Recording cover songs

[el.pescado]

Hi!

Don't know whether post it here or in Digital Audio...

Anyway, I want to record myself playing cover songs with a backing track. I want resulting video to consist of:
1. Recorded video
2. Backing audio track
3. Recorded audio track (possibly with Audio Units applied to it)
If above three elements are synchronized in time it would be great. I am mainly concerned with audio quality, video is not that important.

I have a Macbook Pro with iSight Webcam, OSX 10.8 and all needed musical equipment. How can I achieve best effect for reasonable effort?

Thanks!

 

[Chad3eleven]

You need a microphone for starters.

and you may want to invest in a USB audio converter, something like this:

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/pro-...0@ADL4MF-adType^PLA-device^c-adid^30423324027


allow you to interface directly from an audio source and into your mac (microphone, stereo, guitar)

You also need an editing program.. imovie can be a start.

 

[el.pescado]

Hi,

Thanks for your reply. As I stated above, I have all required musical equipment. I have Sennheiser e906 mic and Focusrite Saffire Pro 14 audio interface. I know how to record audio, I just need information how to add video.

 

[Macman45]

Hi,

Thanks for your reply. As I stated above, I have all required musical equipment. I have Sennheiser e906 mic and Focusrite Saffire Pro 14 audio interface. I know how to record audio, I just need information how to add video.

Do you have iMovie? If I want to add a song to Youtube or the like of, I tend to use if and simply add the audio in afterwards...I'm using Logic X through a Yamaha MW10C which handles the audio side of things. You can doit all through Logic if you have it, otherwise as I say, Imovie is a perfectly good tool for the job.

 

[floh]

1. Recorded video
2. Backing audio track
3. Recorded audio track (possibly with Audio Units applied to it)
If above three elements are synchronized in time it would be great. I am mainly concerned with audio quality, video is not that important.

First, I am guessing that you know that this will result in a video file with two audio tracks. That is great and can be played back from DVDs or files, but will not work on youtube etc.. But you probably don't want to upload there anyways, since you might run into copyright issues...

Second, I would absolutely advise you not to use your iSight camera for recording. It has a weird format (not widescreen 16:9) and performs terribly. Any smartphone or point-and-shoot stills camera will do a lot better, if you have something like that.

Third, so you are looking for a software that:

1. can apply AU plugins to an audio track
2. has good audio quality
3. automatically synchronizes tracks
4. can export video files with multiple audio tracks

Points 1 and 2 will not be a problem for almost anything you work with. AU plugins are accepted in most software, and the audio quality is great unless you mess it up on purpose.

However, points 3 and 4 will automatically set you in the range of professional software. The following three programs can kind of do what you are asking for:
* Final Cut Pro X (300$)
* Adobe Premiere Pro CC (20$ per month)
* Logic Pro X (200$)

Logic can not auto-sync the clips (as far as I know), but you might already have it or get some other use out of it, seeing as you're a musician. That's why I included it.

The first two are the most common editing programs amongst non-TV users, and they will both do great, but they are not cheap and have a steep learning curve. If you have ever used iMovie (or nothing at all), FCPX will probably be easier for you to handle, if you are very used to DAW software from your musical career, you might find Adobe Premiere more intuitive with the track-based layout. If you want more info on how to do what you want with one of these programs, let us know.

If you were looking for something less pricy, you will have more work to do. First, you will probably have to do the syncing manually. I don't know of any free or cheap software that will auto-sync the files for you. And second, you will have to export the three tracks (video, audio1, and audio2) seperately and then mux them with an external program. So it will be a few more steps, but it sure is possible.

Sorry that this is not a simple "do this" answer, but you'll have to make some decisions (monetary and conceptually) here. Hope this helped anyways.

 

[el.pescado]

I want final video to have one audio track. I just want to be able to process two tracks independently prior to mixing.

I have iMovie (but haven't used it), GarageBand and Ableton Live.

 

[daybreak]

I would study first your video software as you have them. People can tell you how and why but you lack some information on the video side. See what the software can do for you. iMovie would be a great starting point.

 

[floh]

I want final video to have one audio track. I just want to be able to process two tracks independently prior to mixing.

I have iMovie (but haven't used it), GarageBand and Ableton Live.

In this case, I would advise against using iMovie, for three reasons:

1. You don't care much about video quality and will not do crazy edits. But iMovie will convert your video on import to ProRes format, which will unnecessarily take up a huge amount of disk space.

2. If you own and use track-based DAWs like Ableton, iMovie will be unintuitively for you.

3. iMovie (although it is able to do it) does not have an easy concept of different tracks. More "different files that you can attach to certain regions"...

You can actually import a Movie into Ableton, synchronize it (manually) and render it out. If you are recording and mixing with Ableton anyways, this is a good option.

If you want a more advanced video editor, you can first try AVIdemux and KDEnlive for free. Maybe you'll taste blood and then shoot for Adobe Premiere Elements (80$ from the Mac App Store), which is a very good program for your needs.

Gotta go for lunch now.