Final Cut Pro HD | H•O•T Hands-On Training [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

1.

If Final Cut is not running, start it and open Chapter 11 Lesson. It's in the FCP Projects/FCP HOT files folder you created at the beginning of this book.

This Devanas clip shows a weather map, with a meteorologist discussing the upcoming hurricane at a press conference. In point of fact, the commentator is speaking at a press conference from a podium in the same room as the weather map. However, since he is not on camera at this moment, in this effect, you will make him sound like he is moving from a large room to a smaller room.

[View full size image]

2.

Double-click Seq Audio Echo start to open it.

3.

Select the Razor Blade tool (press B) and cut the clip at the marker. Turn on snapping to help align the Razor Blade properly with the marker.

A linked clip is one where the audio and video are synced together. Final Cut indicates this by underlining the clip name in the Timeline. When you use the Razor Blade to cut a linked clip, both the audio and video will be cut, regardless of which side you click with the Razor Blade.

Cutting the clip, to create a Through edit, makes it easy to apply an effect to one portion of a clip, without affecting other parts of the clip.

4.

Select the first portion of the clip and choose Effects > Audio Filters > Final Cut Pro > Reverberation. Double-click the clip to load it into the Viewer and click the Filters tab to make it active.

5.

From the pop-up menu, choose Room (Large).

6.

The settings in the text boxes are a tad, um, aggressive. So, decrease the Effect Mix (the percent of the effect compared to the original source) to 12. An Effect Mix of 0 is no effect, all original source; an Effect Mix of 100 is all effect with no original source. In this case, we want to sense a light flavoring of the room, not drown in it.

If you have good speakers, decrease the Effect Level to 3. If you have small multimedia speakers, leave this at 0, which will make the effect easier to hear. If I were mixing this for real, I'd set it to 3.

Then, increase Brightness to +2. This increases the high frequencies, which are a significant component of echoes, to make them easier to hear.

7.

Play the sequence and hear the transition from large room to small. Again, in this case, there's no justification for the movement, but this does illustrate how to prepare a clip for a filter and how to adjust the filter once it's applied.

You can compare your effect to mine by playing Seq Audio Echoes finished.

8.

Here's another example of using audio filters. Double-click Seq Audio Phone start to open it.

(As usual, it is not a problem to have multiple sequences open at the same time in the Timeline.) In this part of the exercise, you'll create an audio effect to make it sound like the meteorologist is phoning in his report.

9.

Select the Razor Blade tool (press B) and cut the clip at the marker.

In order for this to sound like a phone call, you need to eliminate all frequencies below 350 cycles and above 3500 cycles per second. In fact, to make this effect even more believable, it helps if you cut the low end at 500 and the high end at 2500.

There are several possible filters you could use to limit these frequencies. EQs come first to mind. However, an EQ filter principally enhances or de-emphasizes a range of frequencies. You want to totally eliminate them.

There is no single filter that does this. However, if you use two filters, this becomes very simple.

10.

Double-click the second half of the clip to load it into the Viewer. With the clip still selected, choose Effects > Audio Filters > Final Cut Pro HD > High Pass Filter. Then choose Effects > Audio Filters > Final Cut Pro HD > Low Pass Filter. Finally, click the Filters tab.

11.

See how both filters have been applied to the same clip? You'll work with multiple filters again in Exercise 3.

However, the frequency settings are wrong. You want the High Pass filter to allow (pass) all frequencies above 500 cycles. So, change this setting to 500.

Next, you want the Low Pass filter to pass all frequencies below 2,500 cycles. So, change this setting to 2500.

By the way, the Q represents the amount of feathering in an audio effect. A high Q, greater than 1.0, has very little feathering, and the transition is very sharply defined. A low Q, less than 1.0, has more feathering, which softens the transition into the effect.

12.

Play the sequence. Hear how natural the voice is in the beginning, then, after the cut, how it sounds as if he's on the telephone.

Compare your sequence with mine by playing Seq Audio Phone finished.

13.

As a reminder, to close a sequence in the Timeline,Ctrl+click the tab containing the sequence name and choose Close Tab.

14.

Sometimes, even simple effects can be fun! Save your work, if you want. You are done with audio filters; it's time to move to video.

NOTE | Thoughts on Audio Filters

Audio is one of the things I love, and an area that many video editors have limited experience with. Here is a quick summary of the types of audio filters in Final Cut, along with suggestions on how to use some of them.

There are two sets of filters supplied with Final Cut Pro HD: Apple and Final Cut Pro HD. The differences are that the Apple filters are included with the operating system, but the Final Cut filters are only available to people who own FCP. I tend to use the FCP filters, because I like them better.

The Final Cut audio filters fall into four broad categories:

Equalizers

Repair

Dynamic control

Echo and reverb

Equalizers are designed to alter selected frequencies, either to enhance or eliminate them. The more bands an equalizer has, the more adjustments it can make at one time. Equalizers include 3 Band equalizer, Band Pass filter, High Pass filter (this is the same as the Low Shelf filter), Low Pass filter (the same as the High Shelf filter), and Parametric equalizer. You've already learned how to use the High and Low Pass filters. Try using the Parametric EQ to warm a voice, that is, to enhance the low frequencies. Set it to a Frequency of 300,Q of 1, and Gain of 2.5.

Repair filters are designed to fix problems like hum, or a speaker who is too close to the mic. Repair filters include DC Notch, Hum Remover, Notch, Vocal DeEsser, and Vocal DePopper. Try using the Hum Remover to take out a low hum where power lines are interfering with your audio. Change the Q to 20. Slowly turn on each of the harmonics, one at a time, and listen to your audio to balance between decreasing the hum while causing the least degradation to your dialog.

Dynamic control filters are designed to maximize gain without creating distortion. These filters include Compressor/Limiter and Expander/Noise Gate. I don't particularly like these filters in Final Cut, so I don't have any suggested uses. If I need compression or limiting, which is different than compressing video to go on the Web, I'll move my audio into an audio editing package such as Peak or ProTools (which you'll learn more about in Chapter 12, "Output Your Project") where I have access to better audio tools.

Echo and Reverberation filters are designed to make a singer's voice sound fuller, or give a better sense of the size of a room. Generally, you don't add echo or reverb to a narrator, cool though it may sound.