While this is unlikely to be a problem for Windows users, Apple’s recent trend of tyrannical streamlining has left Mac users at a disadvantage when it comes to access to video codecs. After breaking a lot (like a lot) of files, I found the answer to my dilemma: uncompressed video. Even then the results were washes of compression artifacts that buried the original source. I wanted an experience more akin to databending images with audio effects but very few videos ever survived the process I put my images through. Running video through the import/export process produces some interesting results, but feels like replacing random bits with a hex editor.

My experiments with video in Audacity have been more trial and error than deliberate execution. Still, once you’ve messed with the gamut of audio effects and image formats you start to gain an understanding of the way these combine to determine your output.

This is of course a predictability relative to a medium defined by unpredictability. Part of the charm of Audacity as a databending tool is the ability to predict results.