Dailysonic_Adam
Mar 11th, 2005, 10:51 AM
I wanted to contribute something useful to the Podcast Alley, so here's a little audio technique that some of you may not know about, but is something very very useful in putting together your podcasts.
Its called ducking. If you set up your studio gear or software correctly, you can make music bed automatically lower its volume when you (or who ever is hosting the show) begins to speak.
I'll explain how to do this using multitrack software like Pro Tools or Logic, but if you understand the concept, you can set up ducking in almost any studio or software situation - even duck in real time.
1. set an audio track for your voice or whatever you want to trigger to ducking. we'll call this track one.
2. set up up another separate audio track for your music bed or background sound. we'll call this track two.
3. put a compressor on track two. (this an effect or plugin that's come with most multitracking software)
i guess i should quickly explain compression. a compressor reduces the dynamic range (loudness) of a signal. it ofter used to even out the levels of a musician's performance (ie. make the quiet parts sound louder, or the louder parts sound quieter).
as far as we're concerned, there are two important setting on a compressor... threshhold and ratio. threshold defines the volume level that the comp. kicks in. and ratio tells the compressor how much to reduce the volume by. if that still doesn't make sense, here's an article about it (http://www.harmony-central.com/Effects/Articles/Compression/)
4. set up a "side chain" (you usually set this up in the compressor's plugin settings window) so that the output of track ONE triggers the compressor on track two...
normally a compressor listens to *itself*, and kicks in when the volume level reaches its set threshold... but here, you're setting it up to listen to your voice.
5. play with the ratio and threshold levels, and track one and track two's volume, until you've got something you like. when you play with these setting, you're basically fine tuning everything so that:
a. when you're not speaking, the music plays at a good level
b. when you start speaking, you're at a good level, & the music volume lowers itself to a level that you're happy with.
that's it... i hope that makes sense.
BTW - while ducking is great, I don't always use it. I sometimes find that adjusting the music bed's volume manually gives me better results... buts its definately a very useful little trick.
- Adam
Its called ducking. If you set up your studio gear or software correctly, you can make music bed automatically lower its volume when you (or who ever is hosting the show) begins to speak.
I'll explain how to do this using multitrack software like Pro Tools or Logic, but if you understand the concept, you can set up ducking in almost any studio or software situation - even duck in real time.
1. set an audio track for your voice or whatever you want to trigger to ducking. we'll call this track one.
2. set up up another separate audio track for your music bed or background sound. we'll call this track two.
3. put a compressor on track two. (this an effect or plugin that's come with most multitracking software)
i guess i should quickly explain compression. a compressor reduces the dynamic range (loudness) of a signal. it ofter used to even out the levels of a musician's performance (ie. make the quiet parts sound louder, or the louder parts sound quieter).
as far as we're concerned, there are two important setting on a compressor... threshhold and ratio. threshold defines the volume level that the comp. kicks in. and ratio tells the compressor how much to reduce the volume by. if that still doesn't make sense, here's an article about it (http://www.harmony-central.com/Effects/Articles/Compression/)
4. set up a "side chain" (you usually set this up in the compressor's plugin settings window) so that the output of track ONE triggers the compressor on track two...
normally a compressor listens to *itself*, and kicks in when the volume level reaches its set threshold... but here, you're setting it up to listen to your voice.
5. play with the ratio and threshold levels, and track one and track two's volume, until you've got something you like. when you play with these setting, you're basically fine tuning everything so that:
a. when you're not speaking, the music plays at a good level
b. when you start speaking, you're at a good level, & the music volume lowers itself to a level that you're happy with.
that's it... i hope that makes sense.
BTW - while ducking is great, I don't always use it. I sometimes find that adjusting the music bed's volume manually gives me better results... buts its definately a very useful little trick.
- Adam