GarageBand For Voice Over | Is It Good Enough? 

I'm sorry, I am using Garage Band and am a novice. Your video is helping me put it all together. I understand the highlighting of the area needing to be deleted, but I only know how to arrow to the edit drop-down to cut the section.

I’m using GarageBand. The tools I have available are: 2012 MacBook Pro - upgraded ram and ssd, Yeti usb mic, 7th gen iPad, and iPhone X Max+ with 500gb. My background is as a professionally trained vocalist, degree in broadcasting with dj training and experience. However all my employment has been in the area of manual labor, then working with special needs children; both abused and neglected and substance abuse, then lastly as a Special Ed Teacher. I have spent a lot of time in front of people singing and teaching. My goal here is to develop a career that is fun, helpful, and profitable. I’ve watched several videos now, begun developing my profile and made two practice recordings using GarageBand. My sound is not what I’d like it to be. Need to improve my “sound room” and add a mic screen! I feel like I’m learning a lot from VOICES! Thanks! rilygo - Fort Worth Texas

REAPER DAW, is free trial, maybe Logic soon.

Hi Randy, this is super clear and informative. I was wondering if you've done any tutorials on connecting an iphone to a audio interface (ex. Focusrite 4i4)? I'd like to be able to be able to take a live call on my iphone and be able to respond back to the caller using my XLR mic and be able to record the interaction between me and the caller. The only way I can think to do this is thru an audio interface. Would love any help here.

@@sujithjoyabraham Thanks for watching! While we haven't done any tutorials on this specific topic, you can definitely look into to adapters to hook up your audio interface. You can also look for lightning to XLR adapters to connect a Microphone directly to the phone.

You bet -Randy

This is so awesome to hear. Glad it was helpful! Wishing you the best as you get started. -Randy

You are so welcome! -Randy

Thanks for the sub and for subscribing Marie! Glad we were able to help out :)

Thanks for sharing! Glad this was helpful for you -Randy

So glad we could help! :)

That sounds like a great idea! Thanks for the suggestion and the kind words, Dave. -Randy

Awesome! Love to hear that. Thanks for watching -Randy

Wonderful, glad to hear this. Thanks for watching, Kevin!

Thank you, we're glad you found this video helpful!

You're so welcome! -Randy

Absolutely our pleasure! -Randy

Amazing, glad it was helpful! -Randy

I feel like Audition has some of the best VO tools that come stock!

Thanks for watching!

Glad you liked it! -Randy

Thanks for the feedback! -Randy

Glad it was helpful!

Ouuu, will check this out!

It's absolutely our pleasure. Hope you're having fun getting started. I don't have a lot of experience editing within GarageBand, but a good practice is to keep breaths that aren't too distracting. It tends to work best to take the breath from the second piece of audio you are keeping with a very small crossfade (4-5 ms) placed in the quietest part of the audio. For any breaths that need to be completely removed, you can also experiment with dipping the volume down 4-6dB on the breath. This can really help make them sound less distracting. For the finer edits, very small crossfades placed before the transients will be your best friend! I hope this is helpful. I believe our webinar with Toby Ricketts covers this topic in more detail. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ArxfZYlJVlM.html

Our pleasure -Randy

Not yet, but stay tuned! :)

Glad it was helpful! I just clicked on the blue 'region' and dragged it over the other one. No keyboard shortcuts necessary. I hope this helps -Randy

Hi Ahmad! The phone app is definitely easier to use as it has less controls and capabilities, making it really straightforward to use. But at the same time though, you might feel limited on the phone version with limited features and with a smaller screen.

I think this will have to be a video we cover. -Randy

I'd love to try it out! I've heard such good things.

