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A Method For Getting An Audio Waveform Into The Cassie (1)
A Method For Getting An Audio Waveform Into The Cassie (2)
A Methodf Accurately Timing Video And Audio Inserts 
Audio Crossfades
Adding Outdoor Ambience To A Studio Narration
Audio Splitting Cutting To the Beat (V2 Software)
Audio Splitting Cutting To the Beat (V3 Software)
Adding Voiceovers 
Audio/Video Sample Matching
Avoiding Audio Crossfades With Video Crossfades
Avoiding Audio "Pops" With A DV Cassie
Creating Lip Sync Video Inserts
Get The Audio To Finish At End Of Video (1)
Get The Audio To Finish At End Of Video (2)
Finding Short Audio Samples (1)
Finding Short Audio Samples (2)
Finding Short Audio Samples (3)
Fixing An Audio Pop Between Silence And An Ambient Sample
How Do You Control Background Music During Voiceovers?
How Can You "Ride" The Volume Level Of The Background Track?
Making Music Videos
Mixing Narration And Music
"Music Video" Editing
Periodic Audio Cleanups
Placing An Audio Clip To Start At A Particular Point
Recording To The Sony DSR-20/30/40 AND GVD-300/900 (and probably the
Sony DHR-1000) Via Firewire
Restoring Audio Sb Timing Sync
Re-Inputting A Cassie Edit Recorded On A Sony Dsr-20/30/40.
Re-Synchronizing The Audio And Video Of The Storyboard
Separate Audio Level Checking.
Strobe To the Beat
Syncing Two Camera Interviews
Video Audio Level Checking.
Video Follow Audio Edits
Video Inserts Without Losing Rendered Audio
Voice Overs  requires PDF Reader
Why You Get "Samples Can't Be Overlapped" Messages (1)
Why You Get "Samples Can't Be Overlapped" Messages (2)
Using An Audio Mixer With The Cassie

How Can You "Ride" The Volume Level Of The Background Track?
You simply put in a "silent" sample, which you get when you use "create sample" in the "Audio Record" menu. Then you place it (as many times as you need) in one of the available audio tracks and adjust the track with the music in it to be lower during its (the Silent Sample) duration (make sure
you have the Silent Sample selected). You also fade it in and out so that it is not an abrupt change. Sounds complicated, but you get used to it after you do it a few times.


How Do You Control Background Music During Voiceovers?
For the following situation:

1. One minute story about a local high school diver.
2. A voice over that runs for about first 30 seconds and lasts 10 seconds.
3. Music that runs under the whole piece but needs to be "brought up full" during the 20 seconds in the middle where there is no voiceover.

This is the way I would do it:

(I assume that your voice-over is laid down on the commentary track in two pieces, one that ends where you want your music to be brought up and one that starts where your music should be brought down.)

1. Lay your music on the background track with the full volume (or the level you want to call full volume) all the way. If it's not correct, adjust music up or down until it has the level you want. Now you want to control parts of the music during the voice-overs.

2. Instead of thinking that you bring the music "up", you should bring it "down" for the periods that the voiceovers last. You do this by choosing the first part of the voiceover (it becomes blue). Then you adjust the volume of the music down to the correct level. You do the same with the last voiceover. Render and adjust again until you are satisfied. If you adjust the fade in or fade out times, you can decide how fast the music fades up or down.

The important thing to realize here, is that you chose the voiceover part ONLY to define the range on the timeline you want to adjust, then you adjust the volume of any track on that part of the timeline.

You can adjust any sound volume on ANY other part of the timeline also by inserting a Silence Sample of the appropriate length on any one track, you define a range on which you can make volume adjustments (on any of the tracks).

Avoiding Audio "Pops" With A DV Cassie
Some of you users of DV-equipped Cassies have reported audio "pops" or "beeps" when bringing DV video into the Cassie via the Firewire connection. So have I. They are not the same as the 'clicks' that we sometimes had on non-DV machines at the boundaries of video/audio clips, and which I speculated to be the result of non-zero-crossing audio at the clip boundaries.

The "beeps" (and they really are "beeps" not a low-level click) can occur during the recording of DV source material into the Cassie and are not associated with joining of unrelated audio clips.

