Do you hate the sound of your voice in your recordings? Have you ever wanted to sound more professional? If you answered yes to both these questions, the answer to your prayer is Audacity. It is an audio software program that allows you to make your voice sound better. Using Audacity is easy and free of cost.
Here are the main features of Audacity:
- You can use the software program to edit a variety of sound files including MP2, WAV, MP3, FLAC, and many others.
- You can use it to copy, cut, splice, and blend a variety of sounds.
- It is loaded with effects like equalization, normalization, fade in and out, truncation, silence, and others.
- Its noise gate feature can effectively eliminate irritating background sounds.
The following is a brief step-by-step guide to make your voice sound great using Audacity:
- Import your sound file into Audacity.
- Open your sound file and click on Effect, Equalization, and Graphic Equalizer.
- Use the 60 Hz slider to decrease the frequency.
- Increase the frequency bands around 150 Hz to enhance clarity, articulation, presence, and others.
- Listen to your edited audio file and check if it sounds better. If not, you may have some more tweaking to do. After all, the famous saying “practice makes perfect” applies to Audacity too.
Does that sound confusing? The following is a detailed guide to help you edit sound files like a pro on Audacity:
Install Audacity
Visit the official website of Audacity, choose the version that is most compatible with your device and Operating System, and click on the “Download” link. The instructions keep popping up on your screen. You only have to follow them.
As Audacity is open-source software, it doesn’t include any unwanted programs.
Set Up Audacity
Initially, the wide range of unlabelled buttons and options in Audacity may confuse you. But the simple truth is that you don’t have to use most of these options to use Audacity.
Let us walk you through the interface:
- Audacity includes a couple of drop-down lists that enable you to choose your playback and recording devices. Set up your microphone as a recording device and your speakers or headphones as a playback device. This enables you to record your voice and listen to your edited audio files.
- Click on the red button to record your voice on Audacity. Click on the grey square to stop recording.
- The play and pause buttons will be of great help to you while reviewing your audio files.
- Use the sliders on the interface to control the playback volume and the gain.
- Click on the File menu to save your edited audio files and export existing ones to Audacity.
- Use the Effect menu to edit your audio files.
Start Recording Your Voice
Recording your voice is the easiest thing you can do on Audacity. Just click on the red button to get started. However, remember to remain silent for a few seconds before you start speaking. By doing so, you will create a room tone, which will be of great help to you while eliminating the background noise in your file.
While recording your voice, you will see a timeline displaying your audio in the form of waves. It keeps updating itself as you continue speaking.
Eliminate Background Noise
You can not only zoom in and out the timeline but also select parts of the timeline for the purpose of editing. The selected areas will be highlighted.
- Now select the few seconds of silence at the beginning of your audio file (room tone).
- Click Noise Reduction in the Effect menu.
- A popup appears with a couple of sliders.
- Click “Get Noise Profile” so that Audacity understands the nature of the noise you want to reduce or eliminate.
- Select your entire timeline.
- Click Repeat Noise Reduction in the Effect menu. If you don’t want to do this manually, use Ctrl+ R.
Audacity will now remove the background noise. You can apply this filter multiple times to clean up your file further, but this may destroy the quality of your voice. So we advise you to be careful while using this filter.
Normalize Your Audio File
If you had set your gain below 100% while recording your voice, your audio file will sound quiet. Here are the steps to fix that:
- Select your entire soundtrack once again.
- Click on Normalize in the Effect menu.
- Experiment with the settings in the window that pops up on your screen till you get the desired results.
The normalize option amplifies your audio and makes it louder without destroying the quality of your voice. After normalizing your audio, the sound waves on your timeline become thicker.
Compress Your Audio File
Now that you are satisfied with the loudness of your audio file, you can compress it. When you do so, the louder parts of your sound file become quieter and the quieter parts become louder. As a result, your voice will sound crisper and easier to understand.
Follow these steps to compress your file:
- Select your entire soundtrack.
- Click Compressor in the Effect menu.
- You will see plenty of sliders to experiment with, which means that you have to practice a lot till you get the desired effects.
However, your voice will sound quieter again although it will sound crisper. You can fix it by simply normalizing your audio file again. But this time, set it to -3.0 dB so that it becomes louder while simultaneously leaving you enough space to normalize it again if required.
Add EQ to Your Sound File
After all that editing, you may feel that your voice just doesn’t sound natural. To correct that, you can adjust the high, low, and mid end. Here are the steps involved.
- Select your soundtrack.
- Click Filter Curve in the Effect menu.
- Start adjusting the curve to make your voice sound better.
- You can listen to your edited soundtrack first before applying the changes. The Preview button allows you to do that.
- If you can’t figure it out, first click on Factory Presets under Manage and select a preset from the list.
Here are 3 more tips:
1. Use the Bass and Treble Boost option, but be careful while doing so. Males may want to use the bass boost to make their voices sound deeper. Female users will get better results with the treble boost option.
2. Remove blank audio so that your file length becomes shorter and easier to add to the background of a commentary, video, and so on.
3. Once you are sure of the settings, you don’t have to edit manually. Create an effect chain and apply the changes with one click.