Alright, let's face it. With mobile cameras taking over, the way we record video and the way we watch it have changed. You can love it or you can hate it, but vertical videos are everywhere today. It all started with people just being forgetful and holding their phones vertically when recording. Today, however, many brands create vertical videos on purpose because they look more authentic when published on social media which is (surprise!) consumed on mobile phones that are held vertically most of the times.

Who would have expected that back in 2014, huh?

But can I fix a vertical video if I don’t like the way it looks?

Yes, you can. You don't have to follow those modern media trends if you don't like them. And you certainly don't have to put up with two ugly black bars on either side of your footage, if you accidentally record it vertically - or what is called a portrait mode.

VSDC Free Video Editor offers several ways how to fix vertical videos, and below we'll show you what they are.

Download VSDC Free Video Editor for Windows

One of the most popular hacks is to blur the sides of a vertical video. This is an elegant way to get rid of the black side bars.

Vertical video fix #1 – blurring its sides

• Add your footage to the timeline. To do that, click ‘Add object’ >> ‘Video’ and select the required file from the explorer.
• Use the right mouse button to click on the video and select ‘Duplicate’.
• For the new video object, set the same size as the original video has. See the illustration below.
• Then go to the ‘Cutting and splitting’ tab at the top menu and choose ‘Auto cropping’. It will stretch the duplicated video to the size of the entire scene and create the effect of a background.
• Now, to finalize fixing your vertical video, you only need to blur its sides. To do that, in the ‘Video effects’ tab, select ‘Filters’ >> ‘Gaussian blur’. See the illustration below.
• Go to the Properties window and adjust the blur level to achieve the desired result. The Properties window tab can be found on the right side of the program interface.
• Enjoy the new look of your vertical video! By the way, you can use any other video or image for the blurred background effect if you don’t want to duplicate the original one.

Vertical video fix #2 – creating a project with the same resolution as in your original video

Blurring the sides of a vertical video is the most popular way to make it look decent but there is also a roundabout approach to it. You can just use the resolution the video is recorded in and create a project with the same size parameters. Technically, your video will remain in a “vertical format” but you’ll get rid of the black borders.

Here is how to do it:

• Add your vertical video to the timeline.
• Go to the View tab in the top menu – you’ll open a Project explorer.
• Click on your project name and go to the Properties window to find the scene’s size parameters.
• Reduce the scene’s width (and height if needed) to the size of your original video. See the video tutorial below.
• Now, click on the video object and go to the Properties window to use the “Set the same size as the parent has” button. This action will make the video perfectly fit the size of the scene.

Now you have a perfect vertical video without black bars on the sides. Note that once you perform it, all the objects – videos and images you add to the project – will be automatically adjusted to the new size of the scene.

Vertical video fix #3 – rotating a video that loads horizontally

Sometimes what happens is that we - the forgetful ones - start recording a video in a portrait mode and then rotate the phone to a landscape mode while the video is still being recorded. Or even the other way around! As a result, you can get a vertical video loading horizontally when played.

You can fix that too. In fact, it will literally require you a few seconds and a couple of clicks:

• Add your video to VSDC video editor timeline.
• Click ‘Rotate’ on the toolbar above the scene and preview the result.
• If your video appears to be larger than the scene size, you can manually reduce its size or adjust the parameters using the Properties window.

Now that you know how to use VSDC as a vertical video editor to blur the sides of the footage or change the scene size, you may want to check other guides for creating a great movie. We have over 200 of them on our YouTube channel. Don't forget to subscribe!

Sometimes footage may sound “noisy” simply because there were too many background sounds when you were recording it. Don’t rush to hit the “Delete” button, though. In most cases, you can easily fix it.

In this instruction, we’ll show you how to reduce audio noise from your recording using VSDC Free Video Editor. If you don’t have the tool yet, you can download it from the official page.

VSDC Free Video Editor provides two powerful Audio Denoise filters: Median filter and Audio gate.