The root cause of these are audio 'dropouts' from the source tape that aren't 'intercepted' and corrected/eliminated by the Cassie. We are told by "unnamed sources close to the President" that the use of the top grades of Sony tapes will help minimize the number of such dropouts, but if you
are experiencing them with existing source video there is a workaround...er, procedure for preventing them being digitized into the Cassie.

Instead of selecting "DV" from the video input selection list, choose "DV + Stereo Audio" rather than "Mini DV". You'll need to connect stereo audio cables from your source vtr to the rear inputs on the Cassie in addition to the DV cable. This technique will only work when you're in the "DV + Y/C +
CVBS" mode. If you're operating in the "DV" mode, you don't have any choice for input except Mini DV.

Fixing An Audio Pop Between Silence And An Ambient Sample
When I played a storyboard back with silence and ambient sample in the
BACKGROUND and studio narration in the COMMENT, there was a "POP" just at
the point where the silence sample ended and the ambient noise began. The
solution was to realise that the SILENT sample isn't really silence. When
I rendered the silence sample I left it's volume level at 0db. DON'T
ASSUME THAT SILENCE DOESN'T NEED TO BE MUTED. When I slid down the volume
slider to MUTE, the POP went away.

Video Audio Level Checking.
Before recording your video source material, go to the Audio Record screen and set the input for where you will be bringing your video's audio into the Cassie. Play your the video source and observe the Cassie's sound bars and make sure they don't peak into the "red" (the top three blocks). If they do, then adjust the audio gain slider on this screen to keep the peaks "in the green". After you've set the audio level, then go to the Record screen and digitize your video.


Separate Audio Level Checking.
 Do Tip 1 for audio samples you are digitizing also. Play _all_ of the audio source without recording so you can monitor its level with the sound levels and adjust accordingly with the slider. The sound bars aren't operative during recording so you need to preview the levels before the actual recording.


Recording To The Sony DSR-20/30/40 AND GVD-300/900 (and probably the
Sony DHR-1000) Via Firewire.
Before actually putting a tape in the DV recorders, do a test Finish|Record to DV operation and observe the record level on the meters of these DVCam tape recorders. Adjust, if necessary, the audio levels of your Sb to assure that the meters on the DSR-nn don't exceed about -12 dB. Doing this makes sure you don't get any digital distortion by exceeding the dynamic range of the digital recorders. (I don't know if this applies to the Panasonic AG-DV2000 VTR, but I speculate that something similar applies.)


Re-Inputting A Cassie Edit Recorded On A Sony Dsr-20/30/40.
If you have followed step 3 preceding and are bringing an edit master back into the Cassie using the DV+Rear Stereo, you should set the Audio Record window gain slider to -6 dB to make sure you don't over-drive the audio on input to the Cassie. The analog audio coming out of the DSR-20/30/40 (and probably the DHR-1000) is about 6 dB "hotter" than the level of the DV audio recorded to the digital recorders.

Finding Short Audio Samples (1)
I call those little sound samples "skinnies" for obvious reasons. They occur when the SCENE (video) is much much longer than the SAMPLE (audio). If you have a "skinny" on the COM track and just can't get hold of it to remove it, do the following.

1. Locate which scene the skinny is in and center that scene on the Sb.

2. If the "skinny" is on the COM track, click the ORG or BKG box at the right of your screen. The idea is to get to a track other than the one the "skinny" is on.

3. Click on the box containing the "skinny," i.e., the COM box at the far right of the screen.

4. Click REMOVE on the left side of the screen, and voila, the "skinny" is gone.

One caveat. If you have more than one SAMPLE located in that scene, the "skinny" may not be the one highlighted and you'll have to remove all the samples until you get to the skinny. But it beats trying to "tweezer" it off the Sb.

Finding Short Audio Samples (2)
If there is more than one sample located in the scene, then try this before removing all the other samples:

1. in the editing window, place a one-frame scene as an insert in the Sb.

2. use the start button to move this insert to the location of the skinny.

3. in the audio editing window, the audio sample will have (at least) the same length as the picture on the timeline. Now you can click it.


Finding Short Audio Samples (3)
Try changing the trackball speed to slow. This makes it easier to put the cursor on that fine line so you can remove.


Restoring Audio Sb Timing Sync
I had just finished editing a 15 minute segment of my son's recent wedding. About 120 clips.

First scene was a 10 second black clip followed by a 2 second black clip. I decided that I didn't need that 10 second scene so I removed it from the storyboard. BANG! My audio was messed up. All red again and out of position.

