Mysterious Audio Clipping Conundrum
 

dear audio gurus:

i have an audio file, supplied by an outside source, that sounds great in the Quicktime Player, nice and clean, and sounds great in iTunes playback, also nice and clean. but when i import it into FCP, the audio is red-lining in several places and has that fuzzy clipping sound at its peak.

short of a re-do, is there a solution? or something i am missing? which playback should i trust (inclining towards FCP, since that will be the source of delivery....)? is there something wrong with my copy of FCP maybe? but the levels seem fine with my other audio tracks (music, sfx).

confused and need advice!

If you've got Soundtrack Pro as part of FCS then open it up in there. If you zoom in and see plateaus in the waveform you've got clipping at source. If you don't have STP as part of FCS then something like Audacity will let you view the waveform (or, even FCP itself if you configure the timeline to display the waveform).

Not being an FCP user I can't explain its behavior, but the file itself is either clipped or not. If it's not, surely you must be able to crank it down to an acceptable level in FCP.

If FCP doesn't allow you to examine the waveform graphically to check for clipping, download a free copy of Audacity.

Wow, those were pretty similar simultaneous posts, Mike. :>]

good advice, thanks guys!