Subject:Sound Forge: New user questions

Posted by: tigapeach

Date:1/13/2003 8:04:47 PM

I recently purchases Sound Forge 6.0 primarily to be able to split long MP3 files (full concerts) into smaller files to burn to cd and also assign track numbers. I know that I can split a file into different regions, but is it easier to say divide a 2hr 20 min file into 3 files to burn to 3 cd's or should I just make each song a separate region? (I'm assuming that Sound Forge has the ability to assign track numbers within a large mp3 file because my salesperson told me so, although he doesn't know exactly how. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.


Tigapeach

PS Is it possible to add effects or alter eq real-time while listening to a file you're editing?

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: MJhig

Date:1/13/2003 8:39:24 PM

First, MP3 files are already compressed and are lossy. It's best to record and save the originals as *.wav or *.pca then do your editing etc. then as a final step convert to MP3 while still saving the raw *.wav or *.pca to disk or CDR.

Second, "is it easier to say divide a 2hr 20 min file into 3 files to burn to 3 cd's", sure it is but you won't have separate tracks for each song?", if you want each song to be on it's own track then you need to break them up into regions and burn them to how-ever many CDRs necessary.

Third, "Is it possible to add effects or alter eq real-time while listening to a file you're editing?", you will have to get familiar with the capabilities on editing in SF by reading the help and maybe doing some research on digital audio concerning compression, EQ, etc. there is no simple answer to this.

Here is the basic procedure to separate tracks;

If there is no blank space between songs;

Place the cursor at the start of the audio in the file.

Press "m" to insert a marker.

Press the spacebar to start playback.

Press "m" again at the crossfade location to insert another marker. Repeat to the end.

Click Special > Regions List > Markers to Regions, when prompted click yes or ok.
In the Regions List window highlight a region click enter to edit name.

Click tools > Extract Regions and save them to a folder and burn them all in your burning software using DAO (disk at once) to prevent spaces between tracks.


If you have blank space to eliminate between songs;

Press "[" at the start of the song.

Press spacebar to start playback.

Press "]" at the end.

Press "r" to create region and name it.

Repeat to the end.

Click tools > Extract Regions and save them to a folder and burn them all in your burning software using DAO (disk at once).


MJ

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: Iacobus

Date:1/13/2003 11:20:31 PM

You can listen to effects and alter EQ in real time without committing such changes to the file by using the Audio Plug-In Chainer. (ALT+9 on your keyboard.)

HTH,
Iacobus

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: gazercmh

Date:1/14/2003 9:38:59 AM

What if you're starting with an mp3 file that's long and you want to break it up and burn it to CD? What I do now is convert the mp3 to wav using other software, then open the wav in Sound Forge and do the markers to regions to extract regions process. If I just open the mp3 in Sound Forge and follow the same process will I get the same result? Am I wasting time converting it to wav before opening it in Sound Forge?

Also, what if I just want to split an mp3 file into smaller mp3s, without creating wav files? If I open the mp3 in Sound Forge then divide it into regions then extract the regions as mp3s, am I effectively re-compressing the file?

Thanks in advance for any help. This forum is great.

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: Iacobus

Date:1/14/2003 1:32:03 PM

Each time you save an MP3 is when the compression occurs.

If you take an MP3 and extract regions, I believe the extracts will be WAV files. If you save these extracts as MP3's, it will further compress what's been compressed before (as the file was originally an MP3 to begin with). It essentially doesn't matter unless you're going to do further edits. That's why it's so important to keep the original as uncompressed as possible and do your final render as MP3 as MJ stated.

HTH,
Iacobus

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: gazercmh

Date:1/14/2003 3:47:28 PM

thanks a bunch, Iacobus.

sounds like Sound Forge isn't a good app for splitting mp3s, unless you don't mind the second round of compression. maybe they'll build that into the next release :)

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: Iacobus

Date:1/15/2003 2:56:06 PM

I think it's a great app for splitting MP3's (and about any other compatible file format you throw at it). It's just that the MP3 format itself is not conducive to audio editing. That's why I suggested using a lossless format such as WAV or the lossless-but-compressed PCA format before even getting to the stage of splitting the file. That way, no compression is even introduced.