My wife suggested I just put the 10 second clip back. What the heck, why not. Re-inserted the clip, rerendered the storyboard and ...voila! Everything was back in place.

Re-Synchronizing The Audio And Video Of The Storyboard
 I came across a situation where the video was getting ahead of the audio. The problem occurred only when playing the storyboard. Playing the individual scenes audio and video were always in sync. Luckily the fix is easy. Simply go to the Finnish menu where you will see the message "Record to VCR" and play. You will see a message "Synchronization" pop up. After it disappeared and the storyboard played I went back to my storyboard and it remained in sync thereafter.


Making Music Videos
To make a music video here's a trick you can use.

1. Have the tape player or CD player feed to a mixer then to the audio input of the Cassie.

2. Hook up a video camera to the video input of the Cassie and aim the video camera at the audio levels of the mixer.

3. Begin recording the signal from the video camera.

4. Start the music whenever you want. You should now "see" your music by the audio level meters being viewed with the video camera.

5. Record the music again as an audio-only recording via the audio record screen.

6. Place the music on the com or bkg track and adjust its Start range until you until there is only one song.

Now the two audio tracks are in sync. Make a video log of your music video based on the audio level peaks and valleys. Make a note of exactly what the time code is where the music starts and this is where you will start the video for your music video.

Now delete your video track and replace it with the scenes for your music video with the audio you placed in the background track still there. It should line up with all the transition exactly where you want them.

Video Follow Audio Edits
I like to employ a few of these in each of my wedding videos. You see this technique used a lot in broadcast TV. Here's how I do it:

Scene A = Footage of wedding party/guests dancing.

Scene B = Interview of Bride's parents.

Trim the last 2 seconds off Scene A and place into the storyboard. Then, trim the beginning of scene B so that when it is played back there is no hesitation between the start of playback and the first word said by the person being interviewed (first word is heard immediately with no hesitation). Now, place scene B into the sb immediately following scene A.

Next, go back to Scene A and re-trim it so that it now consists of the last two seconds which were removed in the trim above. Insert this 2 second scene into scene B in the sb. Cassie should by default place it at the proper start point.

When this sequence is played, you'll suddenly hear the interview audio 2 seconds prior to the video cutting from the dance footage to the interview footage. You may also place transitions (crossfades work well) between the inserted footage and the interview footage. Works great!

A Method Of Accurately Timing Video And Audio Inserts 
Here's a way to read project time-code numbers accurately during your project. This method will be useful for accurately timing audio and video inserts. Cont….

1. Create an empty 1-frame scene. Choosing a color other than black is best.

2. INSERT this empty scene into storyboard at the approximate location where you want to know the timing.

3. Select RANGE. Click START. You can now scroll freely through the Sb. Note the timecode numbers for the insert start (and if you wish, end) times.

4. After noting the times, delete the empty scene.

BTW, You can also use this method to determine storyboard playback time location anywhere in the project.


Avoiding Audio Crossfades With Video Crossfades
Here's a quick and easy way to avoid 'audio fading' during video crossfades:

1. Place two scenes on the storyboard. Go into audio mix, mute the ORG audio on each.

2. Add a transition. Render

3. Go into EDIT. Select one of the two scenes. Go into SPECIAL, choose SCENE > AUDIO SAMPLE. Repeat with the other scene.

4. Go into AUDIO MIX. Find the audio samples at the bottom of the audio clip bin. Place the first audio sample on the COM track, at the beginning of the first scene.

5. Place the second audio sample on the BKG track, at the beginning of the second scene. (You MAY need to use RANGE to place the second audio sample at the beginning of the dissolve.)

6. Render audio.

Periodic Audio Cleanups
I've been told by Draco that for every re-render of audio, the "old" remains on the HD....periodic audio clean ups are helpful to do BEFORE you run into a problem.

Whenever you re-render an audio sample, additional disk storage is utilized. This is why you can have say, just 5 minutes of audio in your program (out of an hour total capacity, for example) and be nearly out of audio storage space.

The solution is to do audio only cleanups regularly! Your audio storage will be miraculously restored.


Why You Get "Samples Can't Be Overlapped" Messages (1)
Cassie software tries to insert audio clips STARTING at the currently selected scene in the AUDIO MIX/DUB window. (Make sure that the 'Bkg' track has a check mark before you try the insert.) If the length of the sample is longer than will fit before it hits another sample on the same track then the error message "Samples can't be overlapped" will appear.

