How To Make A Good Looking And Sounding Youtube Video

[urb]

I guess it's high time I posted some kind of How To... thing on hooking up a DAW and movie making software - so here's a really quick overview of how I do it now. It took some trial error before I finally got it sussed but here's how I did it for this vid.

First of all plug yourself into Logic or some other DAW - Garageband will probably be fine. The tricky part is filming and recording at the same time so I always hit record on the camera first then on the computer - then keep going until I nail a take I'm happy with:



Then it's over to iMovie with the footage - it's best at this point to have mixed your track to your satisfaction, this is where any 'tweaking' goes on (I've found the default 'bass amp' in Logic to be very good at bringing out certain frequencies i.e. the Mids, I usually go for the 'Top Class DI Warm or Mid) - edit the footage to the exact length of the audio - that way you'll be able to sync the two very precisely.



Then open up a 'Mastering' template in Logic - Import a bounced file from your audio project - i.e. a Wave, AIF or MP3 but the higher quality ones are preferable. Then you can tweak some more on the audio with your various additional compressors and FX but this is optional - then from the File menu go 'Open Movie' - then go 'Export Audio to Movie' - this will then replace the not so great camera recorded sound with some lovely full fat Logic sound - then save the movie file to your hard drive.



For a finishing touch you can then re-import the movie back into iMovie and add some smooth in and out transitions or text or whatever else you might want to do. It sounds a bit complicated but the more I've done it the quicker I've got - the key is getting the movie and audio clips exactly the same length then syncing the two is very straight forward - that's been the biggest headache for me in the past!

I have this ace Canon High Def handicam the Canon HF200 HD:

http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/camcorders/253063/canon-legria-hf200

And here's the finished video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHEvEssOVeY


I hope all this helps - just ask if you have any questions and if anyone else has any tips please add them.

Cheers

Mike

[Robert Manning]

[quote name='urb' post='832107' date='May 9 2010, 12:42 PM']I guess it's high time I posted some kind of How To... thing on hooking up a DAW and movie making software - so here's a really quick overview of how I do it now. It took some trial error before I finally got it sussed but here's how I did it for this vid.

First of all plug yourself into Logic or some other DAW - Garageband will probably be fine. The tricky part is filming and recording at the same time so I always hit record on the camera first then on the computer - then keep going until I nail a take I'm happy with:



Then it's over to iMovie with the footage - it's best at this point to have mixed your track to your satisfaction, this is where any 'tweaking' goes on (I've found the default 'bass amp' in Logic to be very good at bringing out certain frequencies i.e. the Mids, I usually go for the 'Top Class DI Warm or Mid) - edit the footage to the exact length of the audio - that way you'll be able to sync the two very precisely.



Then open up a 'Mastering' template in Logic - Import a bounced file from your audio project - i.e. a Wave, AIF or MP3 but the higher quality ones are preferable. Then you can tweak some more on the audio with your various additional compressors and FX but this is optional - then from the File menu go 'Open Movie' - then go 'Export Audio to Movie' - this will then replace the not so great camera recorded sound with some lovely full fat Logic sound - then save the movie file to your hard drive.



For a finishing touch you can then re-import the movie back into iMovie and add some smooth in and out transitions or text or whatever else you might want to do. It sounds a bit complicated but the more I've done it the quicker I've got - the key is getting the movie and audio clips exactly the same length then syncing the two is very straight forward - that's been the biggest headache for me in the past!

I have this ace Canon High Def handicam the Canon HF200 HD:



And here's the finished video:



I hope all this helps - just ask if you have any questions and if anyone else has any tips please add them.

Cheers

Mike[/quote]


What a fantastic article! very well written!, might i recommend a bass DAW plug in; the IkM Ampeg SVX amp sim in awesome, or.. the Mark-bass studio 1, is awesome. great fun on stand alone mode for an awesome sounding bass practise session!

[purpleblob]

Fantastic information, may well have to have a shot at doing one of these vids one day. Thanks for sharing.

[Spoombung]

Interesting and useful information. I haven't tried this method but will in the future. Thanks!

