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Score
     
 
This iMovie exercise teaches:
 
Max Steiner composing
 


● How to synchronize shots to music using beat marks
● How to insert, pin, and float background scores to digital movies
● How to add sound effects
● How to duck sound tracks (reduce volume in one to make another more audible)
● How to select a score appropriate for your project
● How to judge when silence is better than music

(Instructions for Windows Movie Maker are here).
 
  1. Download these two files. One is a 54-second segment of Santa Fe Trail "work print" ready for "Max Steiner"—you— to partially re-record. The second is 35 seconds of Steiner's score to insert back into the film.  
  The clip includes visual cues and a click track such as Steiner, conducting the Warner Bros. orchestra in 1940, would hear in his earphones.  
  2. Create a new standard Movie Maker project. Call it "Score." Drag "PictureTrack" into the timeline.  
  3. Drag "Santa Fe Trail Score Excerpt.mp3" into the project where the sound editor's punch mark flashes.  
  4. If you missed the insertion point, relocate the sound clip by dragging forward or backward.  
  Hint: To synchronize the music and picture tracks, mute the picture track (Right click, "mute.") Steiner was "mickey mousing" here. Nudge the sound track forward or back so that, as often as possible, the actor's footfalls advance to the music.  
  5. Would a changed sound environment convert this action into elegy? Mute "Santa Fe Trail Score Excerpt.mp3." Add to "Score" this soldiers' chorus from elsewhere in the movie. Trim the soldiers' chorus‚"singing.mp3" to the final 54.6 seconds of sound. Right click and select "fade-in" and right click and select "fade out".  
  Using the Clip Trimmer, trim the soldiers' chorus—"singing.mp3"—to the final 54.6 seconds of sound. Add a 1.0 second fade-in and a 1.0 second fade-out. (Inspector>audio>fade in/out>manual.)  
 
7. Add this wind sound approximately here, anticipating slightly the exterior shot that follows. Add a 2 second fade-out.
 
  8. Duck the wind track—that is, reduce the volume of the soldiers' chorus track. (Inspector>Audio>Ducking>15%).  
  9. "Antique" the picture track. (Inspector>Video Effect>Romantic. Inspector>Video>Red Gain>175%>Brightness>-17%.)  
  You're done. You movie now sounds and looks something like this.  
 
 
  10. Want to play more? Delete the wind track and reinsert it into the workspace without attaching it—i.e., without "pinning it"—to any frame. (It now "floats.")  
  Using the Clip Trimmer, trim "singing.mp3" to the final 40 seconds of sound. Listen. The wind begins now when the portal swings open.  
  Reverse the sound clip order. (Edit>Arrange Music Tracks>Floating Music Tracks). Using the Clip Trimmer, trim back the wind track to its initial 20.8 seconds. The soldiers chorus now begins when the soldier begins advancing.  
 
 
  11. Sequence shots to change with beats of the score. Create a new standard iMovie project. Call it "Beats."  
  Import Drag "Santa Fe Trail Score Excerpt.mp3" into the project. In the Clip Trimmer, play the sound track. At every beat where you'd like to make a cut in the picture track, tap "m" on your keyboard for iMovie to insert a beat marker. Click Done.  
  12.Drag a sequence of shots into the work area. iMovie trims your selections to fit inside your markers. Replace any segment by dragging a different segment over it. Your movie now sound and looks something like this.