Audio Clips play too Early!
 

Hi everyone! So i'm still fairly new to vegas, and now i'm encountering out of sync audio.. can anyone tell me how to fix it..

When I play the project from beginning to end it's so out of sync..

For certain clips.. the audio is fine..

So I have on the timeline my main video and it's audio.. There was a small section of the video that I wanted to add audio effects to.. I tried splitting the audio and adding the effect, but it effected all of the audio on that track, so I put it on the track below.. When I play it putting the marker close to the point where that "split" audio clip comes in.. it plays fine.. If I move back a bit and play.. it will play slightly early.. if I move even further towards the beginning .. it's totally off.. is there something I'm doing wrong?

Is there a way to fix this? Please help..

Depending on your system, it could be simply lagging when previewing on the fly, as it changes from no effects to effect.

Try a RAM preview - drag from a point a little before the split to after - this will create a shaded region. Now Shift B will create a temporarily render in memory, to give you an idea of how its really going to be when rendered.

You could also try rendering to new track for a similar part of the timeline - this creates an actual rendered file which can later be discarded.

Peter is right. Chances are it is just a lag issue. Your system is probably frame skipping and giving the appearance your audio is out of sync. There are adjustments you can make to the audio sync...but before I would adjust anything, I would render your video and burn it to DVD and see if there is any out of sync issues then. If there isn't, it is your system not being able to keep up with the demand. If it is still out of sync, you have another issue on capture or something weird. I doubt this though. J

when doing an edit preview make sure the preview is set to PREVIEW AUTO or PREVIEW FULL your choice although I prefer auto-it sets a smaller screen and the preview quality is fine for edit decisions. If you have the preview set to GOOD or BEST more often than not there will be a lag and Vegas will drop frames to keep up-the problem you expereinced is 1 I have had every once in a while and the audio goes haywire as well.
I'd be will to bet the audio is fine and you're just getting a lag in the preview.

Don

In addition to the above, have you verified that all your audio sample rates are set the same? Steve

i rendered it and make a wmv file, and it played early in the final output, it wasn't AS bad as it was when I was playing it in vegas, but the sound came into early.
I don't understand, is this just a vegas thing? Because of all of the editing softwares i've used on my computer, i've never had a problem like this..

P.s I had it on auto preview.

It's not necessairly a Vegas thing. Over the years and the thousands of hours of tapes I had this issue once and frankly can't remember what I did to correct it. It sounds like a real anomoly.

Just brainstormin' here so bear with.

If I'm understanding correctly the audio of the RAW captured footage is not playing in sync correct? If thats the case somethings fishy. Did you at anytime even inadvertantly unlock the audio track from the video track and perhaps slip the track a few frames? Does the RAW footage playout OK in the media player?
Render as an AVI check it before you render as WMV but honestly Jenna, it souds like in an editing process the audio got moved. Not saying that WAS it but it sure sounds like it.

Don

I didn't move the audio, i kept the audio linked with the video.. but there was a small section of audio that I wanted to add an effect to..

so because I couldn't figure out how to do it on that audio track (just the small clip) without the rest being affected, I made a new audio track and moved that small clip down to the new audio track and added the effect, it plays fine, if I play it right before the clip begins, but the further towards the beginning i go.. the earlier the audio clip plays.. So the audio on the first track plays fine..

perhaps there is something wrong with the additional tracks I added..

Oh and is it possible to add an audio effect to a split clip of audio without affecting the rest of the audio on that track??

I don't know, but to sum it up.. everything on an audio track besides the first one.. played earlier.. these were all just small clips, they were lied up properly, and did play fine from the beginning of the clip.

If I read this right you added a track and moved a clip to it to add an effect.
Is it THAT clip that is playing too early in the process?

First you can can effects to the clips at CLIP (event) level instead of TRACK level by simply right clicking, adding NON-REAL TIME FXs and add it to the Clip or Event. NOW you don't have to move Clips or Events around. It sounds like when you moved the clip to a new track that somewhere the other clips slid a bit. Maybe not but without actually seeing and playing the timeline it's a guess.
Try moving the Clip back to the original position, add the FXs to the CLIP and then stretch the timeline out by rotating the mouse wheel. This way you can actually see where any gaps might be OR if the audio is truely lined up with the video clips.

Don

heres the clip
 

well that fixed the problem with the one clip, but the other clips are still playing early.. They are just short special effects clips..

Basically it's a silly "sword fighting" scene.. after the small clip, I have a section of black space (and text).. and the special effects for the swords start as soon as the black clip plays, even though they are clearly underneath the sword fighting video clips.. (lol.. it was just something I was using to learn sony vegas a bit better.. )

this is just so confusing.. I mean it isn't terrible, but i'll take a leap and show you guys the clip I uploaded.. no rude comments.. I know it's not a work of art.

but heres the link for the video on youtube. I used my niece for the video.. lol.. and she's just a baby..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrGX7PHIhn8

First when you watch.. you'll hear a high pitch laugh.. that is supposed to come it.. when she stops crying, and has a little smirk on her face.. you'll notice how early it comes in..

Secondly.. the text afterwards that says "getting even".. you'll hear the sound effects come in way to early...after that the rest of the sound effects play fine..

now you can see exactally what i mean

Well it didn't seem like it was too far off so what you might do is make sure those audio clips are unlocked from the video and slip them over one or two frames see how it is and if needed slip them again. Keep doing that until the are correct then highlight the audio and video clips and GROUP them together.

Thats one POWERFUL baby ;-)

Don

how do i group them all together?

Highlight the all the clips you want as 1 group whether thats 1 video and 1 audio clip or a bunch of V&A clips. You can SHIFT CLICK or CONTROL CLICK to highlight the ones you want the simply press the G button to GROUP those clips together. Now when you move one you move them all.
Grouping is a good thing especially after you've done some heavy work to audio or video files and you want them to stay both toghether and sync'd.

Don

I couldn't group them all into one group, because everytime I clicked down to the other audio tracks, a hightlighted track would go away, so I put them into two groups.. as best I could.. and it didn't seem to make any difference..

this is just confusing. I know it's not an important video, but i'd rather tackle the problem so that if it arises in the future i'll know what to do to fix it..

but thanks for all your help!

Hold the CONTROL key and click that way you can highlight the very first and the very last or anything in between. If you want to select all of the highlight the first and then right click and click on SELECT EVENTS TO END or use the shift key and right click.

However splitting into 2 groups works just fine :-)

Don