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Participant
July 14, 2019
Question

How do I sync the video with all this audios

  • July 14, 2019
  • 1 reply
  • 461 views

Hello Guys,

I have a friend that he is recorded a song, but he recorded like multiple of audios, like one is the guitar, one audio he is singing and one audio is the drums and so..

and he is filming a clip that he is playing the same parts as the audios, so my question is how do I sync the video with all this audios that its will sound smooth and you know like a song from the beginning to the end..

the results should be like this:

Pink Floyd - In The Flesh? - Cover (Live At The Dobbie Hall) - YouTube

he is filming like this, one wide shot that ill clone him (that's i know how to do) and some zoom shots on the guitar and drums and so, and I need to sync all this audios and videos into one, how do I do that ?

if you dont understand, let me know know ill try to explain better.

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    1 reply

    Legend
    July 14, 2019

    I think you're going about this the wrong way.  First, the different audio recordings need to be properly mixed into one coherent "song".  Pro Tools is an industry standard software for that kind of thing.

    Once that's done, then your friend should film himself "lip-syncing" to the already mixed song, making sure each take has the song in the audio track.  That will make syncing very simple.

    Legend
    July 14, 2019

    Jim is right. Here is some specifics ..  and be aware, this is a LOT of work, and often takes a whole 12 hour or 14 hour day ( or more ) to get MTV stuff done on a pro level, like your link to a famous band.

    Make the song complete and put it on some kind of portable music player ( like on of those old boom boxes ). Make sure you can easily go to the part of the song you WANT to start playing at .. like, you can shuttle it backward and forward quickly so that when you press the PLAY BUTTON it plays from the spot you want.  This is important, because you will do more than one take of each shot.

    If possible use a SLATE for ID ( or piece of paper ) saying roughly how many seconds into song ( from beginning ) you are filming.  E.G. on paper it says, " 9 seconds ".  That will help you when you get to editing and organizing your shots into bins etc.  If you can listen to the song and do a quick cartoon storyboard of your basic ideas for SHOTS and angles that would help you when it's time to shoot... you can X out those cartoon frames that are DONE as you go along.  For example, you hear some nice lead guitar with fancy fret work, make a note of time and make your cartoon of close up of guitar neck where he is doing fancy fingering, etc.

    So anyway, you have the song on a portable player and you have that same song in your editor.  The song is DONE.

    Now you play the song so the musician can hear it ( doesn't have to be loud but sometimes you start loud a little bit just to help musician get into the beat and mood etc.. then lower sound and when you get to the part you want to film yell to him something like ACTION … At this point you are recording ( hopefully something simple like a small shotgun on top of your camera going directly into your camera sound ).  Put that level up high so you can hear the music playing from portable player and other stuff you say to each other during your shots.

    When you put that clip into your editor you'll know it's supposed to be about 9 seconds in, and you can match the waveforms to sync it to your FINISHED SONG ..  

    Plan on a real long day and prepare to order pizza delivered …. and hope the musician and you don't hate each other by the end of the day.

    Legend
    July 14, 2019

    not that it matters much, but just a side note

    on pro jobs with big budgets there is an on set sound recordist ( sometimes called a mixer ) who has the final song on tape ( in old days was tape, now it's hard drive or SSD, whatever …. same thing basically ) which has timecode on it. The final song for playback has timecode. The camera(s) are jammed with the same timecode and the stuff recorded LIVE by recordist is also the same timecode.  That way all the editing later is done by exact timecode. You can't do that unless you have the equiv. of crystal sync on sound cameras slate, etc...

    Regardless, it still takes forever to do the work.