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To crossfade music is the popular way DJs the world over-whether at parties or in nightclubs and discos-do to keep the crowd busy dancing all night. Because continuity on the dance floor, is how any party lover can really say that they had a great time.
And keeping the dance floor busy means continuously making the music to play non-stop. To keep the music playing non-stop, crossfade is the essential technique used. If you're a music lover in today's world, there is a lot of audio software tools online that you can download and use to play your favorite music.
The best part is that with a few good tools like audacity, you can make the music that you love play non-stop using non other than the technique of crossfading which is what this post will talk about right now.
What is crossfade
How it works
What is crossfade
How it works
Difference between Analog and Digital Crossfading
Most common uses of crossfade
What is crossfade?
When a deejay gets onto a stage with his audio equipment-laptop, mixers, loudspeakers, microphone and other audio accessories, etc. his job is to dish out music to an expecting crowd of people. It doesn't matter the environment, whether it is a house party, the night club or a private all exclusive party.
What is crossfade?
When a deejay gets onto a stage with his audio equipment-laptop, mixers, loudspeakers, microphone and other audio accessories, etc. his job is to dish out music to an expecting crowd of people. It doesn't matter the environment, whether it is a house party, the night club or a private all exclusive party.
The Dj knows that he has to delight of the audience with the music that he is going to play. In doing so he has to ensure two things;
-He must play the kind of music that will keep the audience busy on the dance floor and not be bored;
-the music must have continuity and no breaks except when he the deejay or the party host wants to make an announcement.
This is where the technique of using crossfade comes in. Djs know that once the music plays and the crowd starts dancing, they have to keep the music playing non-stop.
They know that an already excited crowd wouldn't want the music to stop and so they the Deejays have a big responsibility of keeping the crowd so busy dancing, enough to forget their worries for one night.
After all, when you go to a party you go there to have fun and to forget all your worries. This brings up the question, what is crossfading?
Crossfading audio music as the Djs do it all the time, is a simple way of creating a smooth transition from one song to another. In essence it means that when song A is about to finish, song B transitions into song A and continues the flow of music like it's one long audio track.
Here is how one source defines it.
"Crossfading is a phenomenon through which a smooth transition is created between two sounds...and is often utilized by DJs who blend various tracks into a single song in order to enhance the music performance...." source tecnopedia
To enhance the music performance simply means that music plays continuously in non-stop fashion and this is what crossfading is all about. It allows one song to fade smoothly out while the next song fades smoothly in.
Crossfading audio music as the Djs do it all the time, is a simple way of creating a smooth transition from one song to another. In essence it means that when song A is about to finish, song B transitions into song A and continues the flow of music like it's one long audio track.
Here is how one source defines it.
"Crossfading is a phenomenon through which a smooth transition is created between two sounds...and is often utilized by DJs who blend various tracks into a single song in order to enhance the music performance...." source tecnopedia
To enhance the music performance simply means that music plays continuously in non-stop fashion and this is what crossfading is all about. It allows one song to fade smoothly out while the next song fades smoothly in.
The transition process has to be smooth and highly unnoticeable to the ordinary ear. And so what you get with this smooth transition is a mix of different songs playing like they have been joined together to play as one full length music.
This is what the Djs do all the time at the night clubs. But to do what they do using the technique of crossfading it is best to understand how crossfade works.
How Crossfade works
The process of crossfading sound is simple. However to understand what it entails though, you need to know two elements that apply when crossfading sound-the fade-in and fade-out features. The fade-in/fade-out elements are keys to getting crossfade to work.
How Crossfade works
The process of crossfading sound is simple. However to understand what it entails though, you need to know two elements that apply when crossfading sound-the fade-in and fade-out features. The fade-in/fade-out elements are keys to getting crossfade to work.
a) Fade-in: The fade-in process is when a piece of audio or song is progressively made to increase in volume until it reaches its full sounding peak. This progressive increase of the song is widely used in mixed audio music.
Television shows, the movies and news segments also implement this feature. You can notice it being used in news segments lot when the news is about to end or the news anchor announces a short commercial break.
b) Fade-out: This is the process where a piece of audio or song gradually declines in sound until the music reaches an inaudible level. This means that the beats, the vocals, etc. all gradually become inaudible at once until the music stops playing.
In most cases and sometimes as may happen, even in a given song there is the element of fade-out where the vocals(person singing) fades out so only the beats are heard, or the beats(the instruments, drums, percussions, guitars, etc.) fade out, leaving only the vocals being heard.
The fade-in and fade-out features are the essential elements of crossfading. And so once you apply them in your music compilation, you are simply trying to ensure the smooth transition of one song to another without interruption. Everything mixes together like a single track and this is what the audience hears-this transition from one song to another, as one long line of music that continues.
Difference between Analog and Digital Crossfading
There was a time when crossfading audio music require some amount of effort and creativity. Back then, if you're old enough to remember, crossfading was done by using three tape decks
Two were used as the source audio, and the third one was used to dub the audio from the two source tapes. Crossfading was done by manually turning down the volume of one source tape while turning up the other. This was a very tricky way of crossfading but was how analog crossfading was done.
Fast forward and the internet brought with it the digital audio revolution where a piece of sound could be enhanced or manipulated using a simple software. Using specific audio software, crossfading could be done at the touch of a click.
Digital crossfading then, could be done by downloading an audio software onto your laptop or desktop and using that software to crossfade your music collection.
Most common uses of crossfade
While this post is limited to crossfade as it applies to audio music, crossfade can also be applied to video contents and photos.
Video content editing: You can apply crossfade when editing video contents by using a video editing tool. By using a software program for video editing tool you can join together a series of video clips to transition smoothly one into the next during the editing process. The final output is a video that when played back shows one long frame of video content from start to finish.
Photo editing: Crossfade can also be applied to photo or picture editing. In this case you can bring together your favorite pictures and make a collage. By using a photo editing software, you can arrange your photos or pictures according to your preference and then apply the crossfade process while editing. This way the final result will be a series of photos arranged as one long photo.
Conclusion
We live in a digital era where audio music can be played on a wide variety of digital gadgets designed for the purpose of playing and listening to audio music. Listening to music digitally means you can use multimedia software with crossfade features to compile your favorite songs and listen to them on the go.
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