16bit Audio on XL1 not Loud enough!

[ozab]

Hello-

I shot a stage show with my Canon XL1 Video Camera.

Somehow I recoreded it with 16bit Audio. And now the sound is not loud enough.

Any work around?

Thanks so much for your help.

[jagabo]

Just make it louder with a program that does so. Most audio and video editors have such a feature.

[ozab]

I will try that. But was looking for any SW that would do anything. Thanks!

[jagabo]

You can do it easily enough in VirtualDub.

File -> Open Video File
Video -> Direct Stream Copy
Audio -> Full Processing Mode
Audio -> Volume (adjust as necessary)
File -> Save as AVI

That will increase the gain of the entire audio. There are filter that will dynamically increase the gain so that soft parts will be louder but loud parts will not distort.

[ozab]

I tried Vitrual Dub. But, still the Volume is LOW.

Pls HELP

[Soopafresh]

Can you post 10-20 seconds of the original file somewhere ?

[ozab]

Ok, Im in Chicago, I will do it when I go home. Thanks so much.

[jagabo]

I tried Vitrual Dub. But, still the Volume is LOW.

Are you saying it didn't change at all, or are you saying it's still not loud enough?

[ozab]

Yes, Jagabo - Its still not loud. Here is the original file. 20 sec.

www.shopat360.com/video.avi <RIGHT CLICK ON LINK AND DO SAVE TARGET AS>

[jagabo]

I downloaded your file. It's a type 2 DV AVI. I was able to increase the volume with VirtualDub 1.7.2 exactly as described earlier. I increased it by ~25 dB to get it up to a nominal level.

Type 2 DV AVI files have two copies of the audio. The raw DV data from the camcorder (which contains both audio and video) is saved in the AVI file as a video stream. A second stream contains an additional copy of the audio as an audio stream. I believe VirtualDub only changes this second copy of the audio.

How did you test the volume of the resulting file? Saving the DV AVI back to tape may not include the modified audio. But most media players will play the second copy.

A further problem you'll have is that the audio is so low that its buried down in the ambient noise. So after you increase the volume the background noise will be pretty loud too. But at least you can hear the voice.

[Soopafresh]

It can be made much louder - here is your audio track, before and after

[jagabo]

And here's a sample of what it sounds like.

output.wav

[Soopafresh]

The problem you will have is the additional hiss sound when you make it louder. You can hear the words, but there is a lot of "ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss" sound. It is noisy. You can reduce the noise with a filter, but it won't be perfect.

[Soopafresh]

Here's only the noise portion of your recording. Removing this will be difficult without creating artifacts.

noise.mp3

Here's the recording put through the Audacity noise reduction plugin. You'll hear the artifacts.

audacity_noise_reduction.mp3

There are better noise reduction programs out there, none of them are free. DiamondCut DC6 is pretty good . Here's the continous noise filter. It sounds better than the audacity one. You can get DC Millenium (the junior product) for $60. http://www.enhancedaudio.com/millennium.htm
There's a limited function demo on this page http://www.diamondcut.de/enpages/download.html


dc6-continuous_noise_reduction.mp3

[ozab]

OK, Guys, I think I am now understading.

One more question - I have 3 hour of total video with speaches in between. And, all the speach part is where the audio is very LOW.

Can you tell me how to fix all the speaches and load it in my Pinnacle Studio for editing?

Thanks again everyone.

[jagabo]

I haven't used Pinnacle Studio in a long time but I seem to remember the audio shows up on the timeline and you can adjust the volume in sections by clicking on the volume line to create nodes, then move the nodes up and down to increse or decrease the volume.

[ozab]

No, What I meant was:

I want to fix the audio in Virtual Dub or with DC Millenium.

Should I load the 3 hour AVI file in those sw. and then fix audio and save it again then load it in my editing program?