Audio Recording Tips

This is a short guide on how to do mastering using Cool Edit Pro (old name of Adobe Audition). Particularly, this is written based on older Adobe Audition 1.5. But I do believe that techniques outlined here can also apply to later Adobe Audition versions such as Adobe Audition 3.

Mastering is a last stage of the audio production process, next to mixing. So make sure that before you start mastering, your audio wave must pass the following properties:

1.) It is a mix down wave. This is single waveform, which is summation or the final result of the mixing process. It should only be one waveform but containing all musical instruments mix (vocals, drums, guitars, etc). See example below:

2.) No EQ and Compression is still applied. It should be completely fresh, the single waveform is still NOT being adjusted with any mastering EQ and compression settings.

3.) The maximum amplitude of the audio wave (Peak amplitude) should not exceed -1dB. An allowance is needed for EQ and Compression adjustments in mastering. If the wave is already peaking at the loudest level (0dB), then there is no room for EQ and Compression adjustments.

It is a good practice in mixing that the completed mix down should have some room for EQ/mastering adjustments. You can measure the peak amplitude by going to Edit View –> Analyze –> Statistics.

OK, if your wave has been conforming, let’s start the mastering process.

Step1. Trimming of start and ending. I give a 0.3 second allowance before the start of the audio wave and 0.6 second allowance at the end of the wave. If the wave exceeds 0.3 second from the moment it started playing, cut it. Below is the sample screenshot of the trimmed wave at the start (it was exceeding 0.3 seconds before and I cut it to 0.3 seconds standard).

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This is coming from recording.org forum with the exact thread found here:, the original poster is having a problem about how to create a realistic sound like it was coming from behind.

The good thing is that the OP (original poster) provided all the materials for mixing and a sample animated video. This completed mixed sound is needed to be incorporated in an animated video. When you watch the video provided; the sound appears complex but let’s simplify here. Supposing the sound is mixed with respect to a certain observer witnessing the event (missiles chasing the UFO), of course the observer (a person with two ears) is placed at the center of the event. It is why in movie theatres, the screen is always placed in the center with digital stereo system (left and right to simulate real situations). What if we have a scene that a missile coming from left to right chasing the UFO then the missile explodes in the mountain far right? Then as it explodes, we can hear the sound of the falling rocks. To mix, assuming we use the samples of the OP in the thread .We use three audio samples:

1.) The sound of the missile
2.) The sound of the rock explosion
3.) The sound of the falling rocks.

First, to simulate missiles flying from left to right is to pan it far left (-100 to +100 using your mixing software) to right. Then as it flies away from the observer, the sound volume of the missile decreases; I use Adobe Audition to mix this one:

The green line is the volume line; it starts from the top and ends in the middle. The volume starts loudest then it decreases to -6dB (slanting green line from left to your right means a decreasing volume trend).Also, the pan line starts from the hard left all the way to the hard right (blue diagonal line) (to simulate a real time +100 to -100 adjustments in panning).I did not apply reverb on the missile track as I need to sound like it was very near to the observer. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the most popular pieces of music in modern times is doing “acoustic version” of the song. There are two ways in how to make an acoustic version of the song:

a. First method -> recording acoustic guitar and vocals together
b. Second method -> recording acoustic guitar and vocals in multi-track session

This short guide shows how to properly mix acoustic guitar with vocals using both recording techniques. Let’s discuss the first method:

First method: Mixing acoustic guitar and vocals done together:

Credits: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kikisdad/

In this way, follow the simple steps:

Step 1: Connect the guitar to a mixing console.

Step 2: Connect the microphone for vocals in the mixing console, microphone section.

Step 3: Now, test the vocals and guitars playing together.

Step 4: Using Mixing console EQ or any equalizers. Cut -6dB at 3000Hz for guitars (Q=1.4). Boost 2dB at 3000Hz for vocals (Q=1.4). If you cannot find equalizers for each track, you may have trouble recording together. Read the rest of this entry »