Audio issues with trimming...

[jsvfoto]

I trimmed a video in captivate. When I play the video at the place where I trimmed it, the audio track continues like it was never trimmed, and a new audio track starts from the ending place where I trimmed the video. In other words the video portion got trimmed, but not the audio. Basically it's like having two audio tracks playing. I hear both tracks in Captivate and when I publish the project. I then tried trimming the audio first by editing it, and then by trimming the video, but I get the same result. The video gets trimmed correctly, but the audio portion ends up with two tracks (one is the original and the other is the trimmed version). Any ideas what may be causing this?

[jsvfoto]

An update: for whatever reason, even after clearing the CPVC cache, it looked like the audio was trimmed (and I checked by going in to edit the audio and it "appeared" to be trimmed), but the audio wasn't really trimmed. The video was definitely trimmed, but not the original audio. It kept playing. The latter audio (from the trimmed video) also played on the video so that in essence two audio tracks played after my trim point, even in the published version.

Not sure if this will help someone, but what I ended up doing was I edited the audio first and then edited the video. It worked! It was a pain, because I had to keep track of multiple timelines, since the main timeline wasn't actually edited, just the audio. Still, it's a work around and I hope this little tip helps someone save time. I spent the better part of a day trying to figure this one out.

[jsvfoto]

Just another update. I have no idea why this keeps happening to my Captivate recorded demo videos, but I'm still getting a double audio when I trim the latter parts of my videos. I have found another solution that's a bit easier than editing the audio first and then editing the video to match. The solution, at least for me, is to trim the around the trim point where the double audio occurs. This gets rid of the original trim point which somehow eliminates the double audio issue and allows the video and the audio to play in sync where I need them to be. Not sure this will help anyone or if this is an isolated issue and I just have a bad notebook or something, but just updating this because it's a much easier solution that also works.

[stephaniemwilcox85]

I have been having this SAME issue along with numerous co-workers and it has been driving me absolutely crazy.  The 2nd solution worked!!!  I trimmed out the tiniest itty bitty baby piece of my project and the double audio stopped.  This issue has seriously caused me to lose so so so many hours at work UGH.  Glad something works though!!!

[rickpech]

Very strange -- I'm having a similar problem now. Did you figure out if there's a workaround from the get-go? In other words, a way to ensure that both video and audio are being edited simultaneously, or is this just a weird glitch?

[josev6861445]

Hi,

I saw your post and wondered if you were referring to my issue. Unfortunately, I was never able to fully resolve this with my original hardware setup.

A few questions for you...are you using a Lenovo Txx laptop? Second question, how much RAM do you have in your machine? Third question, what kind of disc do you use spinning or SSD? I don't know if changing to an SSD or upping my RAM to 16GB made the difference, but one of these upgrades solved this odd dilemma for me. I had both upgrades done at once, and once they were in place this issue went away.

If push comes to shove, just publish your video as an MP4 and edit it using Windows Movie Maker or Corel Video Studio or Premiere Pro. I've been using Premiere Pro for the past few months to edit videos and what a difference that program makes, especially round-tripping the audio with Audition!

[samanthal42331953]

I have also been experiencing this issue.  I have reported it to adobe support, and was told that this issue "has never been reported", despite this post and my previously reporting the issue myself.  I was told that updating Captivate typically fixes bugs like this, but it did not fix it for me.  I am using the latest version of Captivate 2017.  If anyone has experienced this and found a fix, or stopped using captivate due to a lack of a fix, I would greatly appreciate hearing about your experience.  Thank you!

[fabiank31177439]

I experienced the same issue with my project. I add all the audio to my objects, as I have to translate the training into six different language. When I preview the training, it seems to work fine but once I check it inside the browser, I noticed that the audio cutts off at the end of the audio file. I used Audition to add silence at the start and beginning of my audio file but every time I use the files inside Captivate, it gets trimmed automatically and causes the same problem again and again. It caused many hours of work already and I'm really done with Captivate.

[Lilybiri]

Do not add 'silence' but 'background noise' in Audition.

[RodWard]

Very low level noise is what Lieve is talking about, not just noise per se.

As you have found, when there is dead silence in the audio clip right up until the voice starts talking, then Captivate has a tendency during the publishing process to clip a short part of the audio and you can end up losing a syllable at the beginning or end of the audio.  

The trick has always been to make sure there is at least a few tenths of a second of very low level sound at the beginning and end of each audio clip. Since I record my own voiceover for all my courses, I just open the audio clips in Captivate's own Audio Editor interface, select the quiet section before my voiceover begins, right click this selected audio and use the Adjust Volume function to lower the sound level down to something that the human ear cannot hear.  (If you've recorded in a nice quiet room then the audio level might even be low enough already, but making it even quieter is still advisable.)  I do this at both beginning and end of each audio clip and Captivate never messes with my audio as a result.

If you've already removed all of the audio by inserting silence, then in Captivate you will can just record some more quiet room noise to paste in, or else use Audition (if you have Creative Cloud) to add Noise.

[fabiank31177439]

I'm using speechmaker for the Text-to-speech audio, that I'm using for my project. Editing the files in captivate doesn't work for me. I added 100ms of noise at the beginning and end of the file with Audition and it seems to work fine now. Is there any recommendation for a minimum of added noise, so that I won't have the problem that the audio is getting cut off? 

[RodWard]

A few tenths of a second should be more than enough to prevent the clipping.  However, for HTML5 content, especially if played from a mobile device, I now recommend you have the audio clip start right at the beginning of the slide.  So if my audio begins at 0.5 seconds into the slide, I have 0.5 seconds of inaudible sound at the beginning of the clip. 

As with previous versions of Captivate where SWF was the output of choice, it's still a good idea to make sure there is a gap AFTER the audio clip before the end of the slide.  This is to prevent another problem that can happen where Captivate may try to 'stitch' the audio clips for several slides together, thinking they are all one big audio clip.  Having the gap at the end prevents stitching.

But with HTML5 we've found that the audio on a slide is often the biggest download asset for that slide, which means you really want that one to get loaded first.  Having the clip hard up against the start of the slide timeline seems to work better.  Your mileage may differ, but that's what I do.

[fabiank31177439]

Thank you so much for your help!

[LinPea]

I figured out how to remove the double audio after messing around.

On the right hand side of the editing window you'll see all your trimmed audio clips from trimming the video saved here...

Double click the audio clips near the bottom (last trimmed) and click "edit" to listen to the clip. Once found just close the window and right click on the audio clip to delete. It worked for me and now I don't have 2 audio clips over lapping.

[YardrocD]

I was experiencing this same issue and this resolution worked for me!  Thank you so much!  I've spent more time than I care to recall trying to deal with the problem of "double audio" when trimming. No idea why it's happening in the first place, but glad you found a solution. Thanks Again!

[andyw47413861]

You absolutely rock!  This has been a nightmare for so long.  I thank you!

[RoryP]

I have to second that. I am having a lot of issues with the Trim feature not trimming the audio track properly. this solution helped me fix those issues. Thank you!