Mauvio
Price: Free (in-app purchases) from fave.co/33zGH8B
With all the emphasis about making highquality video on mobile devices, it’s a shame so little attention is paid to audio. Slick visuals can do the trick, but without the right soundtrack videos you’ll only make half the impact.
Mauvio is the first mobile app from Accusonus, makers of professional audio plug-ins for Mac and Windows. Fuelled by industry-leading algorithms, Mauvio improves sound on iPhone or iPad videos without tweaking dozens of knobs or settings, making it easy for anyone to use.
The first step is to select a video from your camera or Photos library, which you can preview (but not trim) before importing. Mauvio automatically improves audio by applying under-the-hood magic while loading, so it’s ready to play with just a tap. There’s a slider to jump to a specific location, as well as a Before and After toggle switch so you can hear the difference during playback.
When a video finishes it automatically loops, a nice touch when making adjustments on shorter movies. Accusonus recommends headphones for best results, and I concur – even the robust speakers built into newer iOS devices don’t measure up when listening for subtle audio improvements.
FILTERS AND MORE
For those who prefer a little more sonic control, Mauvio provides two different ways to improve a soundtrack. Voice Cleanup features six filters that can be independently adjusted or disabled entirely: Balance, Enhance, De-Noise, Deepener, De-Esser and Volume.
Of these, De-Noise is the most useful for helping reduce unwanted background noise. The built-in audio filters are nowhere near the complexity of their desktop equivalents, but that’s the whole point – simply move the slider between zero and 100 per cent until the audio sounds better.
Mauvio also includes SFX, where users can add one of more than 30 different sound effects in four categories: Crowds, Environment, Rain, and Sports. They’re all looping background ambience rather than frame-specific effects, but can add a nice touch to the right picture; however, they tend to be a little too exotic for the average home video.
Once everything sounds the way you want, Mauvio exports an existing video to a new file together with the enhanced soundtrack. The first 10 are free, but after that you’ll have to subscribe for unlimited exports, at a reasonable £2.99 per month or £9.99 annually. (There’s no limit on the number of times you can load different videos without saving.) Two features currently missing are support for audioonly formats, as well as opening videos stored in Files, although exported movies can be shared to any location.
VERDICT
Mauvio delivers powerful, one-slider audio enhancements for mobile videos, but experienced audio knob jockeys will find the experience too restrictive.