Final Cut Pro 6 - Connecting Audio Devices and Configuring Software

Chapter 7

Using the Voice Over Tool

139

I

Important:

If you select a DV camcorder as your recording device and External Video is

enabled in the View menu, a message appears saying that you cannot record using
DV audio. Before you can record, choose View > External Video > Off.

Step 2:

Connect a microphone to a microphone preamplifier, and connect the

preamplifier to your audio interface

Some audio interfaces have microphone preamplifiers built in. For more information,
see the documentation that came with the audio interface.

Step 3:

Open the Voice Over tool and choose audio input settings

You need to set up the Voice Over tool to correspond to the audio equipment
you’ve connected.

To select an audio input in the Voice Over tool:

1

Choose Tools > Voice Over.

2

Choose your audio interface from the Source pop-up menu.

3

Choose the audio interface input your microphone is connected to from the Input
pop-up menu. For example, if you connected your microphone to input 2 on your
audio interface, choose input 2 here.

4

Choose a sample rate that matches your sequence sample rate.

To determine the audio sample rate of your sequence, see Volume IV, Chapter 27,
“Sequence Settings and Presets.”

Step 4:

Choose an audio track and duration for your voiceover

In the Browser, select and open the sequence to which you want to add a voiceover,
then set In and Out points where you want the voiceover to begin and end.

Step 5:

Determine the offset of your audio interface

Every digital recording device has some latency from the time audio enters the
microphone to the time it’s processed. This latency can cause your narration to be
offset by a few frames from your video. You can adjust this offset in the Voice Over tool
so that your audio is recorded exactly in sync with your sequence. In general, USB
audio interfaces have an offset of one frame and DV camcorders have an offset of three
frames. Other interfaces may have different offsets.

140

Part I

Audio Mixing

To determine the offset of your audio recording device:

1

In the Timeline, set the In point of your sequence at 10 seconds, then set the Out point
at 20 seconds.

2

Hold the microphone that’s connected to your audio recording device to the speaker of
your computer.

3

Choose Tools > Voice Over, then click the Record button.

(What you’re doing is recording the audio cue beeps that your computer plays back.)
Recording stops automatically and this new audio clip is placed in the Timeline.

4

In the Timeline, drag the end of the newly recorded audio clip to the right to show the
last 2 seconds of the audio recorded after the Out point.

5

Compare the position of the first frame of the final cue beep’s waveform to the position
of the Out point in the Timeline.

To show or hide the audio clip’s waveform in the Timeline, press Command-Option-W.

6

If there’s a difference, add this number of frames to the offset already selected, then
choose this new number from the Offset pop-up menu.

Alternatively, you can move the clip after recording it to compensate for latency.

Step 6:

Plug in your headphones

Connect your headphones to the headphone port of your computer, and you’re ready
to start recording.

20-second point

First frame of the ending beep
that occurs two frames later