and name your project.
Gear up the recording device to your microphone in Audacity'southward Device Toolbar (or on Mac, set the microphone equally the default recording source in Apple Audio MIDI Setup).
Y'all are now ready to record the narration. Do non worry most mistakes, pauses, coughs and similar - we can edit those out later. In fact you may want to make a few deliberate mistakes so y'all can practice editing them out later. When you stop to make a correction, get back to the start of a natural suspension - sentence or phrase - and start again in a normal phonation: once yous accept tried to edit out your mistakes y'all will realize the importance of this.
Click the Record button 
in the Ship Toolbar. Record your narration.
| | If you have just made a recording it is strongly recommended to information technology immediately to WAV or AIFF (ideally to an external drive) as a safety copy earlier you lot start editing the project. |
To be really professional, perform a level test of your voice before it is recorded for existent. Click on the downwardly pointing arrow in the Recording Meter and click "Start Monitoring". While speaking into the microphone every bit loudly as y'all intend, adjust the recording level slider (by the microphone symbol) on the Mixer Toolbar so the Recording Meter is almost reaching the far right-mitt side (but non far enough to bring the red clip lights on). If the Recording Meter is not visible, click on and enable the Meter Toolbar
Step 2: Edit the narration
Cutting out the mistakes
Do not edit too tightly - the last result should audio natural. Employ Audacity'southward Cut Preview characteristic to hear how each edit will sound earlier you make the edit. Then listen back to each edit - undo and try again if it does not sound natural.
The image below shows a state of affairs where the speaker paused, cleared his throat and continued with the next judgement. We want to take out the pharynx-clearing plus enough space around information technology to arrive sound natural.
Equally y'all tin can see, the portion to be removed is selected. Printing the C fundamental to hear ii seconds of audio before, and one second of audio afterwards the selection - this lets you lot hear what information technology will sound similar after the selection is deleted. This is called "Cut Preview". Adapt the length of the selection until the edit sounds natural. Various ways to adjust a selection were discussed in the Editing an Existing Audio File tutorial. When you are happy with the selection, press the Delete key, choose or press Ctrl + Thou to delete the choice.
If you want to hear more than two seconds before or 1 second after the pick choose (on Mac information technology is ), select the Playback section, and in the Cut Preview department set the "Preview Before Cutting Region" and "Preview Subsequently Cut Region" times to your liking.
Continue in this manner correcting the mistakes until you are satisfied with the end result.
Salvage your work.
Leveling out the volume
Unless you are professional person narrator or voice-over specialist there are probably level (volume) variations during your narration. Call up, your listeners cannot see y'all, then having a consistent volume for your narration is of import and then they will be able to hear and sympathise everything you are proverb.
You could get through and manually suit the volume throughout your narration rail using the Envelope Tool, but there'south an easier way - use Audacity's born Compressor event. Click on the Track Control Panel of your narration track to select the entire track so choose . The Compressor is a complex but very useful effect, then let's have a moment to see how it works.
The Compressor upshot works by making the loud parts quieter, then amplifying everything, which ends upwardly making the quiet parts louder.
Click the push button and let Compressor do its work. Listen dorsum to the result.
- Are the serenity parts notwithstanding also repose? Choose and try again with a Threshold setting of -18 dB.
- Does your phonation sound unnaturally squashed? Undo and try again with a Threshold setting of -vi dB.
Notation that once you have gone through setting everything up the first time, on subsequent tries yous just change the Threshold. This make it easy to dwelling in on the setting that works.
When y'all take your narration edited to your liking, be certain to relieve your project. Now it is fourth dimension to add together the music.
Step 3: Import the background music file
Choose and open up the background music file you lot accept called for the projection. Audacity imports the music file into your project and puts it in its ain stereo rail.
You tin can import music from a CD into Brazenness for the podcast but it should not exist recorded equally it plays every bit that is tiresome and inaccurate. Instead, extract (rip) the audio from the CD to a WAV or AIFF audio file and import that sound file into Audacity. See this tutorial for details.
It is also possible to record the music from records or cassettes (see the tutorial Copying tapes, LPs or MiniDiscs to CD) or whatsoever audio that plays on the computer (on Windows or Linux) and tape it into Brazenness - encounter Recording audio playing on the calculator.
