Gary Levitt is the co-founder of Future Moments. Last week, he introduced himself and his iOS app – Audio Fix: For Videos.
I don’t normally cover iOS software, but I’m a big fan of anything that helps our audio sound better, so I wanted to bring this to your attention.
NOTE: I have not used this app, but it sounded interesting, a free trial is available and I thought you’d like to know.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Future Moments is a developer of a number of iOS apps: MicSwap, MicSwap Pro, AudioFix Pro: for Videos, AudioMaster: For Podcasts and Music, AudioMaster Pro: For Podcasts and Music.
“AudioFix Pro: For Videos instantly improves, boosts, extracts or mutes the audio in your iOS videos. Import a video and AudioFix immediately cleans it’s sound and maximizes it’s volume.
“We never overwrite your original. Save as a new video in the same resolution. You can also use Audio Fix to reduce the file size of your video for easier sharing with our compress video option. Use Audio Fix to remove all sound from your video. Lots of options!” (iTunes listing)
DEVICE REQUIREMENTS
iOS 9.0 or later iPhones iPod touch, iPads
Product: AudioFix Pro: For Videos
Developer: Future Moments LLC
Website: future-moments.com
iTunes link: itunes.apple.com/us/app/audiofix-for-videos/id1060647377?mt=8
Free trial available allowing you to experiment with settings. Subscription required for export. Subscription pricing: Quarterly ($4.99 US), 6-months ($7.99); and annual ($13.99)
WHAT IT DOES
AUDIO FILTER CHOICES
Here are a couple of tips to using the app:
INTERVIEW WITH THE DEVELOPER
Last week, I sent co-creator, Gary Levitt, several questions via email to learn more about what the app does. Here are his answers.
Larry: Why did you invent the app?
Gary Levitt: There were too many videos with low volume or bad sound. I got tired of cranking the volume on my phone and cupping my hands around the speaker to hear it. I felt a problem that needed a solution.
Larry: What are you doing with the audio in a video file – modifying the master, copying it and relinking to the video, applying filters? In other words, how is the audio being processed?
Gary Levitt: We always work from a copy so we never overwrite your original. The app separates the audio from the video then lets you choose between different noise reduction filters. After that it then boosts its volume while making sure it never peaks. We also have a strong compressor as a filter choice called “Audio Smoother” which can make some videos more pleasing to the ear.
Larry: If you are copying the audio, are you duplicating the video as well?
Gary Levitt: Yep. The app always makes a copy so we never overwrite your original. This way you can easily compare the 2 and not worry about losing anything.
Larry: When you boost gain are you simply doing a level adjustment, normalizing, or applying compression?
Gary Levitt: Mostly we’re doing a level adjustment with a slight limiter, unless you choose the “Audio Smoother” filter. We want to preserve the original audio as much as possible. We try to enhance the good elements and eliminate the bad ones as well as making it nice and loud.
Larry: How are you guarding against over-peaking and distortion?
Gary Levitt: We’ve got a slight limiter there to stop peaks. If there’s distortion already present in the video there’s not much that can be done. Digital distortion is nasty.
Larry: When you remove hiss are you applying noise reduction, or using EQ to reduce high-frequencies?
Gary Levitt: It’s all part of the magic sauce and depends on the filter you choose. AudioFix has a lot of choices. 4 of them are combos of filters for videos with more complex audio problems. These are what we call our “AudioFix Mild” through “AudioFix Ultra” filters. They each have descriptions below their names.
Larry: How are you processing the audio internally in your app – specifically, the bit-depth?
Gary Levitt: We don’t change the bit depth of the original audio unless a user chooses to export as “Compress for Sharing” which shrinks the file size for easier transfers.
Larry: Why should someone consider using your app?
Gary Levitt: Please do it for my sanity. I don’t want to hear any more bad sounding, hard to hear videos! 🙂
SUMMARY
With more videos being shot on iPhones and with more and more people using the mic on their phone to record audio, bad iPhone audio is only going to get worse.
While the ideal solution is to record using double-system, in the real-world that won’t happen. This sounds to me like a very nice alternative to fixing bad audio after it’s recorded.
The app is free for download and experimentation, but you’ll need to purchase a subscription in order to export the corrected audio.