You will need to start it earlier or trim it down in the AUDIO RECORD window. You can set the IN and OUT points to what you need and then insert it into the AUDIO MIX/DUB window timeline.

You can then go back to the AUDIO RECORD window, re-trim the audio and insert it again at a different spot on the AUDIO MIX/DUB window timeline. This second trimmed sample won't affect the first instance of the same trimmed sample.


Why You Get "Samples Can't Be Overlapped" Messages (2)
Y

Placing An Audio Clip To Start At A Particular Point
Let's say I have a two-second audio insert that I want to start one-second into my five-second selected scene and have the "Org" audio of the scene Muted and only hear the audio insert for its two-second duration then back to "Org" audio for the remaining 2 seconds of the scene.

1. Insert the audio clip into the Audio-Mix Sb "Bkg" track and adjust the desired starting point using Start after selecting Range.

2. Mute the original audio by selecting the sample on the "Bkg" track. (Do NOT mute the original audio by selecting the sample on the "Org' track.)

This will give you original audio for one-second, two-seconds of insert audio followed by original audio.

If you set the 'Fade In' and 'Fade Out' times on the "Bkg" track as well then the original audio will cross fade with the inserted audio.

Adding Voiceovers 
The manual is a little hard to understand when it comes to this part of the audio but once you learn it, it is quite simple. Here is how to do it:

1. Click on the music track, when it turns blue go down below and click on the volume slider (which by the way, should be labeled Org, not Vol.) and mute it.

2. Then click on each voiceover one at a time. When the voiceover turns blue, go below and lower the Bkg track (I'm assuming that is where the music is laid, if not, just lower the slider where the music is laid) to -15db or whatever you need it to be.

3. While the voiceover is still blue, set a fade in and fade out time, if desired.

Do that on each voiceover and that will lower the music while the voiceover plays.

Here is my simple terms to explain it: While the voiceover(or whatever piece of audio is blue) is playing I want the rest of the audio to do whatever I tell it to do using the sliders below. It is hard to explain without being in front of the but it does work.

Audio Crossfades
If you insert video crossfade between two video clips, the Org audio of those clips will also be crossfaded automatically.

If you only want to crossfade the Org audio between two adjacent video clips on the Sb you only need to set ONE clip to fade out it will automatically fade the other tracks in. If you set one to fade out AND set another track to fade in you will not get a crossfade that works.

A Method For Getting An Audio Waveform Into The Cassie (1)
 I find that few narrators can go through a script without making mistakes, cursing, or just the emphasis in the wrong place. Plus cars, planes, jet skis and other annoying things passing by can add unwanted sounds.  Consequently, after a recording session you have a pile of tape with OK bits and pieces distributed randomly and need to edit it. Of course, if you have a digital audio editor with waveform display that can take an hour of tape, there's no problem but if not, the problem is to find the exact points to cut (I can't get closer than about half to one second by listening).

What I do is to record the narration on a VCR. I then take the audio signal from my mixer and feed it to a 'scope, in front of which is a video camera coupled to the video input of the VCR. Now, when I play the recording, on the VCR (or in the Cassie), I can "see" the audio waveform and so, in slow motion or rolling the track ball, easily pick the precise edit points. (it occurs to me that if you don't have a 'scope, you could sight the video camera on the LED level indicators of your mixer and achieve much the same result - it tells you the precise point the audio has fallen to zero.)

I took my "scoped recording and recorded the whole thing into Cassie as one video clip. Then, with the script in one hand and a notepad in the other, I played the clip through and carefully noted the timecode of all the in and out points I needed to get all the OK parts of the recording. You see now you can see exactly when a word starts or ends and you can include exactly how much pause you need between words or paras.

I then took the list of in/out points and added a third column - the length of each clip.

Now I went back to Cassie, chose split, selected the first clip in point, discarded all before it then chose that point and rolled in the noted length from my third column, and hit use. I repeated this until I had all the OK bits whereupon I simply assembled them and Voila! - a perfect narration which I then used, after getting client approval, to annotate the exact time for each video clip on my script. 

A Method For Getting An Audio Waveform Into The Cassie (2)
I have just been using Cassie to edit a narration and found it to be much quicker and easier than my linear system. Cultists may be interested in the method I have developed for narration's so here is a simple explanation.

