Audio Correction - Any tips?

[Billy Bitchcakes]

Coming to the end of editing a full length and the audio levels are all over the place. Previously I've just adjusted volumes manually and played it by ear (literally), never even paid attention to the audio meters or anything like that. but would like to be a bit more precise with it this time. Any tips for how to go about it in Premiere Pro?

Just had a play about with the Normalise Peaks option which seems like a good start. Any particular levels I should be aiming for? Any tips on getting all the music the same level? I'm anything but an audiophile so have no real knowledge on what I should be looking for. TIA

[listentoaheartbeat]

Normalization will be useful for the skate clips. Skate sounds are fairly consistent so it will give you cohesive loudness across all of your clips. I'd go for something like -6dB for pop and land tricks. This will give you some headroom for mixing.

Grinds (and super rough ground) can be tricky I guess. They are sustained sounds rather than short transients like pops and landings, and will feel much louder at the same peak level. So unless there is a pop sound determining peak level in the same clip, I'd go for something like -9 to -12dB for grinds.

Most commercially available music is processed for maximum loudness, I wouldn't mess with that. Just pull it down and increase the level until it feels right relative to the skate sounds. I think doing this purely by ear will give you better results than any rule of thumb since the optimal level will differ not only depending on the loudness of the music but also the style and instrumentation.

Just avoid clipping/reds on the main, turn down both skate sounds and music if that happens. If you really want to go down the rabbit hole, you can apply processing like EQ and compression to the skate sounds, but especially the latter can fuck up your sound if not applied with care. In terms of EQ, a low cut filter is easy enough to apply and helps a lot, it removes low-end rumble and will increase headroom that you can mix into.

For context, I have limited experience editing skate videos, but I am an audio professional. I am sure others will have more practical advice, but this is what I'd do from my experience working in sound design and music production.

[bataaard]

listentoaheartbeat is on point imo

After normalisation, i still make a lot of tweaks for it to sound good, to hear the intricacies of the tricks. I need to do that a lot more with the HPX/HMC compared to how it was witt the VX.
My timelines end up looking like that :

Keyframing the audio is time consuming but worth it.

Also don't forget that you can work on audio tracks, rather than clip by clip. I use it to change the volume of the skate clips all at once for example, or all the musics at the same time.
I don't EQ the skate sound, because most people i know actually like the bassy sound of the HPX, or the crispness of the VX. It's part of the signature of those cameras.
I try to not go in the red too much, but if it happens a little bit over the whole vid (on landings ofr example), I put a limiter in the global track.