Audio gate is one of the most commonly used techniques in audio production post-processing. This filter comes in especially handy when you work with live recordings trying to remove the unwanted sounds between passages, because it is so efficient at recognizing steady noise sources – such as rumble, hiss, and hum – and reducing them to the minimum.

Technically, when you apply Audio gating, you control when and to what degree audio passes through a channel. In other words, you create a gate to filter the sounds in the video.

You may want to apply gating for three reasons:

1. To reduce the unwanted external sounds
2. To reduce some natural channel noise
3. To use Audio gate as a special effect

Here is how it works. Gates are controlled by setting several parameters:

• Threshold. Decibel level in which the gate opens or closes. The higher the threshold, the louder the sound (stronger the signal) must be to open the gate.

  

• Attack. Controls the speed of the gate opening and consider very fast attack time for percussive instruments. Slower times (10 ms or more) for everything else.

  

• Release. The release time is key to a natural sounding audio decay. For noise elimination with an electric guitar, set the parameter much higher.

  

• Reduction. Sets the amount of signal reduction.

  

• Ratio. It determines how much compression is applied. For example, if the ratio is set to 4:1, every 4dB of signal that crosses the threshold will be compressed down to 1dB.

  

• Knee. Determines how the compressor responds once the signal crosses the threshold. A hard knee clamps down right away, while a soft knee causes the compressor to gradually kick in as the signal gets further past the threshold.

  

• Make-up gain. A control that raises the level of the signal, once it has been processed, to the desired level for the next stage of the signal.

  

Now that we’ve walked through the process of applying Audio gate, let’s take a look at how Median filter works.

Median filter helps you eliminate impulse noise in your footage. In a nutshell, this can be ideal for removing unwanted, frequent sharp sounds like clicks and pops.

• FFT block size. FFT (Fast Fourier Transform) is an important measurement method which converts a signal into individual spectral components and thereby provides frequency information about the signal.

  

• Window type. There are several different types of windows used to reduce spectral leakage when performing a Fourier Transform on time data and converting it into the frequency domain.

  

• Overlap mode. The setting determines what percentage of the FFT size block of data points is re-used for the next trace. Overlap processing can be used to provide high resolution in both the frequency and time axis.

  

• Overlap coefficient. High overlap percentages and low FFT block sizes provide the highest time resolution but take longer to process the data file.

  

Hopefully, this was helpful. Even though it may sound (or look) overwhelming, once you start – you’ll see how fast and easy audio noise reduction really is. Now go and try it yourself!

To download VSDC Free Video Editor, please, proceed here - www.videosoftdev.com/free-video-editor/download.

Find more awesome tutorials on our YouTube channel - www.youtube.com/user/FlashIntegro/videos.

Many videos require voice commentaries. Educational clips, how-tos, game walkthroughs, video blogs - all are typically produced with use of voice over software. There are various solutions to record your voice and add it to the footage. In fact, there are even 3-rd party tools for voice recording and processing audio on a professional level. Those are used in professional audio recording studios, for example. Yet, some video editors also have embedded tools for recording voice commentaries. VSDC Video Editor is one of them.

There are two ways to use VSDC as a voice over software. The first one belongs to the free version of VSDC video editor, and the second - a more advanced way - is available in VSDC Pro version. Below we'll take a close look at both ways, and explain how you can make use of the audio recording feature for your videos.

In both cases you'll need a microphone which is either embedded or connected to your computer. The biggest difference between the two, is the sequence of steps required from a user:

• In VSDC free version, you can create an audio commentary using an embedded Voice Recorder. Once you record an audio piece, you'll be able to add it to you project and apply to the required video fragment.
• In VSDC Pro version, you'll use a Voice Over software feature. That means, the voice recording is carried out along with the video preview in one and the same window. It allows for adding audio comments at required parts of the movie easier and more precisely.

