how to display audio waveform in footage window ?

[etienne38]

Hello,

I would like to preview audio waveforms on video or audio files in AE before putting them in comp. When I double click A/V files in the project panel they open and I can't see any waveform. I checked everywhere to search an option for it but I could not find anything to achieve this simple and stupid thing. Is it impossible in the footage panel ? 

thanks,

Etienne

[Rick Gerard]

The footage panel is for looking at footage. If you have applied effects to footage in a comp there is an option to render selected effects in the footage panel. If you opened the footage panel by double-clicking the footage in the Project Panel that option will not work.

If you are looking to see the audio waveform that you can see in the timeline when you select a layer with audio and press the L key twice, there is no option for that because there is no timeline with properties for the footage panel. 

[etienne38]

I have to do lip sinc and it could be helpful. It is a pity that such a basic thing can't be achieved in a such a powerful app... 😉

[NS23 · Accepted solution]

Totally agree. I'd be good if a waveform could be displayed in the Footage Window when youre simpky playing an audio file, e.g. WAV file. Also, when playing back a clip that's both footage and audio it can help in a variety of tasks to know what the waveform looks like in relation to the footage. Before going into a comp. Often you've the situation where the comps are subsets of the footage and dropping the audio file or entire footage doesn't really suit some scenarios.

Guess the only option is to make a comp specific to the audio or footage file. However, correct if I'm wrong but the footage window playback is faster than the comp viewer? That's been my experience but maybe just a case of not testing like for like.

Cheers

[luiss76110615]

Audio is a type of footage, previewing audio is previewing footage, and yes, it would be great to have a way to know exactly where a silence or a sound starts in the same way we do with visual content on that panel. Still, the status quo has always called for AE effects and other apps for audio.