Voice over

[looking4garry]

Hi Everyone,

I have a completed slide program, and would like to do a voice over describing the scenes. What is the best way to import this completed video and seperate real time voice over audio into my prestige as a new project? Thanks.

[jimmeeker]

If your slide project is already on video, then just play that into your Cassie as a video signal, like from a camcorder or a vcr.

Then do your narration while watching the video using the mic input on the Casablanca. This is handy as you can watch the video while you narrate. However this produces an amatuerish sounding narration with a lot of hems and hahs etc. and pauses while you try to think of something to say.

It is always better to decide what to say ahead of time. That means, thinking about it before hand.....and writing it down and practicing it a few times before you try to read it into the machine. You don't need to try to watch the video doing it this way and this makes the narration much more professional sounding because you are concentrating on doing a good job of narrating. If you mess up the narration you just back up and read it again and cut out the mistakes. You can edit the audio track just like a video track.

When you record the narration, stop it in paragaphs that go with your slides. So if you have a 10 minute presentation you may have 20 or 30 sound sections. If you record each of these separately, you can add them to the audio track and then "RANGE THEM" back and forth separately until you have them where they are needed. Don't even try to narrate to match the slides in one go. It is just too hard to read the script, talk out loud, watch the screen, run the editor, and run a camcorder or vcr all at the same time. Just don't even try it that way. You'll get so frustrated you'll never try narration again, and that would be a terrible loss.

After the narration audio track is layed down in your Casablanca, now you can go back and time the slides so that they match the time devoted to it with the speaking voice. For instance if your slides are set to move at 6 seconds and you needed 10 seconds to tell the story of that slide or that group of slides, then just add more slide time. After all, they are stills and you don't have to worry about matching mouths talking or doors slamming shut. If you need 10 seconds and your slide is only 6, then trim a copy of it down to 4 seconds and add it after the first one and you'll have ten seconds to go with your narration. Or better yet, make a still from the slide and render it for the length of time that you need to cover the narration for it.

You can also use your camcorder as a narration mic by just talking into it and having it wired into your RCA jacks and have them turned on in your settings window.

I hope some of this helps.

[looking4garry]

Thank you Jim. I'll give it a try. Do you have a preference on the brand or type of mic to use through the mic port on the prestige?
Thanks again. Garry

[jimmeeker]

Hello Garry,

I would recommend that you do some comparison checks with the mic input on your Prestige. First just hook your camcorder up with an adaptor to fit into the Mic input and read a paragraph or two into the Prestige and record an audio track as you are reading the lines. Then plug the wires from the camcorder into the RCA (CVBS) inputs on the back and read the same paragraph into the Prestige that way and record this as a test. Then play both back and listen to see if there is any difference in the quality and cleaness of the audio signals that you have recorded.

This will identify in your mind if you prefer to use the Mic input or the RCA jacks (CVBS) with any microphone. Once you determine for yourself if either of these is acceptable.....then you can worry about what microphone to use. The one on the Camcorder is pretty good when compared to most mics under $50.

You may determine from my answer that I have an opinion on how your results will come out if you do a fair straight forward comparison of the Mic input and the RCA jacks. But I await your judgement on this matter.

[JCS2]

Just another little addition. I just did my first voice over yesterday. I used a sony wireless mic into my solitaire. The quality was quite good. However, I guess very few people like the sound of their own voice and I increased the base in the audio input settings to lower the general tone. I did not script the audio, but it was not difficult to delete and try again as I kept the video to simple scenes. I just kept the paragraphs short and spoke a little slower than normal

Regards
James

[videojim]

If the pics are stills, then you should be able to make the scene any length you want when you hit the
"create scene" button in Photo Studio 2. Thus, if audio is unavoidably 10 seconds long, the pic time can be made to match the length. For this reason, it makes good sense to bring in the pics thru PS2, as you will get more control of the timing.

[jimmeeker]

Hello Garry,

Have you tried to record narration through the mic input directly and then compared the results to recordings made via the RCA jacks. Have you noticed any difference? You should be able to hear a large difference between these two set ups. I'm waiting to hear what your experience in comparing these two methods is before going on with our discussion.

[HansJoachimKoenig]

Hello Jim,
I think Garry couldn't try yet, because he is still "looking4garry"

[rone]

If you decide to use your camcorder to record the "voice over" (not a bad idea), pull your car into the garage, close the doors and windows. Get into the back seat, face the front, and record away. It makes a great recording studio. If your old enough you might even have some "flash backs" to the "Good Old Days" at the local Drive Inn.