@@voices Yeah

We just put out a video on this exact topic! Check out "How to make your recordings sound professional". There are a few things you could do, but keeping things sounding natural in terms of pacing is important. Also, you'll want to avoid completely dead air. There is a difference between the quiet parts in your recording and no sound at all, and it can be really obvious that there are edits after compression. More info in that video I shared. Hope this helps! -Randy

Try adjusting your EQ settings to reduce some of the lower frequencies or choose a treble boost / bass reduction preset

Great question, you should be able to hold option (mac) or Alt (pc) and drag the main track down. Let me know if this works! -Randy

You can check out our video on EQ for Voice Over. It's really tough to demonstrate EQ because how you use it really depends on the mic you use, the space you record within, and of course, your voice. -Randy

We've had a couple webinars with Bradford Hastings discussing audio production: Audio Post Production for Voice Over: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-O_v0zWAY2tM.html Understanding the Power of the Gain Knob: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-HL8rddXdAv8.html The videos definitely are longer but lots of value and golden nuggets in these sessions. Let us know if it helps!!

Interesting. I'd suggest checking in with the manual on that one. I'm not entirely sure, sorry. -Randy

It may be a good tool to practice, but I'm afraid our clients will be expecting higher audio quality for their projects. I'd suggest checking out our video "Voice Over Demo Under $30" for some tips on creating a great demo within budget.

Hi Emily! Audacity has a lot of other features and controls that you can play around with -- it can get pretty advanced. One of the biggest advantage though is that Audacity is free for both Mac and PC users. The sound will be more based on your setup rather than the software, though Garageband is much easier to use especially for beginners in comparison to Audacity. Hope this helps!

We have a video on how to add voice over to your video! Watch it here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-T92yDT6g8CM.html

I think this is mostly preference on whether they want to use Mac or PC. Sound quality would be more dependent on the setup, rather than the computer or even software used!

I believe "E" is the key command the bring up the editor. I could be way off -Randy

You'll need to click 'Share' and export the audio, then import it within your Final Cut project. -Randy

Interesting, I am not sure. I know that's called shuffle or ripple delete in some editors. Maybe GarageBand has something similar. -Randy

Have you tried exporting and seeing if the clicks are still there? Does adding crossfades help in any way?

Hey Eric, are you trying to remove a voice from an existing audio track or simply replace the track?

You can add a .wav file in another track!

Oh interesting, I am not too familiar with GarageBand, but it may be a loop that has been created for playback. Sometimes this can be useful for rehearsing a section. I'd look for a 'Clear loop' option. -Randy

I'm not totally sure. We edit our podcasts in ProTools. I hope you're able to find an answer! -Randy

I'm not sure if you're talking about Edit > delete and move. You can create a shortcut via system preferences > keyboard > shortcuts > App Shortcuts > Plus Sign > GarageBand

Interesting! Are you recording on an interface with multiple inputs? It could be only displaying, for example, tracks 1 and 2 as L and R, but you may be recording on 3 or 4 which may not be represented. I'd also check that your app is up to date. Another option is to see if it's hiding takes once they are recorded, as if there is a loop record function on and it's clearing the playlist for the next pass. It's tough to say, but I hope this helps -Randy

@@voices Hey there, and thanks for getting back to me! I've used only one input, as I have only one microphone. I did just change from my Behringer mic to my older Nady one, and I could see little waves in the bottom display (as you showed how to do in the video), but they're still not the high peaks and valleys that I saw on first attempts yesterday.

@@Andrew-FishermanOfGod Thats very interesting. I'd double check that you're on the most recent update and see if that helps! Sorry I can't be more help for you. -Randy

@@voices No worries, Randy. Many thanks, and keep up the great work, sir!

I'm not sure if there's an easy way to delete a section and snap the other two together in GarageBand -Randy

At the top right section of that "bottom one" or the isolated Audio 1 Track, you can see a slider. Randy clicks on this at 4:16 (very right of the screen).

Lots of factors to consider here and it's hard for us to tell exactly what's wrong. But you can try contacting Garageband's support or even your microphone company's support team.

@@voices Thanks. I’m new to garage band obviously. I restarted my MacBook and the problem resolved. I truly appreciate your response.

@@bobisandyi2 Hey no worries, glad it was resolved!

Great question. We should make a video covering this! -Randy

Are you seeing waveforms when recording? If so, you might just have to adjust the audio output to your headphones or speakers to hear the playback.

This sounds like you might've toggled the Metronome on. You can turn this off.

@@voices What is the Metronome? How do I turn it off?

Sorry for the confusion, but this video is to help with using GarageBand for voice over recordings. -Randy