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Question about audio export format.

H

harmonica44

I have been helping editing my friend's movie. After I edit the audio all together and sync it up, I then send off the tracks to an audio engineer who cleans it up, and does all the crossfading, and creates surround sound out of it, etc.

But she's having a lot of trouble because once I export a track to H.264, which I was told to do, the track cannot be changed. All the tracks are stereo, with the left track full, and the right track empty, since that's what the field recorder was only able to do, was stereo. Some of the tracks in the editing have the right channel filled as well, and have been 'nested'. So some tracks have both channels filled and some only one. When it comes to surround sound as well, some of the tracks, need to have the noise come out on the right channel instead of the left, but the channels cannot be swapped, once exported.

So once I export the editing, put it on a datacard and send it off to her, she cannot make the tracks with sound on both channels, match the tracks with the sound on only one channel. Once the tracks are exported out of Premiere Pro, they cannot be changed. Is there any format I can export them on, or give them to her where you can still fill channels, empty channels, and swap channels afterward?
 
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AudioPostExpert said:
The problem with stereo in a cinema is because of something called the Haas effect. What this means is that unless you are sitting in a theatre along the centre line (between the speakers) the sound will appear to be only coming out of the speaker you are sitting closest to. Usually this effect reaches it's maximum when you are about 10ft from the centre line. It's more than a little off putting to see an actor talking in the centre of the screen but to have his voice coming from 20ft away at the edge of the screen. This is why stereo has never been an acceptable format in cinemas and why a centre speaker (channel) is so vital.

It may just be that you have sat in the centre of the cinema and therefore haven't experienced the Haas effect or it's vaguely possible you didn't notice how drastic and off putting the effect can be as it can vary depending on the size and shape of the cinema. But generally, it's way more serious than just something an audio engineer would notice, maybe someone who is deaf in one ear might not notice though!

G
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How does one go about fixing this? I generally don't have have enough to budget for an audio expert, and would like to learn at least the basics myself. I know from your posts that you will tell me I need to budget for that because audio is more than 50% etc but I really can't at the moment. How do you make a 3.0 channel mix? Premiere only has options for 2.0 and 5.1 to my knowledge.

I'm curious as to how I go about doing this
 
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Okay thanks. I'll ask her about 3.0 stereo mix instead. If that's the better way to go, than we will. I know it's not technically my job to know what video format that we need for the project. But I helped out a lot on this project a lot and booked a week off work to shoot it, and I have spent weeks editing it. I worked for free to get more experience like a lot of us do on here. So I cannot just tell them that it's not my problem since I am not the production supervisor. Cause it would be ashame to see the whole movie get ruined, just because not knowing the codec is not my problem. I feel I should put more effort into making sure my work gets done. I don't think the whole movie and all the effort I put it into it, should have to suffer, just because it's not my problem technically. I know on a bigger paying production the editor can just tell the producer to work his crap out, and still get paid in the end of the day, and does not care what happens to the movie after, but I feel that if I have that attitude at this stage, nothing I make or help make, will see the light of day.

Okay so I can send the audio in an AAF container to her, She says that'll be good as well. But for video I got several choices on Premiere Pro:

DPX, F4V, FLV, GIF, H.274, H.264 blue ray, JPEG, MP3, MPEG2, MPEG2 blue ray, MPEG4, MXF OP1A, P2 movie, PNG, TIFF, Targa, etc.

Anyone of these, the best quality and that will work for her Pro Tools program?
 
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True. Has anyone here used pro tools and know what export codec I need from Premiere Pro? The audio engineer keeps saying that everyone of her clients has sent their footage in the original MOV format, after it was cut, but Premiere Pro says I have to pick on of their codecs before exporting. Does this mean that Premiere Pro is just not compatible with Pro Tools?
 
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As a sound editor I ask for OMF2 with ten (10) second handles. I ask for ten (10) second handles because 99% of the time I don't get room tones or alternate/unused dialog takes. I can sometimes find bits and pieces of room tone and alt dialog in the extra 20 seconds of each production sound clip to help with the dialog editing. Since you are sending only Foley and sound effects two (2) second handles should suffice.

For visuals I ask for .MOV for the visuals. If I'm working on a feature I use QuickTime Pro, which can convert just about any video format to most any other video format, to convert it to a .DV stream. The .DV stream runs much more smoothly on my system, especially when it's on a different drive than my audio work drive.

If it makes any difference to you I use the Canopus ADVC-110 to send the picture to my video monitors. The offset for my system is 22 quarter frames.

Anyone who is as little knowledge of video codecs - like myself - should get QT Pro; it was only $29 last time I bought it. I would suggest that you and your audio gal both get it.
 
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Okay thanks. I don't seem to have OMF2 in Premiere Pro 5.5. But do have OMF. I also still cannot find any way to get them exported in MOV, but I'm still trying to find a way. The Canon T2i manual says that MOV is the recording format, and that H.264/MPEG4-AVC is the . When I am exporting out of Premiere, it asks me for the 'movie compression', as it is called in the manual. But it does ask me for the recording format which would be MOV. Why not?
 
