Common Audio Formats

Common Audio Formats

The built-in AIFF File, CAF File, and WAVE File settings use the Common Audio Formats transcoding format. This format encodes AIFF (Audio Interchange File Format), CAF (Apple Core Audio Format), or WAVE (Waveform Audio File Format) files. You can also create custom settings that use the Common Audio Formats transcoding format.

The properties of built-in and custom settings that use this transcoding format are located in the General inspector and Audio inspector. These properties are described below.

Important: When you add a setting (or a destination that includes settings) to a job, Compressor analyzes the source media and then automatically assigns the most appropriate setting properties (based on the setting’s transcoding format and the characteristics of your source media file). It’s recommended that you use the automatically assigned setting properties.

Setting summary

Displays the setting name and transcoding format, as well as an estimated output file size. When you add a setting to a job or change the setting’s properties, this summary automatically updates.

General properties

  • Name: Displays the name of the setting.

  • Description: Displays the description of the setting.

  • Extension: Displays the extension of the output file.

    Tip: To output a file with a different extension, change the value in the “File type” pop-up menu, described below.

  • Allow job segmenting: This checkbox is dimmed because job segmenting is not available for settings that output only an audio file.

  • Default location: Choose an item from the pop-up menu to set the default save location for transcoded files.

  • File type: Choose a file type from the pop-up menu—AIFF, CAF, or WAVE.

Retiming

This section contains one property:

  • Set duration to: Sets the processing algorithm used to adjust the frame rate during transcoding. Select either of the following options:

    • [Percentage] of source: Modifies the output clip’s speed by a percentage of the source clip’s speed. Enter a value in the percentage field or choose a preset value from the adjacent pop-up menu (with a downward arrow).

    • [Total duration]: Sets the duration of the clip. Enter a timecode duration in the field or click the arrows to increase or decrease the time.

    For more information, see Retime video and audio.

Audio properties

  • Channel layout: Use this pop-up menu to manually set the type of audio channel layout. For more information about audio channel layouts, including the surround sound channel layout, see About audio channels.

  • Sample rate: Use this pop-up menu to set the number of times per second that music waveforms (samples) are captured digitally. The higher the sample rate, the higher the audio quality and the larger the file size.

  • Sample size: Use this pop-up menu to manually set the sample size of the audio signal.

Audio effects

For a list of available audio effects and instructions on how to add an audio effect to a setting, see Add and remove effects.