Splitting and Time Shift

[kdoc]

Thank you gentlemen.

kdoc

[steve]

Thanks Bill, I don't often use labels myself but now that I check (current 1.3.10 alpha version), you are quite correct.

It is possible to keep the labels with the audio, but a bit fiddly.

Basically you need to turn Linking off and make a duplicate of the label track (select then Ctrl+D).
You can then make a selection on an audio clip and include the first label track. When you drag the audio track, the first label track will also move.
Then delete any labels from the first label track that are earlier than the split, and all labels from the second label track that are later than the split.
Then drag the lower label track (with the early labels) so that it is above the other label track.
You can now duplicate the labels from the lower label track onto the upper label track (click and drag to highlight the name, Ctrl+C to copy the name, Ctrl+B to make a new label, Ctrl+V to paste the label name.)
Finally, delete the lower label track and move onto the next split point.

[kdoc]

Having now worked for a couple of days with this (and hours and hours previously), I have to say I find it maddening. Here I've got snippets of voice on 4 tracks which require me to align them, and then with further editing to slide one to the right or left in a way that doesn't move whats to the left but which slides what's to the right along in a linked fashion. I've gotten rid of labels to allegedly simplify. Picture if you will little rectangles of sound with spaces in between aligned among 4 tracks. At times when I slide a snippet it pulls others in the same track along, and at other times it doesn't. At times I have to "select to track end" a snippet. I try turning on and off the "Link Audio and Label track"s, and have rid myself of label tracks. Before I cut my wrist, or just work as I have been, manually resetting the alignment after I move something, does anyone have a comment or suggestion.

kdoc

[Storer]

kdoc,
Here's what you have to do:
Once you have your individual voices separated into clips (not tracks, which in Audacity means one whole line of audio with a Track menu at the left end), you can move the individual clips left and right using the Time-shift tool (TST). Single clips do not have to be selected to move them with TST. If all or part of several contiguous clips are selected, the TST will move all of them in sync with each other, but clips which have no part selected will remain in place. So to move all the clips to the right of a particular time to the right, select only those clips and use the TST to slide all of them to the right (or left).

If you can, it may be easier to select all the clips, move them all to the right to align the last where you want it, and then start aligning the clips from the left -- shift the first clip to the left to align it, then align the second clip and so forth.

Also remember that the F1 key will change to the select tool, and the F5 key will select the TST. It may be easier to switch tools with your left hand on the function keys while the right hand shift and selects with the mouse.

Hope this helps,
Dave

[billw58]

If all or part of several contiguous clips are selected, the TST will move all of them in sync with each other, but clips which have no part selected will remain in place. So to move all the clips to the right of a particular time to the right, select only those clips and use the TST to slide all of them to the right (or left).

Not strictly correct, I'm afraid. If you drag a selection through several clips then click with the TST in an unselected portion of a clip, that clip alone will move. In order to move a "group" of clips you have to click in the selection region.

-- Bill

[billw58]

Having now worked for a couple of days with this (and hours and hours previously), I have to say I find it maddening. Here I've got snippets of voice on 4 tracks which require me to align them, and then with further editing to slide one to the right or left in a way that doesn't move whats to the left but which slides what's to the right along in a linked fashion.

If you have all the clips on one track spaced to your liking, and don't think you'll need to move them ever again except to accommodate cut and paste, then you can do a "mix and render" on that track. Select the track, then Tracks > Mix and Render. There's also CTRL + M which does a Mix and Render to New Track, preserving the original tracks. Perhaps do a "Save Project As" with a new name in a new folder before you experiment with this!

-- Bill

[steve]

At times when I slide a snippet it pulls others in the same track along, and at other times it doesn't.

This may be the thing that I mentioned earlier - if you select a clip that butts up to another clip, then selecting the entire clip makes the selection unpredictable as Audacity has to make a judgement call as to whether the selection includes the previous sample (the last sample of the previous clip) or not. I started to type an explanation of why this is, but it's rather complicated and not really relevant - the important thing is to select part of the clip(s) that you want to move and avoid selecting the clip boundary if the clip butts up to another clip.

For big projects I always recommend practising on a small bit and finding the best working method before starting the big project for real (yes, I've found myself half way into a mammoth project then realised that I could have made the thing a whole lot easier if I'd approached it differently from the start).

I'm not sure if this is quite the same as what you are doing, but it may be similar...

A while ago I had a 3 way interview to put together. As the participants were in different countries, the interviewer e-mailed the questions to the interviewee and he recorded his answers. The interviewer recorded the questions, and then recorded a second track with comments in response to some of the answers given by the interviewee. I was then given a script and 3 CDs - one had the interviewers questions, the second had the interviewees response, and the third had the interviewers comments. It was my job to put it all together to make it sound like a live interview.

Fortunately the whole thing was only about 10 minutes long, but it was still a lot of work (especially as there was background noise on the interviewees recording - but that's another story).

What I did was to import all three tracks. Track 1 = Interviewer, Track 2 = Interviewee, Track 3 = comments.
I did not use track linking.

1) Slide tracks 2 and 3 out of the way.
2) Find the end of the first question and split.
3) Drag Track 1 out of the way and slide track 2 into approximately the right place (leaving a little excess space)
4) Repeat 1 to 3 as necessary until I came to a "comment" (on track 3)
5) (Comment) drag tracks 1 and 2 out of the way and roughly position track 3 (again leaving a little excess space)
6) Continue with steps 1 to 5 'till I got to the end.

At this stage I had loads of little clips in approximately the correct places, but it still needed tightening up.

7) Go through and trim off excess silence from each clip, then apply fade-in / fade-out to each clip (to produce seamless joins in finished project)
8) Select Track 2 (Interviewee) and join all of the clips together (Ctrl+J)
9) Select tracks 1 and 3 (interviewer) and "Mix and Render" (to make one continuous interviewer track).

I now have 2 tracks - one for each person, with all the bits in roughly the right places. (this was actually complicated by the interviewer deciding that he wanted some of the questions in a different order, but never mind that). For this I put the interviewer as track 1 and the interviewee as track 2.

Now its just a matter of trimming out some of the silences and accurately aligning each part. Again working from start to end one phrase at a time:
1) Interviewer starts (track 1) - find end of first bit and select up to start of second bit
2) Alt+Ctrl+K (Split Delete)
3) drag track 2 (interviewee) so that response flows from interviewers question.
4) Find end of Interviewees response and Split Delete up to the next thing he says.
5) Drag Interviewers 2nd question (Track 1) into position.
6) Continue in similar fashion to the end.

There were actually some other steps involved so as to make the whole thing gel correctly, but that was the basic procedure. (Also backup and a cup of tea every half hour).

Hope that helps.

[steve]

Wow, what a lot of responses -
Plenty of ideas to play with and find your own best working method.

[kdoc]

OK Guys; Well that's more than more than more than anyone could expect. Thanks very much. I"m going to have to study what you've said. Let me ask here, before that, however. Do you fade in and out with that little tool that you can pull up and down, or do you use Effect Fade? That seems to be fairly long in time.

kdoc

[steve]

For the project I was describing I used the fade-in/fade-out effects in the Effects menu (well actually a slightly modified version of it).
The "Envelope" tool would have been just too time consuming.

The fade effect works over the selected region, so you can make the fade duration as long or short as you like.
If you want the fade to be a "concave" curve, rather than a linear fade you can apply the fade then Ctrl+R to apply it again. (try this on a generated tone to see the effect).

The disadvantage of the fade effect is that it is not reversible (except through "Undo").