Creating a 'blank' MP3 file on a Mac

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Haydn · #1 Post by **Haydn** » Sun Oct 19, 2008 12:34 pm

I'm getting into editing MP3s on a Mac. I'm using 'Fission', which is excellent -

http://rogueamoeba.com/fission/

I want to create new MP3 files, and I'd like to start with a blank MP3 file, one that's either empty or has a few seconds of silence. Fission doesn't allow you to create new files. I've tried copying files and renaming them in iTunes, but it's pretty complicated (I think it's because of the fixed cataloguing system that iTunes uses). In iTunes, I end up with the new blank file opening up the original song it was copied from.

Anyone know how to create a blank file on a Mac, or a way of doing it in iTunes

Surreal · #2 Post by **Surreal** » Sun Oct 19, 2008 1:15 pm

Ugh, itunes... but I digress.

Find a song that has a few seconds of silence somewhere. Grab the file manually (ie: not using itunes) and copy it to another location. Open said file in an audio editor, grab a silent portion and delete the rest. Save file, rename all the tags, yadda yadda. Re-import the new blank into itunes.

If you can't find anything with a sufficiently long portion of silence, then just grab any piece of the song and scale the volume down to nothing. Works just as well.

Haydn · #3 Post by **Haydn** » Sun Oct 19, 2008 1:22 pm

Surreal wrote:Grab the file manually (ie: not using itunes) and copy it to another location. Open said file in an audio editor, grab a silent portion and delete the rest. Save file, rename all the tags, yadda yadda. Re-import the new blank into itunes.

This is sort of what I'm trying to do. How do I rename the tags on a Mac?

Surreal · #4 Post by **Surreal** » Sun Oct 19, 2008 2:39 pm

I don't know on a mac, but on a pc you can do it manually by just doing right-click/properties on the file. I figure there's a mac equivalent of that.

Haydn · #5 Post by **Haydn** » Mon Oct 20, 2008 5:19 am

Surreal wrote:I don't know on a mac, but on a pc you can do it manually by just doing right-click/properties on the file. I figure there's a mac equivalent of that.

OK - managed to do it with Fission. It has an MP3 Tag Editor called 'The Inspector' -

"The Inspector area allows access to information on the file or clip selected, as well as ID3 tag editing. ID3 tags display in most media players when a file is played, to show information such as the title and artist for a song. Edit tags for the selected clip here, and when the file is saved, these tags will be added as well."

It was a bit fiddly, but I managed to create a 5 second-long 'blank' MP3 track by copying chunks of audio including silence from other tracks, then removing the audio, leaving just silence. I'm doing this simply to have a blank 'template' to work with when playing around with audio. I am really starting to enjoy using 'Fission' - they've made it so easy to use

fredo · #6 Post by **fredo** » Mon Oct 20, 2008 7:40 am

any chance you could just create those blank tracks in Garage Band?

hit the record button, stay quiet for a few seconds, then stop it and export it as an mp3?

Haydn · #7 Post by **Haydn** » Mon Oct 20, 2008 7:46 am

fredo wrote:any chance you could just create those blank tracks in Garage Band?

hit the record button, stay quiet for a few seconds, then stop it and export it as an mp3?

Probably (I don't use Garage Band at the moment).

Mr Awesomer · #8 Post by **Mr Awesomer** » Mon Oct 20, 2008 11:09 am

Use GarageBand.