The basic problem arises from the fact that, I find, few narrators can go through a script without making mistakes, cursing etc or just getting their emphasis in the wrong place plus cars, planes, jet skis and other annoying things passing by. Consequently, after a recording session you have a pile of tape with OK bits and pieces distributed randomly along it and need to edit it. Of course if you have a Digital Audio editor with waveform display that can take an hour of tape, no problem but if not, the problem is to find the exact points to cut at ( I can't get closer than about half to one second by listening).

What I do is to record the narration on a VCR. I take the audio signal from my mixer and feed it to a 'scope, in front of which is a video camera coupled to the video input of the VCR. Now, when I play the recording, on the VCR (or in the Cassie), I can "see" the audio waveform and so, in slow motion or rolling the track ball, easily pick the precise edit points. (It occurs to me that if you don't have a 'scope, you could sight the video camera on the LED level indicators of your mixer and achieve much the same result - it tells you the precise point the audio has fallen to zero.)

I took my 'scoped recording and recorded the whole thing into Cassie as one VIDEO clip. Then, with the script in one hand and a notepad in the other, I played the clip through and carefully noted the time code of all the in and out points I needed to get all the OK parts of the recording. You see
now you can see exactly when a word starts or ends and you can include exactly how much pause you need between words or paras. I then took the list of in/out points and added a third column, being the length of each clip.

Now I went back to Cassie, chose split, selected the first clip in point, discarded all before it then chose that point and rolled in the noted length from my third column, and hit use. I repeated this until I had all the OK bits whereupon I simply assembled them and Voila! - a perfect narration which I then used, after getting client approval, to annotate the exact time for each video clip on my script.

Using this approach I was able to do the recording session and have my finished product all in one (rather long) morning. With my linear system that would have taken me about two days. Of course you could use the same approach with any editing system but then its just so easy, and therefore so enjoyable, to do it with Cassie.

Using An Audio Mixer With The Cassie
Route the audio signal from your source deck through an audio mixer then on to Casablanca. You can then view audio levels on the mixer's VU meters.  Depending on the mixer, you will also have the ability to equalize audio (boost or lower bass/midrange).

Also, a mixer will allow you to hook up a variety of audio components to Cassie. Microphone, cassette deck, CD player, you name it, without having to re-cable. but make sure they've got fully functional VU meters!

Mixing Narration And Music
On the background music track you have the option to mute the original track. You only need to do this once, therefore you don't have to mute the original track on narration when mixing in audio. But also be aware that the effects are cumulative.

If you set the original volume level to -15 dB on the 'org' track and then click on an audio clip in the comment track and there set the original volume level to -10 dB, and then click on an audio clip in the background track and there set the original volume level to -5db, you have effectively set the original volume level to -30 dB whenever there is background music and narration.

It is important to understand this for a proper mix of voiceovers. It is very simple. Ex: If you want to have a music bed mixed with a voice over narration then all you need to do is:

1. Select the background music clip. The name of the background music clip will appear in the information window. Now adjust the slider for the original track to 'muted'. Leave the slider for the 'com' track at 0 dB and adjust the audio level for the background music to a level that would
be suitable anytime there is no narration.

2. Select the scene where you want the narration clip to start. Select the 'com' track button. Next select the narration clip from the audio clips window and 'add' it to the mix. It will pop up on the audio mix storyboard with the default starting at the current selected scene. Adjust the range for 'Start', 'In' and 'Out' according to taste. Adjust the volume for the 'com' track to the level that you want the narration to be, (usually 0 dB but you may also want to adjust it up to say 6 dB for a softer voice). Adjust the volume for the 'bac' track to the level that you want the background music to be when there is narration, (usually to -25 dB but it depends on the music and original level as set in the first step).  Adjust the 'fade in' and 'fade out' times, which will automatically cross fade the narration with the other tracks, (in this case the it will crossfade with the music).


Creating Lip Sync Video Inserts
You capture the same portion of the ceremony from both cameras into the Cassie. Put the full video and audio from the main camera on the storyboard and do video insert edits from the second camera to the storyboard. And you only need to do ONE frame match (to a camera flash is easiest) and from there on both cameras will always be EXACTLY in sync.  Here's how to do it quickly and easily.

