Clip louder in browser than in timeline

[Robin S. kurz]

To be more precise… I take it you’re referring to THIS: https://twitter.com/tpayton/status/704789195043155968 ?

– RK

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What is the Pan Law used in NLEs DAWs and #FCPX? Here it is in a quick graphic. pic.twitter.com/FJnJfK3HRU

— T. Payton (@tpayton) March 1, 2016

[Bill Davis]

T did quite a bit more writing on the Pan Law than just that tweet – basically talking about how the different approaches to panning and summing signals – and when it’s appropriate to apply additional gain to a summed signal.

My take away was that it’s a bit of a conditional and somewhat fluid problem.

If the math yields a 6db drop in the summed result, I can easily manually correct for that and there’s no chance of screwing anything up.

But if I design a circuit that sums – then automatically applies additional gain to the result to somewhat normalize the summed result – what happens when a component of the original channel is super close to digital clipping? Is the sum/boost cycle going to send me into digital clipping? If so that could be a MUCH worse problem.

Thankfully, I’ve never had to figure that out.

The reason I referenced T’s work, is that I’ve just never found any of the sound handling I’ve encountered in X to be a problem I can’t VERY easily fix.
This is kinda in that category to me. So I’ve largely ignored it.

But it’s good to get the info out about how to deal with it if it bothers somebody. And it’s not imaginary. It’s the math.

Creator of XinTwo – http://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery.

[Robin S. kurz]

[Bill Davis] “T did quite a bit more writing on the Pan Law than just that tweet”

Then I think a link would be in order? Since that’s the closest I got via the big G.

[Bill Davis] “My take away was that it’s a bit of a conditional and somewhat fluid problem.”

Actually, from what I’m told and what I’m understanding, the original problem isn’t a bug, no. Unfortunately, for some annoying reason, I’m unable to edit my previous post to reword it accordingly, since I think it misrepresents what I actually meant. What’s most definitely a bug is what I described is happening in the event.

But as far as the OP’s discrepancy is concerned, I’m told “You could automatically raise the volume when you drop a mono clip into a stereo timeline, but probably people don’t actually want that to happen. It is left the same (split sum, as I eluded to in my first post) so if at any point switched back to mono you won’t get distortion, as you would/are likely to if it WERE automatically raised.” Which was my initial thinking, makes sense, and basically coincides with what T. is apparently talking about (somewhere) in more detail, yes.

– RK

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Deutsch? Hier gibt es ein umfassendes FCP X Training für dich!

[Matt Wilson]

Hey Guys,

I’m reviving this old post because the 6 db difference can also be seen between audio playing in the FCPX timeline and the same clip playing in Adobe Audition. Audition has it at 6 db louder. So I guess my question is, which is the accurate one?, and assuming that Audition is accurate, is there a problem with doing your initial volume levels for a film edit in FCPX and then once you take the film project over to Audition, will you have some of the clips actually clipping?

For example, imagine you cut a scene where an actor is screaming. Maybe you bring the audio up to -6db while working in FCPX. Upon transfer, will it be clipping in Audition? Obviously you could adjust that actor’s level down in Audition, but now the relative volumes of that actor compared to other sound in the scene is off. So assuming Audition is the true volume, can you merely do a global volume/level decrease by – 6 db, on all clips, as you begin your Audition session, and would that keep all the sounds the same relative to each other?

Would also be curious if anyone heard anything from Apple on this issue?

Thanks,
Matt

[Matt Wilson]

May have found answer to my question: as I used X to CC to bring FCPX project into Adobe Audition, it was duplicating all stereo clips, yielding 2 clips in Audition(on separate tracks) for each one in FCPX. When I deleted one of the duplicates, the db level in Audition reduced by 6 db and matched the FCPX db level. The duplicated clips were labeled separately as left channel and right channel. I deleted the right channel to fix db issue, but the clip still played with meters showing left and right channel levels and sound came out of both left and right speakers, so assuming all is good here. The good news is that the timeline db level is the one that is transferred over via XML, and not the browser, so your timeline volume level adjustments should be accurate when you go to Audition for proper mixing.

Small note, mono clips came over into audition without being duplicated, but they too were 6db higher, so I figure I can just manually adjust those clips down by 6 db upon importing XML to Audition.

[Matt Wilson]

Problem solved for those experiencing FCPX files playing 6 db louder in Audition. I was using X to CC (formerly Xto7), and that was bringing the files into Audition at 6 db louder. I spoke with one of guys at X to CC producer Intelligent Assistance and he recommended taking the X to CC converted XML into Premiere, and then taking that into Audition. That did the trick.

Note: This was the first he had heard of X to CC having this issue for people going from FCPX to Audition via the X to CC software, but for those with the problem, go to Premiere first and you’re all set.

[Qo_stardust Moletsane]

I had the same problem. Found a solution but it takes long.
Disable all your tracks except the one with the right audio
Apply “Auto enhance audio”
Then increase the loudness amount

Hope this helps.