Part
Sound
You might say: audio, sound quality
Everything the viewer hears: the voice first, then music, effects and the room underneath, mixed to a set loudness.
- What it does
- Carries the words and the mood. Bad recorded sound is hard or impossible to repair in the edit.
- Ask
- Is the voice clear and steady from start to end?
- Trouble
- Echo, hiss, clipping, music over words, or a level much quieter than the next video in the feed.
What to look for
- Voice clear above music and effects
- Steady levels from start to end
- Echo, hiss, clipping or a quiet track
Parts
- Microphone: The microphone that records the voice.
- Mic distance: How far the mic is from the mouth.
- Loudness: Average perceived loudness over the whole video, measured in LUFS.
- Music bed: Music under the voice, turned down (ducked) whenever someone speaks.
- Sound effects: Short sounds placed against the picture: a whoosh on a move, a pop when a card appears, a riser before a reveal, a hit on a title.
- Split edit: A cut where sound and picture change at different moments: the next shot’s sound starts early, or the last shot’s sound runs on.
- Room tone: The sound of the recording space with no one speaking, laid under cuts and gaps so the background stays continuous.
- Drop-out: Pulling the sound down to near silence for a brief beat before a line or a hit.
Sources
- Chris Lyons, Audio Systems Guide for Video and Film Production, Audio chain and recording fundamentals
The poor sound you often hear on online videos is often recorded on the camera’s built-in microphone.
Use it on your project
teardown-apply: hold "Sound" (sound) from the teardown at https://teardownatlas.com/content-creation/ against my project
Paste it into a coding agent that has the teardown skills.
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