Click the Skip to Start button 
on the Transport Toolbar, then click the Play push button 
. Note that Brazenness automatically mixes the music and narration for you. Click the Finish push 
when you have heard enough.
Wait at the Rails Control Panel at the left of each track. Note the "Mute" and "Solo" buttons. You tin use these to command which tracks yous hear when you lot click the Play button. Clicking the "Mute" push button will plow that track off - it volition not be included in the mix when you press the Play button. Clicking the "Solo" button will crusade only that rails to be heard when you press the Play button. The exact behavior of the Solo button tin can be set in the Tracks Preferences console.
Pace 4: Moving the tracks
Y'all can move clips with the clip handles at the elevation of the clip, where the clip name can also exist found:
The Brazenness Tracks and Clips has more details on the process.
Cut the Narration Track
Start by clicking the "Solo" push button on the narration runway - we do not want to listen to the music track while nosotros are doing this work on the narration track.
For the purposes of this tutorial we will presume that we want to cutting the narration into three separate segments. Each of these segments will brainstorm when the music makes a dramatic change.
Find the spot between the starting time and 2nd portions of the narration. Using the Option Tool click at this point. Cull - a split line appears. There are now ii clips on the narration rails. Similarly, put a dissever point between the second and third portions of the narration. The narration track will now look something like this:
Marking the places in the groundwork music track where you desire the narration clips to start
Remember, our goal is to cut the narration to fit the music. So our side by side footstep is to pick the spots in the background music track where we want the three narration clips to start
Click the "Solo" button on the narration track to turn off the Solo function on that track. Click the "Solo" button on the groundwork music track so yous will merely hear that track.
Identify the signal in the background music rails where yous desire the narration to begin. Click at that point with the Selection Tool. Choose . Blazon a name for the label, for case "Kickoff Narration".
Similarly, identify the points in the background music track where you want the second and 3rd narration clips to begin, and create labels at those points. Your project window should expect something like this:
Moving the clips to piece of work with the music
Click the button on the background music track to turn off the Solo function on that track, and so we tin can hear both the narration and music tracks.
Drag the third narration clip using the clip handles so that the start of the clip lines upward with the tertiary label. Brazenness will help you line this upwardly perfectly - when the get-go of the clip lines up with the third label a yellow Boundary Snap Guide will low-cal up. Similarly, drag the second narration clip to line up with the 2nd characterization, and drag the first narration clip to line up with the offset label. Your project window should now look something like this:
Step 5: Accommodate relative volume levels
Yous now accept the narration clips where you want them. Information technology is at present time to adapt the volume of the background music so your listeners tin can hear what you are saying. There are at least two ways to practice this: manually with the Envelope Tool, or automatically with the Auto Duck consequence.
Using the Envelope Tool
Details on how to use the Envelope Tool are hither. You may want to read that page before standing.
Zoom in on the beginning narration clip. A quick way to do this is: double-click on the first narration clip; cull ; then choose Select the Envelope Tool 
from the Tools Toolbar. In the music track, click to create a control point a 2nd or so before the first narration prune begins. Click to create a second command betoken just every bit the narration starts. Elevate the 2nd control signal down to reduce the volume of the music runway. Click in the Timeline a few seconds before the offset of the beginning narration clip to hear the outcome. Press Infinite to stop playback. Adjust the first and 2d control points to get the length and depth of the fade you lot desire. In a similar fashion create the fade upwardly at the cease of the kickoff narration clip.
You could go on in this manner doing the fades on the music rail for each clip in the narration track. Or you could try using the Auto Duck effect. The reward of using the Envelope tool is that you can always go back and change the fades. Auto Duck, being an effect, permanently alters the music track.
Step 6: Smooth fade of the groundwork music
Unless y'all are very lucky (or accept planned very, very well), the music probably goes on for some time later on the narration is finished. In this case you volition desire to fade out the music. Determine how long you lot want the music to go along a full volume after the narration has finished, and how long you want it to accept to fade out.
