Scratch

Sometimes MP3s import a little strangely - unfortunately, there's no known way to fix this. Try converting your MP3 to a WAV (I think Audacity can do that) and then import it - it should work, but it'll have slightly lower sound quality.

Mp3s are made by compressing wavs into smaller files by removing part of the sound frequencies. We can hear from 20Hz to 20,000 Hz worth of frequencies and that is a lot! The Human voice (especially babies) is closest to the 1000Hz frequency and we hear that range the best so we call it the middle of the entire audible frequency range. Ever seen Low Mid High or similar on a stereo? An equalizer is the same thing only it can fine-adjust a bunch more Lows, Mids, and Highs.

Anyway, Mp3s were made because once upon a time (and still for me at home) broadband didn't exist. And sending a 3Meg file, or one song in .Wav format, over dial-up takes around an hour. So someone went "Hey, you could just remove some of the higher frequencies and make the files smaller and they would still sound a lot like the original!" Because the Low and Mid ranges actually make up a very small part of the spectrum with 10s of thousands of frequencies in the audible High range. And as any tone gets lower or higher, it gets quieter because it is appraoching one end of the range of what we can and cannot hear.

So when you make an mp3, there are soooo many options on how many frequencies to remove, and how many frequencies DON"T get removed is called the files "bit rate." I usually hate mp3s (I'm a musician) because I like rock and usually people make them poorly. The cymbals sound less like instruments and more like someone smacking a big set of keys around.

Mp3s used to be made at a single bit rate. Another person thought "Gee, I hate bad sounding Mp3s. But the cymbals (or other high pitched tones) only play in certain parts of the song... hmmm?" and thus was born the "variable bit rate." Now your mp3 can squeeze out frequencies that aren't loud right now, but add them back in when the drummer smacks 'em again in the song.

So, although I never use sounds in my projects and have not read hardly anything about them in the forums yet, I am guessing that somewhere between bit rate quality, variable bit depths, and who knows what else has been thrown into the mix since I was into that stuff, lies the answer on why people have so many problems with mp3s.

As for .wavs, although they have also been tinkered with slightly, the 16 bit 44k whatever it is .wav is the original and standard version used by music companies to make cds. Aha!! The bit depth went up 22, 32, 64, something like that but that is the opposite of mp3s. Wave files got bigger in order to try to capture a better quality (basically more tiny little slices) sound. Hi-def? Blu-ray? The same thing but Blu-ray is video. Why don't I even care about them enough to see if I spelled them right? Because the human ears. eyes, and brain can only input audio and video so fast anyway. Just cause you can squeeze a little more data in doesn't mean I can magically hear or see better. (      money grabbing gimmicks... surround sound was done before like 30? years ago Google "quadraphonic" I think, but now you know so don't be scammed anymore by shiny plastic, and bad actors in tv commercials  > = P           )

Last edited by Locomule (2010-07-27 17:11:37)

Locomule wrote:

Mp3s are made by compressing wavs into smaller files by removing part of the sound frequencies. We can hear from 20Hz to 20,000 Hz worth of frequencies and that is a lot! The Human voice (especially babies) is closest to the 1000Hz frequency and we hear that range the best so we call it the middle of the entire audible frequency range. Ever seen Low Mid High or similar on a stereo? An equalizer is the same thing only it can fine-adjust a bunch more Lows, Mids, and Highs.

Anyway, Mp3s were made because once upon a time (and still for me at home) broadband didn't exist. And sending a 3Meg file, or one song in .Wav format, over dial-up takes around an hour. So someone went "Hey, you could just remove some of the higher frequencies and make the files smaller and they would still sound a lot like the original!" Because the Low and Mid ranges actually make up a very small part of the spectrum with 10s of thousands of frequencies in the audible High range. And as any tone gets lower or higher, it gets quieter because it is appraoching one end of the range of what we can and cannot hear.

So when you make an mp3, there are soooo many options on how many frequencies to remove, and how many frequencies DON"T get removed is called the files "bit rate." I usually hate mp3s (I'm a musician) because I like rock and usually people make them poorly. The cymbals sound less like instruments and more like someone smacking a big set of keys around.

Mp3s used to be made at a single bit rate. Another person thought "Gee, I hate bad sounding Mp3s. But the cymbals (or other high pitched tones) only play in certain parts of the song... hmmm?" and thus was born the "variable bit rate." Now your mp3 can squeeze out frequencies that aren't loud right now, but add them back in when the drummer smacks 'em again in the song.

So, although I never use sounds in my projects and have not read hardly anything about them in the forums yet, I am guessing that somewhere between bit rate quality, variable bit depths, and who knows what else has been thrown into the mix since I was into that stuff, lies the answer on why people have so many problems with mp3s.

As for .wavs, although they have also been tinkered with slightly, the 16 bit 44k whatever it is .wav is the original and standard version used by music companies to make cds. Aha!! The bit depth went up 22, 32, 64, something like that but that is the opposite of mp3s. Wave files got bigger in order to try to capture a better quality (basically more tiny little slices) sound. Hi-def? Blu-ray? The same thing but Blu-ray is video. Why don't I even care about them enough to see if I spelled them right? Because the human ears. eyes, and brain can only input audio and video so fast anyway. Just cause you can squeeze a little more data in doesn't mean I can magically hear or see better. (      money grabbing gimmicks... surround sound was done before like 30? years ago Google "quadraphonic" I think, but now you know so don't be scammed anymore by shiny plastic, and bad actors in tv commercials  > = P           )

You've got something there!

Locomule wrote:

Thanks and I'm forever sorry about the novels but I'm the OG super geek and it just gushes out. Plus, I've learned sooo much by crawling through years worth of archived posts at forums for all kinds of subjects.. so I know how much difference a single post can make for who knows how many people to come in the future. I also occasionally remember that not everyone here is 39 years old and has lived through all these changes so I'm just sharing what I've seen, I'm nobody special. And as far as sharing knowledge, this site rocks. We are growing giants around here!

I actually appreciate your long posts, and the insight you bring from your experience.    As much as I greatly enjoy today's technological advances, I sort of wish I could have been around for the days of BASIC, Commodore 64 (I have an emulator bookmarked), etc. Then again, what would I do without Scratch and the internet? 

When that happens I import that song into audacity, then export it as a wav

nonster wrote:

nonster wrote:

Sometimes when I import a song into a project it comes up as being 0:00. It says it imported and it has the song title and everything but it won't play??? It's an mp3 too??? WHAT AM I DOING WRONG???? HELP ME!!!

Thanks to everyone who helped me!!!! I figured it out! Thanks thanks thanks!!!

Well, looks like this topic has been resolved, so I'll close it.

And also, I just realized this should probably go in Troubleshooting    I'll move it there, too.