Split the shots from both cameras so that they have exactly the same start position, I use a camera flash as it usually happens in one frame. Use the 'Split' function for each camera shot and 'set position' to the camera flash, then DROP this early portion of the video. Next 'set position' to the very end USE the rest.

Put the main video on the storyboard, (now includes only from the reference point to the end without being 'TRIMMED'). If the second camera shot is longer than the first then trim the OUT point so that it is shorter. Video insert editing requires this.

Play the storyboard and get ready to press the pause button. At the point where you want to cut to another camera press the pause button and note the time. For our example lets say that it is at 1:32.17. Press the stop button.

TRIM the camera that you want to insert into the main shot on the storyboard by setting the IN point to just BEFORE the insert point. In our example use 1:31.00. (Nice round numbers are easier to work with). Leave the OUT point at the very end.

Select the scene on the storyboard that starts closest to the insert point.

Now do a video insert of the second shot and set the START point to 1:31.00. Next trim the IN and OUT points to taste! Finally, adjust the START frame to match the IN frame and you have perfect sync! (i.e.,: if you set the IN frame to 1 sec’s and 17 frames then add that 1:17 to the START frame or 1:32:17 also). That's it, just accept the START, IN and OUT values for the insert edit and it's done.

You may wonder why I don't just trim the IN and set the START point to 1:32.17. Instead I set both to 1:31.00 and then fine tune the actual cut position by adjusting the IN and START position equally. Most of the time a second is more than enough, because I like to use a lot of video follow audio edits anyhow, (you hear the person start speaking and then the video cuts to the person speaking 15 frames later). OTOH, if you also want to do these video follow audio edits then you can set both the IN and START points to whatever number shows up when you pressed pause, (in this case 1:32.17). This almost always produces a perfect split audio edit and it saves you the fine tuning step, (well except for setting the OUT point in the insert range window).

If you ever get an error message saying that 'the scene is too long to be inserted here', then trim the insert camera OUT position back slightly.  (Till you are able to do the insert. You can always trim the OUT position to the end for the final shot if need be.)


Syncing Two Camera Interviews
I just finished a 2-camera remote Pete Seeger interview with mixed audio (interviewer and interviewee) on both cameras but without time code.  Although we used a clap board to establish a common zero point for editing, the INSERT mode of the Casablanca worked even better as a means of setting a perfect common "00:00:00" point for sync sound in both scenes.

Tape/scene A was Pete Seeger and Tape/Scene B was the interviewer. I loaded the tapes (18 minutes each) into the Casablanca with each "roughly" starting at the same time. However, going into the INSERT mode I was able to go to a spot in the A scene and a roughly common spot in the B scene.  After a little trial and error with the INSERT frame-increment buttons I got perfect sync of the B video over the A video and audio. I then noted how much the B scene was "off" from the A. I could then use that XX:XX:XX time difference to CUT from scene A or B. Now the 00:00:00 points for each scene was the same and in sync. All I did now was use the INSERT mode to drop the video of the interviewers 23 questions over the Pete Seeger A scene video. The time on A was the same as the time on B. It worked like charm....including the ability to add a dissolve where appropriate.  Although I was able to put mixed audio on to both cameras, sometimes you can only record mixed audio on one camera. This will still work as long as the other camera picks up some recognizable audio of the interview.


Audio/Video Sample Matching
Some audio samples seem to play back slightly longer (a frame or two) in the storyboard than they do in audio record or audio mix dub. These are samples that were split using the new auto-split feature. There IS a work around. Trim the audio SHORTER in audio record, so that it plays back
LONGER in the storyboard. Not the most elegant solution, but should only amount to a frame or two.

Adding Outdoor Ambience To A Studio Narration
A (studio recorded) 30-second narrated introduction ended with an opening question that was to be edited to an interview recorded on location (with ambient wind noise). The problem was that the difference between the studio quiet and remote windy ambient noise was very jarring in both a cut and dissolve edit. So I needed to slowly bring up the ambient wind noise behind the final part of the studio narration. On the remote tape there was one and a half seconds of ambient sound before the interviewee spoke.  With the Casablanca I was able to duplicate this 90 frames of windy ambience (with a cricket in it) into four seconds. I then made a 26-second silent sample in the BACKGROUND audio channel to which I added the four-second created ambient sample; making it slowly fade up under the
ending of the studio question. Since the ambient sample was actually taken from the seconds right before the question, it matched perfectly.