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MileCreations said:
How do you make a 3.0 channel mix? Premiere only has options for 2.0 and 5.1 to my knowledge...I'm curious as to how I go about doing this
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Unfortunately, you do need a bit of a budget because of course, you need a 3rd speaker for your centre channel. You also need to have a DAC (Digital to Analogue Converter) with at least 3 outputs or some other way of outputting 3 channels from your computer to the speakers and you need an amplifier which can handle at least 3 channels, unless you are using self powered monitor speakers. Once you have the hardware sorted out, a 3.0 mix is setup as a 5.1 mix but you don't route/send anything to the surround or LFE channels. To layback the audio to the picture depends on the media you are laying back to. For DVD you would create a Dolby Digital (AC3) datastream using for example Apple's Compressor program.

I would of course advise using professional audio post to create your mix because cinema sound is difficult to do well but if you just don't have the budget, the relatively small outlay for an extra output and speaker to create your own 3.0 mixes is more than worth it.

harmonica44 said:
Okay so I can send the audio in an AAF container to her, She says that'll be good as well. But for video I got several choices on Premiere Pro.
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Well, as you've seen from the 3 audio post guys on this thread, we all use ProTools, so we all need the picture in a mov container but we each use a completely different codec, resolution and picture size. For example, I use Prores (1080p), Alcove uses DV (and I think SD picture resolution) and AcousticAl uses H264 (720p half size). In other words, we each need a different video specification which depends entirely on our individual setups. However, we all accept H264 as the delivery format, which is very common when working remotely, therefore:

At the moment you are in a stalemate situation, she doesn't know what video she needs and you therefore don't know what video to send her, so neither of you are going anywhere! I suggest you halve the problem. Send her a H264 video at the size/resolution you are editing at (presumably 1080p), with a medium to high quality setting. The problem then only becomes how and what she transcodes the H264 into for use in her setup. The only disadvantage of this (first step) solution is that the H264 you send her will be quite large in size, probably somewhere not far off 1GB per minute.

harmonica44 said:
Okay thanks. I don't seem to have OMF2 in Premiere Pro 5.5. But do have OMF. I also still cannot find any way to get them exported in MOV, but I'm still trying to find a way.
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Stick to AAF as she has told you she can import this container format. You don't include/embed the AAF file in the mov file, they are created individually and are sent and remain at all times two separate files.

G
 
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Alcove Audio said:
As a sound editor I ask for OMF2 with ten (10) second handles. I ask for ten (10) second handles because 99% of the time I don't get room tones or alternate/unused dialog takes. I can sometimes find bits and pieces of room tone and alt dialog in the extra 20 seconds of each production sound clip to help with the dialog editing.
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Although a little more tricky and time consuming to setup, the best option is to get a referenced AAF. That way you get the entire original production sound recording, all the picture editor's edits and therefore the maximum opportunity for finding usable room tone, template noise for cleaning, alt dialogue, etc.

Alcove Audio said:
Anyone who is as little knowledge of video codecs - like myself - should get QT Pro; it was only $29 last time I bought it. I would suggest that you and your audio gal both get it.
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Most of us Mac based audio guys use MpegStreamClip for transcoding. It's free, easy to use and accurate.

G
 
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Okay thanks. I want to give her the AAF folder format, but am having a little trouble making it in Premiere. Premiere says you have to resave the whole project and I don't want to do anything that cannot be undone. Last time I did something like that I lost two whole scenes, that had to be re-edited, and it even saved to the back up copy. It asks if I want 'legacy' or 'embedded audio'. Which do I choose? Thanks.
 
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harmonica44 said:
Okay thanks. I want to give her the AAF folder format, but am having a little trouble making it in Premiere. Premiere says you have to resave the whole project and I don't want to do anything that cannot be undone. Last time I did something like that I lost two whole scenes, that had to be re-edited, and it even saved to the back up copy. It asks if I want 'legacy' or 'embedded audio'. Which do I choose? Thanks.
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I'm not sure what "Legacy" means, presumably the opposite of "embedded", IE. Referenced/Linked but I don't know why they would call it "Legacy". As she doesn't seem to know what she's doing, "Embedded" will be easier for her to deal with, make sure you give her at least 2 second handles though.

If you're concerned about the resave process, back your project up first (on a separate, external drive), then disconnect the drive before the resave. That way the process can't affect your back up copy!

I mentioned earlier about sending her a H264 1080p at a medium to high quality setting. Scrub that suggestion! I forgot she will probably need a high quality render for the VFX work. You will need to speak to her again and she really must give you clear instructions on the video quality/resolution/codec she needs. She can then transcode that high quality render to something more suitable for ProTools. For just audio post work a H264 which uses about 300MB per minute, rather than the nearly 1GB I mentioned before, would be fine for almost any audio post eventuality.

