Dear all, welcome to this new tutorial on Audacity, a free and open source
multi-track audio editor for Windows, Mac and Linux that supports 16,
24 and 32-bit audio with outstanding editing tools and effects.
You can download Audacity for free from the official website you find in
the video description below.
When you open Audacity, it automatically looks for plugins including VST,
VST3, Nyquist, and much more and then shows its main interface. On top you
get The player and the main buttons; at the bottom the timeline in seconds
with a completely empty project.
You can also customize the interface and its colors by going to Edit,
Preferences, Interface, and selecting the Theme.
When starting from a new project, set the sample rate from the bottom left
corner of the screen and import audio files including FLAC, MP3 and WAV by
dragging and dropping them into the timeline. These are shown as
independent clips, complete with audio waveform in time and collected
within rows called Audio Tracks. If these tracks are too big you can adjust
their height by dragging their borders.
To navigate through the timeline, you can hold the CTRL key and use your
mouse wheel to zoom around the cursor. Alternatively, you can click on Fit
Project to Width to fit the zoom to the entire project.
To playback audio, you can use the player buttons at the top of the
interface.
You can also use the Spacebar key to play and stop or the P key to pause
and resume playback.
The playback starts from where the black cursor is and follows the green
one on the timeline in seconds, with the position shown by the time display
at the bottom. Right-click on it to change format.
You can also click on any point on the timeline to play your audio from
that specific point. Take a look at the volume meter at the top right
corner of the interface to check and regulate the master volume.
Click and drag on the timeline to create a loop region to play
continuously.
You can then enable or disable the loop by clicking on the Loop ON/OFF
button next to the player.
Let's see how to record audio! Check your audio source from Audio Setup,
Recording Device and create a new track by right-clicking on a vacant
space.
Click anywhere on the track to drop the black marker as starting point
then click on the Record button (or press the R key) at the top of the
interface. Make sure to check the second volume meter in the top right
corner to monitor the volume from the microphone. Finally, use the Stop
button to end the recording.
Now let's see how to edit audio clips with the Selection tool.
To select a clip entirely, click on its filename above. You can click and
drag the clip from this point to move it in time or to another track. To
undo any changes you've made, just press CTRL (or CMD) and Z.
You can trim a clip by clicking and dragging from the top, cutting out part
of its content. To split a clip into two parts, drop the black marker
properly and use CTRL and I.
To cut, copy or paste a selected clip, use CTRL (or CMD) and X, C and V
respectively. You can also delete the clip with the Backspace key.
If you want to select a part of the clip you can either click and drag within
it or click and drag on the left or right from the black cursor. This way
if you cut the clip, only the selection is affected. You can also use
Silence audio selection option to mute the selected part.
On the left side, you get several options to manage each audio track. You
can click on the arrow to hide or show each track; use the Mute button to
silence the track and all of its clips and the Solo button to play it solo
by muting all the other tracks.
To adjust the track volume use the minus/plus slider. You can also balance
the stereo channels with the L/R slider.
Click on the track name to switch between the audio waveform and the
Spectrogram view. The spectrogram shows the power spectrum in time across
the audio frequency spectrum.
Audacity includes outstanding audio effects you can apply to tracks and
clips.
The new real time effects allow you to apply live effects to any track
while the audio is playing. To add these, go to the Effects button on the
left and then to Add effects. This shows a list of all the plugins that are
currently installed and available.
If you miss any effect simply go to Get more effects... to download and
install plugins for free from the official Audacity website. For example
you can download MuseFX and install its effects for Audacity. As you reload
Audacity, these new effects appear on the list, ready to be used.
Click on the effect name to open its properties and adjust the effect live.
Use the IO button to turn the effect ON and OFF, and click and drag the
effect in the list to change its order in the chain. To remove the effect,
click on the right arrow and select No Effect.
Besides the live effects Audacity supports the classic Nyquist effects,
which can be applied to selected audio clips.
Select any clip and open the Effects tab to choose the effect to add, such
as Change Speed. This opens the interface to edit and apply the effect,
which is only possible when you stop the playback. You may also need to
undo to remove the effect and come back to the original audio clip.
If you need more Nyquist effects, you can download them from the Audacity
website. These are .NY files that can be edited with any text editor.
To install the effect, simply copy and paste it into the Plug-Ins folder of
Audacity. Make sure to check if it is enabled by going to Effect, Plugin
Manager, using Rescan to update the plugins list.
Besides the Selection tool you have two additional tools you can use to
make advanced editing on clips.
The Envelope Tool allows you to create audio fades with several nodes
called control points. The external point sets the start of the fade by
affecting the waveform gain, while the internal point fixes the end of the
fade by editing the waveform shape. You can add more points to customize the
fade as you like.
If the waveform goes beyond the vertical zoom, simply right-click on the
left side to zoom out.
With the Draw tool you can manually edit the audio waveform to remove
clicks, spikes, and pops. You may need to zoom in a lot until you see the
single samples, then click and drag to shape the waveform. Hold down the
CTRL key to move one sample per time and the ALT key to smooth the
waveform.
When working with MIDI Audacity has limited features, being an audio editor
and not a DAW. You can import MIDI files and manage them as audio clips,
getting sound from Preferences, MIDI Devices, Device.
You may not be able to connect MIDI keyboards or change notes or velocity,
so you may consider to edit the MIDI file with another software before
importing it into Audacity.
To save your project go to File, Save Project As. This will be saved in a
.aup file format.
When you're ready to export your work, go to File and select Export to
export your entire project in MP3, WAV, or other formats. If you want to
export a specific part of the project, select it and go to Export Selected
Audio.
You can also share your work online by going to Share Audio. This uploads
your work on audio.com - a free online service that collaborates with
Audacity, allowing you to easily share your work with other
people.
Thank you very much for watching this tutorial! Do not forget to subscribe
to our channel and visit our official website to learn more tips and tricks
on audio production!