Video Inserts Without Losing Rendered Audio
1. Record an audio sample (in this case part of a song). Trim to the desired length (in this case precisely 1 minute). Set a fade in/out if desired.

2. Go into empty scene. Create a coloured scene (to distinguish it from BLACK scenes). I made mine 10 seconds long.

3. Insert into storyboard as many times as needed. (I inserted 6 of them = 1 minute).

4. Insert audio sample to coincide with first frame of the series of coloured scenes. RENDER THE SAMPLE NOW - the process will not work correctly if you don't.

5. Go to TRANSITIONS or IMAGE PROCESSING screens. Select SCENE. Choose
RANGE. Give the scene a name. Scroll back to the first frame of the series of coloured scenes to set the start point. Then scroll forward to set the end point.

6. Go into EDIT - you'll find the scene you just created. Play it. Audio and video have been locked together.

7. Remove coloured scene series from the storyboard. Add the new scene to the storyboard.

8. You can now INSERT video into the storyboard without having to re-render, and without having audio move down the line. (And you can even cut on the beat, by playing storyboard, pausing at beat/transition points, noting time-code numbers, then trimming/inserting).


"Music Video" Editing

The following is a distillation of several tips on doing video INSERTS synchronised to music.

1. Create a black scene equal to or slightly longer than the desired audio clip and put it on the Sb.

2. Create another black scene of a few seconds length and put both in front of and behind the scene of step 1. (This is to provide some flexibility in later editing.

3. Go to the AUDIO MIX-DUB screen and INSERT the music sample on the BACKGROUND track in conjunction with the scene of step 1.

4. Adjust audio levels as desired and RENDER.

5. Select SCENE and adjust RANGE to cover all of the black scenes of steps 1 and 2; rename as desired.

You now have a video scene with music that you can ADD to the Sb and do video INSERTs in sync to the music to your heart's delight without losing the music track. Since the music is now part of the "ORG" track, you now have both the BACKGROUND and COMMENT tracks available for addition audio additions or control using the SILENCE technique.

[NOTE: There seems to be a bug in v2.081 s/w that sometimes causes the preceding procedure to cause audio 'glitches' on playback of the Sb. Be sure and play the Sb after each INSERT to make sure audio track is OK.]


Audio Splitting Cutting To the Beat (V2 Software)
You can do Audio-Scene creating and splitting for cutting to music using V.3.

Well I am still on V.2. something or other and tried doing what he said but didn't work.   So I made a black empty scene, (extending it by making a slow motion scene as someone said in the tips) and added it to the story board .   Then I went to Audio Record and added my commentary and rendered.

Went back to the edit screen to play the clip but no sound!   Made a scene of it and hey presto! sound.
Then went on to split and will now insert pictures.   Sounds a bit protracted but it didn't take long in fact.

Audio Splitting Cutting To the Beat (V3 Software)
I don't know if you know but there is an easier way to do edit pop videos on the Cassie. This was on the USA list not so long ago. I have changed some of the wording to make it easier to understand, hope it helps.

TIP: CUT TO THE BEAT IN REAL TIME (V3 SOFTWARE)

1. Record the music or narration

2. In the Audio Record window, choose Sample>Scene - a black video clip of

your audio will be created and will appear in your edit bin.

3. Go into Edit, choose the black video clip just created

4. Click on Split

5. Click the play button to play your clip

6. Click USE on the beat with left mouse button, between sentences, or wherever you'd like. You won't see anything apparently_ happening, but when you go back into Edit, there you will find black video clips, split into pieces for you, neat as pie, each timed out to let you know how long your Inserts need to be to cover.

8. Place all your splits in order on the timeline and put your picture  inserts over each split.

Strobe To the Beat
An idea that came to me from the tip Audio Splitting Cutting To the Beat (V3 Software). Though this is for making clips that are to the beat.

I  wanted to be able to find an easier way of making the dance bits of a wedding reception easy to strobe and less painful then the way I was doing then.  It occurred to me that instead of playing a music clip why not play the dance clip, hit the "use" button every time I wanted the strobe to start and again to stop. You then put all those clips in sequential order on the storyboard, highlight the one I want strobe, do a search to find the clip in the BIN, do a strobe on it and replace that clip with the strobed one. just do that to the rest and viola its all in sync and strobed where you want it.