Chapter 8. Adding Sound to Your Movies

In This Chapter

  • Understanding audio fundamentals

  • Recording good-quality audio

  • Working with audio in the Premiere Elements Timeline

  • Syncing your video to the beat of the music

  • Making the best use of audio effects and transitions

Most people think of movies as just moving pictures. When you edit your video clips together in a movie project, you probably spend most of your time working with the visuals by placing video clips in the Timeline, adding transitions, and even using a special effect or two. The audio portion of a movie is, sadly, often given the afterthought treatment.

Fortunately, you are reading this chapter, which means that you care about audio and you know that it matters. Many video experts claim that audiences are more forgiving of flaws and mistakes in video images, while poor-quality audio is immediately noticeable and off-putting. This speaks volumes (pun intended) about the importance of audio.

If you really want to create high-quality, well-rounded movies, you need to spend time tweaking audio levels, smoothing audio transitions between clips, and maybe adding narration or a musical soundtrack. This chapter introduces you to the basics of audio and shows you how to work with audio in your Premiere Elements projects. I also show you how to use the great audio tools that come with Premiere Elements. Those tools include SmartSound, which automatically generates royalty-free soundtrack music to match your project, as well as a beat-detecting ...

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