Technology and Innovation

Those in the know say that one day, pretty much every household appliance will be connected to the Internet in some way. We’ve had Net-enabled fridges, washing machines and microwaves… now make way for a piano. Roland’s HPi-5 is the first digital piano to enable you to download music from the Internet and see the notes appear on its built-in screen. What’s more, its Digi-score technology can produce an on-screen musical score based on the notes you play. Don’tworry if you’re a novice key-tinkler: there’s even a video game-style “guess the notes” tutorial and – oh yes – an on-screen bouncing ball to keep your tempo in check. There’s also more advanced recording and playback features for all the budding Mozarts among you.

We’ve got a fruity feeling for this new subwoofer from Tannoy, with its long-throw heavy-duty cast chassis and American cherry finish with a polished alloy trim. It’s not just a looks thing, though. Its continuous output power shapes up at 200W RMS, while its peak output power is a healthy 400W. The dimensions are 522 x 805 x 5iomm, and it weighs in at 42kg.

Also impressive in the looks department is the SC-DM3.This slim and slinky one-box Micro DVD AV system can be stacked either horizontally or vertically, again offers Dolby Digital, Dolby Pro Logic and DTS decoding, a sub/sat speaker system and an integral amp capable of delivering 200W power output. The SC-DM3 is available in June.
The final piece of the AV puzzle arrives in the shape of the SA-XR10 home cinema receiver. Designed to partner the DVD-XV10 DVD player (reviewed on page 112), this 55mm high box of tricks uses digital tech to deliver 100W into all five AV channels and comes with Dolby Digital

It’s easy to encode MP3s, and short cuts can be emailed to clients for approval. With a media player, they can use the time counter to reference any changes. If you have a Web site, consider building an exclusive media page for clients, where you can upload their materials and send them a link. They can preview from anywhere, and you’ll look every bit the professional.

Buyout music is the obvious choice for most video projects. There are no copyright issues and plenty of variety, and most vendors offer full- and broadcast-length edits of each piece. But what if the supplied versions don’t suit your project? Thai’s where music editing comes in. Most popular music uses standard verse/chorus/bridge structure, and instrumental music is no exception. Forget that there are no lyrics, and listen closely to the music. You’ll hear repeating sections, themes and hooks. Your first step is to identify and mark the beginning and end of each.

You can do some amazing things in your NLE. but music editing is best left to dedicated audio editing software. If you use Adobe products. Audition is your tool of choice. Sony users will probably want Sound Forge. The Avid crowd will naturally gravitate toward ProTools. Those with Macs might look at Bias Peak. If you don’t have a dedicated audio editing program, there are some free alternatives. Audacity is excellent freeware that offers all the basic editing tools and runs on Windows.

I’ve mentioned this before, but back in ancient times, we actually edited audio with razor blades and sticky tape. It took a good eye. a good ear and mountains of patience. Today, digital recording and editing make the process seem like child’s play. Back in the day. if you made a mistake, you had to start all over Today, fixing an error is just an Undo click away. You can even fix something from 30 minutes ago. so no whining about the level of difficulty.

With audio, music is the deciding factor. If your video is voice-only, you most likely could lower your sample rate to 22kHz, while music would be better at 32 or 44.1kHz. Lowering the bit rate can make your file smaller as well. Bit rate, or the number of bits per second of video, changes quality with different codecs. If you are using MP3 compression at 192kbps. your music will sound quite good. As far as music is concerned. 96kbps is low quality, and 320kbps is generally considered to sound exceptional. Again, this changes with the type of compression used, so you may want to experiment.

One of the toughest things to do in audio production is to create a three dimensional aural landscape that matches the level and tone of the audio with the physical space in which it is created. For example, a lav microphone placed on an actor that you see at a distance will sound very unnatural. Use a shotgun and place it at a distance from the actor, so that the voice matches the distance we see. These will not be equal. The microphone will be much closer to the actor than you might think. To practice mic placement, choose a favorite scene from a movie and try to duplicate the sound you hear.

Unfortunately, new filmmakers often overlook audio. When studying films, listen to the audio without watching the picture. Does the audio convey the story and provide a sense of what is happening? Is the audio clean and consistent, and does it show good dynamic range? Are there any points where the audio is overmodulated and fuzzy? Is the dialog clear and concise?