If you or anyone who wants you to split a long file up, be sure to render or ask for the person to render the long file in a workable, lossless format such as WAV. I believe Microsoft's new Windows Media 9 format has support for a lossless format as well (but not yet implemented in SoFo's products).

HTH,
Iacobus

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: specktron

Date:1/16/2003 1:37:40 AM

"Am I wasting time converting it to wav before opening it in Sound Forge?"

SF is WAVE EDITOR. It doesn't matter what format the file was in prior to opening it in SF. When it is loaded into SF, it IS a wave, it HAS been converted from whatever form it was to a wave. The wave file will appear in the temp file (options/preferences) as soon as you open it. So unless you have a utility that you know converts other formats to wave better than SF, then you might as well just load it into SF before converting it.

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: philsayer

Date:1/28/2003 6:24:08 AM

I'm glad you posted, specktron - I thought I was going mad, or had been misunderstanding SF for a l o n g time!

So going back to the original question - I find the simplest way to achieve what you're trying to do - namely edit a long mp3 file and burn to CD - is as follows:

Open the source file (yes, in the process, SF has made it into a .wav, as specktron wrote.)

Now open a new file (File> New...) By default, the sample rate is 44,100, Sample size is 16-bit and Channels will be Stereo. If not, change them to those settings (assuming you want a stereo CD, otherwise, use Mono)

Find the end of Track One on your source file, and place your cursor at that point - better still, place it just BEFORE the start of the 2nd song. Then, hold down your left mouse button and drag the cursor back to the start of the file. That way, you've highlighted Track One. Then Copy and Paste it into your new, blank file.

Save that file as Track 01 or by the song name - anything useful - but save it as a WAV, not as an mp3.

Do that for each song.

Remember, you'll need a lot of disk space - around 700Mb per hour for the WAV files.

Then, use your CD burning s/ware to make the CD from the WAV files. As you still have the original mp3 on your hard drive, there's no point in keeping the new individual WAV files on your hard drive, (unless you've lots of space!) but you might consider saving (i.e. converting) each of them as mp3 files instead of, or as well as, the original source mp3.

Basic principles - whatever file format you open within SF, the program makes it into a WAV automatically. If you then Save As... (e.g. make an mp3 or other format) the original file is still there, as SF has made a copy of it to work on. (Unless you're in Direct mode.)

Hope that helps!

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: Geoff_Wood

Date:1/28/2003 9:20:03 PM

Apart from the mp3 v. wav thing (I assume this is being recorded on a hardware MP3 recorder - otherwise record WAV !!!)....

If you long recording is a continuous live performance, it may be better to split the file into CD-sized lengths, then use CDArch or Vegas to insert track numbers into the one big event. Otherwise you will end up with 2 sec silences between tracks, which can sound odd in a live recording.

geoff

Subject:RE: Sound Forge: New user questions

Reply by: MJhig

Date:1/28/2003 9:55:40 PM

I've already posted the detriments of MP3 along with explicit procedures for the two scenarios that are much less labor intensive than highlighting each track and saving as a separate file individually.

The method/s I posted work/s flawlessly even with long songs broken into movements/tracks (i.e. Yes, Stevie Wonder) without a hint of a gap other than the track LED read-out changing to the correct title on a player capable of reading text or the track # changing on those that can't. I use Easy CD Creator since it came with my burner and never have a gap problem.

If at all possible stay away from MP3 unless you want to post one on the web or load an MP3 player and only then compress to MP3 as the very last step after editing, burning as an audio CD and backing up the original file as a *.wav or *.pca to data CD.

If you are recording the audio yourself and the gear you are using has the ability to record as a wave then do so. If you can only get the audio as an MP3 whether recording or downloading then unfortunately you are starting with an inferior file but still, load it into SF without doing anything and don't re-compress until all editing and burning is done.

Is my font invisible of am I just being blown off?

MJ