Audio Disappears

[becca]

I completed editing an interview in Audacity. When I tried to listen to the complete interview again, there were various sections of the interview that had NO SOUND. These sections occurred throughout the interview and lasted for 10 seconds up to a over a minute. I can see that the audio tracks are still there (because the waves are still there) but the Meter Toolbar shows no activity and absolutely no sound comes out. I have used audacity a number of times before, but this is the first time this has happened. How do I retreive the audio tracks in my interview?! I would really appreciate any advice on this topic! Thank you!

[kozikowski]

<<<because the waves are still there>>>

The waves are created by Audacity in response to your show, but then they're saved in two files for use later. If you change an Audacity project without having Audacity open, then the waves can get out of step with the show.

And the show itself can get damaged if you "clean up," delete, move, or modify files in your project. Most people are shocked to find that all original capture clips and imported sound files stay active in an Audacity project. There's no such thing as deleting all those sound files because "they're not being used any more."

Our joke is this kind of thing happens to the neat compulsives who are always organizing.

You can't move anything, either. Once Audacity uses a sound file for your project, it sets in stone the location of that file.

Did I hit it?

Koz

[becca]

Koz,
Thank you so much for explaining all of that information to me. However, does this mean that I have no way of getting my audio clips back? Do I have to completely re-edit my entire interview now or is there a way to retrieve those audio clips so that I can actually hear the sound? I would really appreciate any additional information on this topic! Thank you so much for your help!

[steve]

Check your Windows Recycle Bin, if you have accidentally deleted some files, you may be able to Restore them.

[kozikowski]

Audacity didn't actually do anything. When you created your project, you exposed Audacity to your capture files, live sound clips, and music files and that's where Audacity is expecting to find them, pretty much forever. Audacity is still looking for them. Audacity doesn't keep internal copies, although in certain versions, it can be forced to. The blue waves on the screen are drawn by the first two AU files inside the _DATA folder.

If you can remember the folder locations where your music was during the editing, you may be able to put it all back where it was. If you deleted files, you may need to go back to the original or live music capture files. That will be harder to match up, but if you used whole clips in a fairly simple directory structure, that may still work.

I'm dancing around telling you that if your original performances don't exist on backup media somewhere, you may have no show.

Koz

[becca]

Thank you both so much for all of your help! It looks like I am going to have to start over again, but at least now I know not to delete any files! Thanks again!

[kozikowski]

Make copies of all your valuable original sound files on backup media (not on the same hard drive). Most programs "Save" will keep you out of trouble, but that doesn't work so well in Audacity. In Audacity "Export" will produce stand-alone, self-contained sound files that you can easily move around, copy, and email.

So export each capture file to multiple locations and then export the show--some would say several times as you're producing it. Final1-Premix-Thursday.wav. WAV is the highest quality sound file and there are people who Export As WAV... and then go on editing with the export.

I produced a theatrical short and did all the live voice captures. I exported each session as wav files and gave a copy to the editor who smashed it all together into the show. I think I still have the backup files here somewhere. That's the down side of being compulsive the other way.

"Hey, Koz. Do you recognize this voice file? I think it's one of your backups, but nobody can remember for what."

Koz