G
 
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Okay thanks I will ask her. She says none of her clients have given her an AAF format before. It doesn't seem to ask how many seconds of handles I need so far though, but I am still learning this whole process.
 
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harmonica44 said:
Okay thanks I will ask her. She says none of her clients have given her an AAF format before. It doesn't seem to ask how many seconds of handles I need so far though, but I am still learning this whole process.
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I have visited VFX and CGI teams on quite a few occasions, to see what they were working on to inform my sound design but I really have no idea of the VFX workflow/s. So you would be better taking the advice of Knightly or someone other than me concerning her requirements on VFX side.

OMF (and more recently AAF) has been the international de-facto method of materials exchange between the picture editor and the audio post department for over 15 years, at every budget level of film and TV. If you wish to work professionally as a picture/video editor (and if she wishes to ever work in audio post professionally) learning how to deal with OMF/AAF files is a fundamental knowledge requirement.

Later, on bigger and more time critical professional projects you will also probably need to learn about EDLs and Change Lists for the audio post department. For now though, you might be lucky first time around but expect to have to create several different AAFs (or OMFs) until you hit on the right settings which will allow the OMF/AAF to be opened by ProTools. It might be quicker/easier to just export 30 secs or so of the project to AAF for test purposes and only export the full duration of your project once you've discovered the settings which work. Having different audio types (say wav and mp3), bit depths or sample rates in your sequence when creating your OMF/AAF is one of the common problems which often makes an OMF/AAF un-openable, as can multi-channel (more than mono) audio files in older versions of ProTools.

G
 
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Okay thanks. Well I have 24 bit/96hkz wav files. Is there anything else I need to know? She's been hard to get a hold of, and would like to just no asap, since we are about a week behind. Then I can just drop them off for her, and hopefully there will not be any problems when she goes to work on it. When you say sample rate, do you mean if I set the settings to 'audio samples' as oppose to 'milliseconds'?
 
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harmonica44 said:
Okay thanks. Well I have 24 bit/96hkz wav files. Is there anything else I need to know? She's been hard to get a hold of, and would like to just no asap, since we are about a week behind. Then I can just drop them off for her, and hopefully there will not be any problems when she goes to work on it. When you say sample rate, do you mean if I set the settings to 'audio samples' as oppose to 'milliseconds'?
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If file size/disk space is an issue convert all the audio to 24bit/48kHz. There is nothing to be gained by using a 96kHz sampling rate but plenty to loose: Double the file storage space and double the the CPU processing requirements.

To use a picture analogy, audio is recorded as a number of snapshots or frames. The eye is easily fooled by a relatively slow number of frames per second, 24fps in the case of film, the ear is far more sensitive in this regard. The "Sample Rate" can be thought of as the number of audio frames (samples) per second. The standard for TV/Film is 48kHz, which is 48,000 samples per second. The analogy is flawed though, whereas 48fps can provide a noticeable improvement in the visuals, a 96kHz sample rate does not provide any noticeable improvement, except in extremely rare and specific situations. As a general rule stick to a 48kHz sample rate setting.

The settings of "audio samples" or "milliseconds" I would presume applies to the setting of the time ruler or grid for aligning the audio clips rather than anything directly connected with the quality or content of the audio files themselves. I don't know the context of this setting but I would guess that "audio samples" is probably the safer choice.

G
 
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96,000 samples per second instead of 48,000 means you use twice the storage space per second and twice the CPU processing power for every effect or plugin you use. It also means you use twice the bandwidth for data transfer.

G
 
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Okay thanks. I get it now. I also made an AAF container of the movie. I tried opening it to see if it worked and all that since Premiere Pro, told me some things could not be exported. But everytime I try to open it, the computer freezes and tried 3 times. So I guess I can just give her the file and see if it works on hers. But I'm already behind so hopefully it worked. Is it normal for systems to freeze on this AAF system?
 
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harmonica44 said:
I also made an AAF container of the movie. I tried opening it to see if it worked and all that since Premiere Pro, told me some things could not be exported. But everytime I try to open it, the computer freezes and tried 3 times. So I guess I can just give her the file and see if it works on hers. But I'm already behind so hopefully it worked. Is it normal for systems to freeze on this AAF system?
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From post #54: "you might be lucky first time around but expect to have to create several different AAFs (or OMFs) until you hit on the right settings which will allow the OMF/AAF to be opened by ProTools. It might be quicker/easier to just export 30 secs or so of the project to AAF for test purposes and only export the full duration of your project once you've discovered the settings which work. Having different audio types (say wav and mp3), bit depths or sample rates in your sequence when creating your OMF/AAF is one of the common problems which often makes an OMF/AAF un-openable, as can multi-channel (more than mono) audio files in older versions of ProTools."

G
 
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