This tutorial teaches you how to change the volume on clips in Avid Media Composer.
Audio Mixer Tool in Avid Media Composer
You need the Audio Mixer Tool to change how audio levels. Go up to the Tools menu and select Audio Mixer. Now, move your time position indicator, the blue bar in the timeline, to make sure it’s overtop of the clip who’s audio levels you want to change.
Take a look at the Audio Mixer Tool.
If the clip is only on A1, you’ll see you can adjust the A1 slider in the Audio Mixer. If your clip is on multiple tracks, or there are multiple clips at this time, you’ll be able to adjust the volume on all of them. When your clip is on multiple tracks, which can be often, you’ll want to adjust the volume on both sliders.
Like the music used in the video tutorial? It’s Walking With A Pet on AudioJungle.
Using the Sliders in the Audio Mixer Tool to Change Volume
There are a few ways to use the slider to change the volume in Avid Media Composer. The easiest way is to click the square in the middle of the slider and drag it up or down. Up makes it louder. Down makes the volume softer.
Another method is to click on one of the numbers off to the right side of the slider. The track’s audio levels will jump to that value when you click one of the numbers.
Lastly, you can click in the box at the bottom of the slider and type in a value.
Change Volume over Time in Avid Media Composer
Please note that when you change the volume of a clip using the Audio Mixer Tool in Avid Media Composer, it’s for that instance of that clip in the timeline. If you want to change volume over time, you can use keyframes to do that (this is outside the scope of this article). However a quick and dirty way, and the method I use 99% of the time after more than a dozen years using Avid, is this:
First, make an Add Edit on the clip. Then change the volume on the now second part of the clip. And lastly add a dissolve at the Add Edit point.
If you’ve read this tutorial and you still can’t figure it out, please leave a comment and I’ll do what I can to help troubleshoot it. But if you can now change the volume in Avid Media Composer, I hope you stick around and check out some of the other Avid tutorials on my website or consider signing up to get notified about new blog posts and happenings around EVF.
– Josh