- A good part of the audience tends to agree that something is missing from a video without background sound. This does not force you to add audio in all your videos, but it does force you to evaluate if it is convenient to do so
- If the answer you give yourself, or that your team gives you, is positive, you should consider a series of essential steps to successfully add music to your productions
Audiovisual production can be an infinite world of possibilities, especially for those who are just taking their first steps in the field. For example, if you have the image but you think that to be complete it lacks the sound, then it is important to know how to add music to a video. We teach it to you easily.
The first thing you have to keep in mind, of course, is that it is not about adding a sound for its own sake, but with a meaning. The background music, or any other type of audio that you consider appropriate, must at least accompany what is being seen and, in the best of cases, contribute with its lyrics or its melody to what we observe.
Therefore, you have to manage this resource very carefully to avoid abusing it, or doing without it unnecessarily when you could very well include it in your productions, to give them a distinctive touch.
Essential Steps to Add Music to a Video
think about the tone
Choosing the perfect music for your audiovisual piece is what will determine, in the end, its success or failure. Far from wanting to put pressure on yourself, you must be aware that music can affect the emotions of the audience, so learning to combine it with what is shown on the screen is as important as the video editing itself.
Of course, as you gain experience you’ll fine-tune your ear, and you’ll be able to imagine more precisely how well they match specific audio tracks with the videos you’re thinking of applying them to. Meanwhile, it is recommended that you do the simplest of all: the trial and error method.
Do not limit yourself to just one tone, but think of several and put them to run on your videos, taking advantage of the fact that surely you have a preview system to check how well they combine The elements.
Royalty Free Music Libraries
The issue of commercial rights to many music tracks is one that still has no solution, and one that you will learn about as you get involved in this environment, so the best thing to start with is to stick only to royalty-free music libraries, that ensure you have no claims against you.
If you’re one of the many creators wondering why you should use these libraries when you have hundreds of songs available on Spotify, YouTube Music, and iTunes, the answer is simple: so you don’t risk your job. You can suffer a lawsuit about your products, and that will force them to stop being published. Normally, this means that you will not receive money for the effort, etc.
In other words: no matter how much you pay for your streaming music, you do not own that content. Then, turn to royalty-free music librariesWhat Soundstripeto cite an example.
License the perfect song
You already have where to get your themes, and that means that it is time to discard some to select others. Alternatively, if you’re going to use a copyrighted one because you think it’s perfect, license it. Whenever you don’t, you expose yourself to a Content ID lawyer identifying the issue, and suing you.
Just in case, a lawsuit can be settled for a $100,000 fine, or 10 years in prison. It depends on the country.
Bring everything to your editor’s timeline
With your sounds already chosen, emphasizing the music but also the others, take them to the video editor. Many times it will happen to you, and it is not strange that it happens, that the ideal audio disappoints you when using it. But you don’t have to get frustrated or anything like that. Sometimes a sound you didn’t like will end up loving you.
If you have a few hours of video editing on you, you will know that you only need to drop the sound files into the timeline or timeline, and play the content along with the video, which will go on another timeline. Remember that you can advance the track, delay it, cut it, and modify it in thousands of ways.
Repeat the process as many times as you have to
One of the advantages of royalty-free music libraries is that you can do and undo with the content you find in them, so it’s another reason to agree with us if you don’t want to spend more. Undoubtedly, you can invest in licenses from time to time, but it doesn’t make sense to do it all the time.
For a video, if it is of a respectable length of time, you may need several songs or sounds. Multiplying them by the licenses of each, if you have to pay them, you will end up losing money, not winning. So learn to discern situations, and do and undo with your video and audio edits when you have to.
What else would you like to know about the process of adding music to a video?
