OS X Mountain Lion: The Missing Manual

Chapter 16. Sound, Movies & Speech

Macs have been capable of handing sound and graphics from Day One, years before the word multimedia was even coined. OS X’s QuickTime technology plays digital movies and live “streaming” broadcasts from the Internet; its speech features let you command your Mac by voice or make your Mac talk back; and VoiceOver is a beefed-up talking-Mac feature for blind people.

This chapter covers it all: how to record sound and video, edit it, play it back—and how to make your Mac talkative.

Playing Sounds

You can have a lot of fun with digital sounds—if you know where to find them, where to put them, and how to edit them. You can play almost any kind of digitized sound files, even MP3 files, right in the Finder—if you put their windows into column view or Cover Flow view (or use Quick Look). But that’s just the beginning.

Controlling the Volume

Adjusting the volume of your Mac’s speakers couldn’t be easier: Tap the and keys on your keyboard. (The key next to them is the Mute button, which instantaneously cuts off all the Mac’s sound—a wonderful feature when you find yourself trying to use the Mac surreptitiously in a library or a church.)

Alternatively, you can add ...