For this activity, we’ll be getting our feet wet with Adobe Audition, the Creative Cloud’s industry-standard audio editing application. While you might think of Audition as being just for audio, you’ll see that you can work with video directly inside Audition, as well as, when working in Premiere Pro (the Creative Cloud application for video editing), you can edit audio in Audition and have it sync directly back into your video project. It’s pretty powerful.
Start with watching the following to get yourself acquainted with the software.
Beginner Tutorials
Watch Mike Russell’s beginner’s tutorial for Adobe Audition. It walks you through the basics of the interface, wave file format settings, and the multitrack feature. Check out the video description for timestamps and chapters for exactly what he’s covering and when. Note that he’s using a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2–a fairly industry standard basic digital audio interface–when he’s playing with the microphone gain. Depending on what microphone you have, you may just need to play with the computer’s volume levels, instead.
Deliverables
At the end of this mini-project, you’ll have two deliverables: a podcast intro/jingle that is an original creation by you (using sound effects and music you’ve found; you don’t have to record any music or do any foley work on your own… unless you want to!), and a screenshot of your Adobe Audition multitrack view showing how you’ve mixed the various files. (You’ll find an example of that in the #audition channel in Teams.)
Your submitted MP3 file needs to include the following at minimum:
two different sound effects
two different background music tracks
your introduction
The content of the introduction is up to you. It could be something like, “Hello to all my loyal listeners! It’s your host, (your name), and do we have a show for you today!”
consider placing your introduction text within one of the background music beds and ducking the music volume to make it stand out, as well as bookending the spoken word with the music
Begin brainstorming the feel and flavor of your “podcast”
Remember, it’s just the jingle and introduction; your full podcast episode comes later.
Search for background music and sound effects that complement the feel/flavor you’re trying to get across
Script out and record your introduction narration
You’ll want to try a variety of different takes on this until it feels right and the volume/levels are decent
Using the Audition Multitrack view, begin organizing your MP3 and WAV files.
Play with timing, audio ducking, volume, even the effects rack if you’re feeling jaunty. Remember to watch those levels! Don’t trust your ears.
Screenshot the multitrack view and export the entire session as a single MP3 file.
Scroll down to “Export multitrack mixdown files” to see how to product an MP3 from your multitrack. Make sure to choose Entire Session!
Submit both your exported mp3 file and a screenshot of your Adobe Audition multitrack view to the D2L dropbox for Mini-Project 1.
Naming conventions are as usual: APCV301-Lastname-Assignment, so I would submit APCV301-Straight-MP1-screenshot.png (or .jpg) and APCV301-Straight-MP1.mp3
This course is adapted from ETCV 301: Interpreting and Presenting Digitally, developed for the University of Arizona by Dr. Stephen Arnold.