[urb]

And here here are a couple of new ones that have better audio....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZSGUKYGQ-c

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZYdPsLzLI8

[urb]

UPDATE INFO:

I've been meaning to post an extra tip in here for a while and now I'm only just getting round to it - so here you go.

Apologies if you don't use iMovie - it's just what I use but I'm sure there are plenty of other straightforward video editing tools out there - anyway with regard to adding the sweet sounding audio track to your footage there a much easier way of doing it than I mention above. In short mix down your audio to your satisfaction then import the MP3 in iTunes (best to bounce it down as an MP3 as WAVs are great but Youtube will still compress the crap out of the audio/video anyway...).

Then go into your project in iMovie go to the bottom right media panel - the one that shows all the themes, text and video effects - and click on the music tab - there you will see you entire iTunes library - search for your song name in the search box, once it comes up simply click and drag the MP3 over to the left hand screen where your video is sitting - the whole area where the audio will be added will glow green, then line up the audio track with the video so it sits beneath it.

The trick here to syncing them properly is to be very precise with your audio and video editing - so if you have included a count in on your tune and you can still hear it on the footage from the audio picked up by the camera then you can use that to line up the two clicks so that they sound as 'one'. The other thing that's good in the latest version of iMovie is the 'Precision Editor' - if you hold your mouse over the start of your movie clip you'll see some small icons on the clip click on one of these and small menu will pop up saying 'Precision Editor' - click on that and a new close up view of the video will open up beneath your main editing space. In there you will see a bar that can be shifted forward or back on the footage to pin point the exact place you want the clip to start at - this is crucial to lining up your video clip with the audio. Once you've done this simply click the blue 'Done' button and the window will close and the main clip with now be edited - it's easy to go back in and tweak it forward or back a bit as sometimes the video will be a little ahead of the audio and so you'll need to trim a little more from the start to bring it back in line.

I've found if I can get a really neat start on the audio and can hear enough sound on from the camera mic that I can usually nail the syncing a lot faster than I used to - it's all about planning ahead and making sure that you give yourself a couple of aural or visual cues so the whole sync-up thing is as pain free as possible.

Hope that all makes sense and feel free to ask any questions....

Cheers

Mike

[bilbobass88]

Very useful information, thanks very much!

[King Tut]

Here's a video I've made using this method - be interested in feedback from anyone.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FH2M8rzAvFc

[greyparrot]

hello iv been doing you tube vids for a while now
bassmanrich44 channel this is what i do;-
i bought a multitrack recorder a couple of years back i was lucky and got the yamaha aw4416 at a great price, simply amazing unit. You can buy many of the older trackers for penuts and the quality is great, so i have a great older hd video costed £500 a few years back got it less than a ton, makes many of the ones you get now look like toys....so
i vid me and record me on the tracker, then i upload both video and audio to my laptop and i then use a mastering program (free) to get the volume right and then save it as a wav file in highest bit form (u tube supports this) then i simply sync up the audio with the vid, using the standerd WMM add some fx for a bit of fun, and thats it, save it in hd, upload to u tube.....BUT i think one of the most important bits of gear are i think the head phones....you need to get a flat sounding can so you dont go crazy with too much bass. Also i use boss cans they have a flat frequency responce. Thats how i do it, the longest part is uploading to you tube the rest is as fast as you can get a good take.....i love doing them, its good fun and you make freinds on you tube as well, not too mention great way to sell a bass, or yourself ....hope this helps, maybe check out my channel asee what you think of my way.

cheers.

[Diablo]

ahhh, learning a lot. I've always just used a video camera and used the footage/sound straight off. Never thought half the vids on youtube cheat by overdubbing a separate sound file. No wonder they sound better than my attempts. Suppose I should get a better vid camera and see how it gets on with mating it up to my Tascam recorder.

Cheers,
Rich

[Jimmi Clarke]

Hello!!

Yes, I do a similar thing with my vids, it's been a bit of a journey but I'm getting there. All TV and film companies record audio and video separately that's why the clapper board was invented so you can see match the video and audio. I make the track in logic I then record the bass live whilst filming so the bass is live. I use my phone to film it. I then mix the track and master it and the sync the video in final cut.

Enjoy!!

http://youtu.be/ttewPrQwgxo