Export audio only, as M4A or WAV

For a podcast, a voiceover or a mix someone else will finish, export the sound alone. Every cut, fade and level in the project is applied, the same as in a video export.

Export the audio

1. Choose File > Export… (⇧⌘E).
2. Under Format, choose:
   • Audio only (.m4a) - a compressed file, small enough to upload to a podcast host;
   • Uncompressed WAV audio (.wav) - the full-quality sound, for editing or mixing elsewhere.
3. Optionally, turn on Match loudness to -16 LUFS (see below).
4. Press Choose destination and export… and choose where to save it.

About the WAV file

Rooster writes the WAV at the highest sample rate among the project's audio, music included, so nothing is resampled down, in stereo if any of it is stereo. If any source is a 32-bit floating-point recording, the WAV is 32-bit float too, which keeps sound above full scale instead of clipping it; otherwise it is 24-bit, or 16-bit when every source is.

It is called uncompressed rather than lossless on purpose: if a recording was already compressed when you imported it, the WAV cannot restore what that compression removed.

Match loudness

Match loudness to -16 LUFS raises or lowers the whole mix so the narration measures -16 LUFS, the level podcasts and spoken-word video are published at. The loudest peak is kept 2 dB below full scale, so a recording with sharp peaks can land a little short; the sheet says where it will land. It is off until you turn it on, after which the project remembers it for its next export. It appears once Rooster has measured the project.

When there is nothing to export

If the project has nothing on its timeline yet, the sheet says so and the export button is off.