Method #1. How to use VSDC as a free voice over software

• Open the editor, go to the ‘Tool’ tab and select ‘Voice Recorder’

  

• If you need the audio to be recorded in a prticular format, first you should choose it. VSDC voice recorded offers a lot of popular audio formats such as MP3, AAC, WAV and etc.

  

• Second, select the audio device you're going to use for recording.

  

• If necessary, you can check the option to split your recordings by their duration or by size.

  

• To start recording your voice, click the corresponding button.

  

• When your voice comments are ready, go to your project and add the audio files to the timeline - precisely where it needs to be added.

  

Method #2 How to use VSDC Pro as a more advanced voice over software

• Add your video where you want to add your voice.

• Click the ‘More Tool’ button on the panel above the scene and select ‘Voice Over’.

  

• Preview the video and decide where you’d like to add your comments.
• Move the cursor to the moment of the video where the recording is supposed to start.

• Click the ‘Start Recording’ button.

  

• Record your voice using the microphone.

• At the end of recording click ‘Stop recording’.

  

• Click on the ‘Playlist’ button to see the list of recordings.

  

• Close the voice over window.

• Your recording will appear on the timeline automatically.

  

Even though both ways help you get the job done, VSDC Pro version makes a more precise voice over software, saving your time and effort. So, if audio recording is not a one time job, but rather a regular task you 'll have to deal with frequently, you should probably consider it as a more convenient tool.

If you're looking for using voice over software in your video production process, you can also check out our YouTube channel to see how quickly and easily you can utilize VSDC for that purpose.

So, you got a shaky footage, and now you’re looking for the way to fix it? You’re on the right page then. Watch this guide and read the instruction below to see how to quickly stabilize your video using VSDC Video Editor.

Truth be told, most videos shot on the go without special equipment (camera stabilizer mount) come out shaky – just in a varying degree. That happens when you’re holding a camera and your hands start making sporadic movements, or when it’s attached to a drone or a vehicle so that you’re shooting and moving at the same time. Yes, action camera owners, that is especially relevant for you.

Gladly, there is a way to easily remove jittering and achieve a perfectly stable image in the process of post-production. In fact, the Video Stabilization tool is among the most demanded features of VSDC video editing suite. And if you’re curious about how it works, the secret is in the ability to shift video frames. It allows for excluding the shaky effect while any gaps created in the process are being filled with the information from the previous frames.

In our inbox, we often see questions from users on what the best stabilization settings are. So, we decided to address this in a separate tutorial. Below, you’ll see a guide compiled with help one of our dear users who submitted the parameters that worked best for his footage. After being tested, they appeared to be efficient for most shaky videos, so we’re happy to share the secret setup with you.

The parameters used in this tutorial are 'Shakiness' and 'Smooth zoom'. Here is a step-by-step breakdown of the process:

Open VSDC Video Editor and proceed to ‘Tools’. Select ‘Video stabilization’.

Click ‘Open file’ to add the footage you’re willing to stabilize.

Find ‘Shakiness’ among available settings. This parameter detects how shaky a video is and how quickly your camera changes positions and takes control of these movements. Set the Shakiness rate to the maximum using the arrows.

Once you’ve done that, find the ‘Smooth zoom’ dropdown menu in the upper toolbar. This setting allows you for smoothly zooming in the footage.

Select 'Use the smoothed zoom' as shown on the screenshot below.

After performing these actions, you should get a stabilized video, no matter how shaky the original was. So, if there is nothing else you’d like to change in it, just proceed to the ‘Formats’ tab and choose the most appropriate output format. Remember that in VSDC, you can change export profile settings – format, codec, resolution, quality, width, and height - when necessary. If this is the case, click on the “Edit profile” button at the bottom right corner.

Once you’re done, click on the red ‘Export project’ sign.

To download VSDC Free Video Editor, please, proceed here - http://www.videosoftdev.com/free-video-editor/download

To subscribe for VSDC Pro annual license, please, place your order.

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Find more awesome tutorials on our YouTube channel - https://www.youtube.com/user/FlashIntegro/videos