New guy...+help?

[asanchez]

My name is Andrew Sanchez, I am one of three student technical directors at Dos Pueblos High School in Santa Barbara, California...I'm also her theater's sound designer and chief operator.

A friend and colleague of mine, who is one of the other STDs (haha) for the program, referred me to this site and I figured it would be a good place to get advice from more experienced people than I.

And here I am.

While I'm here I might as well ask a question.
Anybody familiar, or well, experienced with the Audacity sound editing system, could you help me out? I'm trying to modify a sound effect for an upcoming show, and I'm accustomed to using a different program on a Mac that the theater department no longer has access to, and have downgraded to a Windows operating system. I was able to find Audacity (free, which is why I got it), and am having trouble getting used to it. The sound effect I want to fix is a doorbell, which has a beautiful sound and one that's perfect for what I want to do, but it cuts off at the end just barely in time to make it noticeable. I want to be able to increase the length of it (copy and paste maybe?) or at least help the fade out before the cutoff, but I'm not sure what to do.
Any advice at all?
Thank you!

Andrew Sanchez

[seanandkate]

Welcome Andrew! First, you've GOT to get a better acronym than STD . . .
Haven't used Audacity (I'm an Adobe Audition man myself), but I would look for a reverb function. Hopefully Audacity has one. Otherwise it will really seem like the sound cuts off. And if you need to extend it, it will smooth the splice.
Welcome to the booth!