Using the Selection Tool, click in the music rails at the betoken where you want the music to be completely faded out. Cull . Press the Delete key. Now click at the point where you want the music to brainstorm fading out. Again choose , then Choose .
Pace 7: Check your mix
If you maximized the book of your narration rail back in Step 2 there is a good take chances that when you mix it with the music rail the resulting mix will be too loud and cause clipping - this is a bad matter. Remember, we maximized the volume and leveled out the loud and soft passages and then that people would be able to hear you. To check for clipping, play dorsum a brusk portion of the project where there is narration and background music. Spotter the Playback Meter - if clipping occurs the red "clip bars" will announced at the right-mitt end of the Playback Meter. If this happens, utilise the Track Gain Slider to turn downward the volume of both the narration and music tracks to -ii dB. Heed to the short section again and await for the red clip bars on the Playback Meter. If clipping still occurs, turn down the book of the narration and music tracks to -four dB each.
Step 8: Relieve and Consign
The control just saves the Audacity project. You demand to [Export Audio|Export]] your projection in order to use information technology with other audio applications. When you lot export your project, Audacity automatically mixes it, then the exported file sounds merely like what you hear when you click the Play button.
Make sure there are no unwanted bits of audio far along the time line or your exported file will be unexpectedly long! Click on the Fit to Width button 
in the Edit Toolbar. If the expected length of your final mix is displayed in the window, all is fine. If the displayed time line is much longer than your actual production, look for the unwanted bits of audio and delete them. You may need to click just past the existent end of your narration/music and delete everything from there to the stop of the rails(due south).
Audacity can consign in a multifariousness of formats. The ii virtually commonly used are MP3 (for podcasts and similar) and WAV (for burning to CD).
Optional - Mix and Render
You may want to Mix and Render your project before you consign it. The Mix and Render command (in the Tracks bill of fare) volition mix your project, and put the resulting mix in a new rail (this is the "render" portion of the command). This gives you the opportunity to maximize the volume of the final mix, and do a final check for clipping. If you would like to try this, follow these steps:
- Choose
- Mix and Render only mixes the selected tracks - you want to mix all of them
- Choose
- your project is mixed into a new stereo track and the previous, split up tracks are deleted
- Choose
- The Bear witness Clipping command will put red vertical bars anywhere clipping has occurred in your track. If whatsoever red confined appear, cull and go back to Stride 7.
If no clipping was detected, proceed:
- Click in the Track Control Console of the newly-created track
- Choose
- accept the default values and click the button.
- the volume of your final mix is maximized.
You exported a projection in a previous tutorial. If y'all need a refresher on how the Export Audio works, that information is on the Export Audio Dialog page.
Congratulations, your narration over groundwork music is now ready to share with the earth.
Stride 9: Backup
Fill-in your exported WAV or MP3 files - you do non want to lose all that valuable work and have to do it all over over again, do you? Computer hard drives can fail, destroying all data.
Ideally use a dedicated bulldoze (one+ TB external drives are user-friendly and economical), or upload to an online (cloud) storage service, to store the WAVs or MP3s. Meliorate nonetheless is to make ii copies on unlike external devices and even meliorate is to concur an off-site backup
Publishing your Podcast
Publishing your Audacity-created podcast on the Internet is in some ways the most important stage of all. Unless you podcast purely to entertain yourself, you lot want others to hear what you have to say. Much useful communication on how and where to host your podcasts, how to ready RSS feeds and how to publicize your work can be found in the Wiki Tutorial "How to publish a Podcast".
Farther reading
The following volume on Podcasting was written by one of the co-founders and developers of Audacity:
- Podcasting with Audacity - Purchasable e-book (PDF download or view online) written in 2007 by Dominic Mazzoni and Scott Granneman
Where to get from here
For more data
- How the Solo push works: Audio Tracks, Tracks Behaviors Preferences
- Moving clips: Audacity Tracks and Clips
- Using the Envelope Tool: Envelope Tool
- Using Labels: Label Tracks
- The Compressor issue: Compressor
- The Auto Duck effect: Motorcar Duck
- The Mix and Render command: Tracks > Mix and Render
Source: https://manual.audacityteam.org/man/tutorial_mixing_a_narration_with_background_music.html
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