External Audio Editor

[Mark Barton]

I have used this feature many times with Audacity as my editor with Sony Vegas Pro 8, 9, 10, and 11. It has always brought in just the audio portion of by AVCHD video. Can you provide some more details bout the version of Vegas you are using ,what external audio editor, and maybe something about the source you have on the timeline that you are trying to edit?

[Nick White]

Thanks for the reply.

Yep no worries.

I am using Vegas Studio Plat 11, and like you, Audacity. I have tried the same thing with SoundForge Audio Studio, though and had the same result.

The video I am using is from my camera. 1080 50p from a Pana HDC HS700. The Audio is the audio tracks from the video. It is 5.1. But I am at this tage just trying to edit a single audio track.

The method that failed for me was to right-click the audio track and choose Edit in External Editor, or Edit Copy in External Editor. This has resulted in Audacity saying that it cannot import Filename.m2ts (the video file from the camera).

I have tried removing the audio from its group but that did not seem to help: same error. I also tried duplicating the track, but again to no avail.

I have been able to render the audio tracks an then open them in Audacity, and I have seen that as an instruction in a tute, but it is cumbersome compared to a simple external edit.

I did have limited success with actually rendering the 5.1 tracks as a 5.1 output, but not quite. However more of that later…. if needed.

Nick

[Nick White]

Sorry. Audacity.exe has been set as my default external editor and fires up automatically when I ask the edit using external editor.

I also tried the Tools/Audio/Edit in External Editor, with the same result.

Nick

[John Rofrano]

[Nick White] “The method that failed for me was to right-click the audio track and choose Edit in External Editor, or Edit Copy in External Editor. This has resulted in Audacity saying that it cannot import Filename.m2ts (the video file from the camera).”

This could be a problem with Audacity. If you use Open Copy in Audio Editor, Vegas should be making a WAV file that has the name of the video file with “Take 2.wav” appended to it. That’s the filename that Audacity should be looking for not the m2ts file. At that point you are editing a WAV file copy of the original audio in the video file. I use this all the time with Sound Forge and have tested it with Adobe Soundbooth. I don’t see why it wouldn’t work with Audacity.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Nick White]

Thanks for dropping in.

Yeah I thought that, but I get the same error from SoundForge Studio, if I pick that as the default editor.

The video I was using was behaving strangely, so I tried another one and it did the same thing

This is the SF message.
“The file C:Panasonic2012033020120321_131122.m2ts could not be opened.”

So the key seems to be that my efforts are somehow not just sending the audio.

…..aaahahhhh! If I use say, and AVI file I have no trouble, and there’s the rub. I actually get a _video_ track in SoundForge. So it’s the m2ts format that is the trouble. Vegas is _supposed_ to export the video.

Can I open the Audio _without_ the video stream, without rendering and re-importing? I can see the use of having the video stream, but in many cases I would not need it. If not I guess I have to render to another track in a usable format and work with that for sync work in SF. It does not even need to be HiQ, I guess, for sync work.

Nick

[Mark Barton]

Nick,

I tried again, but this time set audio to 5.1. I normally just do stereo. When I chose edit audio Audacity opened the m2ts, even though I selected only one audio track, but left everything grouped together as it was when I dragged the video clip to the timeline. If I chose edit a copy, then Audacity opened the take-2.wav file. The version of
Audacity I am using is 1.3.13-beta (Unicode).

I always got the wav file to edit with my stereo projects, so trying the 5.1 was something I noticed different with your source video.

Mark

[Nick White]

Well see my other post, but this is interesting. When you say Audacity opened the m2ts file, you mean it actually did open the 5.1 audio, , or it tried? If you get it to actually open it, I would be interested. I actually have a later edition: 2.0.0 (Unicode)

AHAH! Yes. Open a Copy actually renders the track to a new track, then opens the audio. Ta for that. I had tried duping the track….so close yet so far..

I also have worked with separate audio in the past, where I was actually adding music to others’ videos. So yeah that’s a different thing.

My problem with 5.1 when I got it to work was that the main two stereo tracks were blank! Bah! That’s my next project.

Nick

[Danny Hays]

May I ask why are you using an external audio editor? I have a Tm-700 and a HDC-SDT750, both 5.1 audio. If I don’t need midi instruments or have to fix pops or clicks, I could probably stay in Vegas. Vegas 1 and 2 were audio only. It supports directx and vst pluggins. But can you select the one audio track, event and hit the U key. that unlocks it from the other audio tracks and video as well. then try opening it in an external editor. By the way, your camera can capture at 1080 60p right? Vegas allows us to make custom project and render presets to work with those files. Hope this helps, Danny Hays

[Nick White]

Thanks for the input

mmmm…cause it says I can? 😀 But more seriously, I have done a lot of music tracks for videos, so that is what I was thinking about : the ability to go to Sonar X1 (which is on another PC while I play with and learn Vegas) for whatever.

I have to admit I have not even started to look at the audio plugins.

AFAICS the U key is the same as Group Remove From. This does not seem to isolate the audio event/ track as far as editing externally is concerned, even if I select only that event. I still get the error message.

The camera is PAL so 1080 50p, but yes.

I am happy with the render presets that I am starting to make up, so yeah I get that, at least basically. Still learning the “best” ones for various output needs.Willing to be coached or led to info, as I figure that I bought this absolutely amazing camera for consumer stuff and I will be spending hours filming then editing, I may as well get the best results for _others_ to see.

I have yet to understand the real value of the Project Properties. It took me a while even figure out that the _theoretical_ reasons were for smoother previewing while editing, and even that has not been very successful for me. I am working on a below-par machine, so I don’t know. Maybe it helps if it’s marginal. If you can explain further, seriously then please do. It has been one of the most baffling areas for me. I saw a Youtube video that explained about how it was used (to smooth editing) and there I have remained until any further light dawns.

So far my best effort in this regard is to make the Project Properties really small in frame size, then render to RAM. The small frame and lower quality enable me to render more at one time. If I use the match media idea and then pick a 1080 50p video, AFAICS I get next to no RAM time.

Nick

[Mark Barton]

It opened in Audacity with 6 audio tracks. Although I was not sure how to make changes to save back to Sony Vegas Pro. You need to export and I was afraid it would try to export the whole m2ts file. I wonder if Sony Vegas Pro and your version of platinum use a different method to open the video clip and that is why you are getting the file locked message.