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Audio Blogging – Part 1

The World of Blogging

Module 6

Hi Usha! Where have you been? Hi Pooja! Lots have been happening on my end.

I heard that you started studying again. How are you managing everything?

It’s a bit difficult, now that Rahul is going to school. But then, my friends and I make podcasts out of the lectures. I can go over them when I have time.

What exactly are podcasts?

If I miss a class, I get my friend to record the lectures on her phone. Then with a very simple software I edit the sound, remove pauses and digressions, add a bit of music and the podcast is ready!

Wow, that’s such a smart idea Usha ! Actually, I could use it to help my students too !

The term podcast itself is made up of iPod and broadcast. Podcasts began as audio programs which were recorded and uploaded to Apple’s iTunes service. People would download them into their iPods and listen whenever it was convenient.

The idea of distributing audio content in this manner soon spread beyond the iPod. It has now become an accepted media format for discussions, lectures, musical performances and other such audio content.

Podcasts on countless themes are available on the internet.

Like text-blogs and v-logs, podcasts can be about any subject under the sun — news, art, science & technology, history, comedy and so on.

You can find them on all kinds of sites and services, according to your interests.

Production

Recording Technology

To make an audio podcast, you need a good quality microphone and set of headphones to start with.

External mikes, either wired or Bluetooth connected, give much better quality of sound than phone and laptop microphones. Using them ensures that the spoken words are clear and extraneous noises are kept to a minimum.

 Podcasting can be done by a single person or it can be scripted as a conversation or discussion between multiple people. If there are multiple people in the podcast, you can either record in the same room or virtually, through Skype or Google Hangouts.

Recording the podcast in this way is almost free for the producer, since each person is at their own location and there is no worry about food, transport and other costs.

If you want to have face-to-face interactions, then the producer will be required to provide mikes for the guests.

The other option is to book a studio or recording space for this purpose. Both will involve some expenditure which not all bloggers would be keen on.

In this situation, the best option is to download an open source program called Rainmeter to record audio coming from your computer internally.

Line up your guests at their locations and use Skype or Google Hangouts to connect with them.

Rainmeter takes the incoming internal audio data (guest’s or guests’ voices) and the external data from the mic (your voice) and records them together as one stream. This avoids the extraneous sounds from the environment to great extent.

If you are using Google Hangouts, there is a feature called “Hangouts On Air” which allows you to record your conversation live and then save it as a YouTube video.

In this case, the video portion is just the Google Hangouts conversation screen with thumbnails for each of the speakers.

Editing

To edit your recorded conversations, you can use Audacity. Audacity is an excellent audio recording and editing software which is free and open source and can be easily downloaded.

Using Rainmeter and Audacity together, you can mix external and internal audio streams.

Content

Just like a blog, a podcast should be something you are passionate about and you are interested in.

The audio aspect of a podcast makes it more immersive than a text. The audience hears things for themselves rather than reading and imagining from written words.

Format

A podcast can feature a single person talking about a topic of her or his interest or it could be a discussion or debate or simply a conversation.

It is up to you to decide the style your podcast is going to be in, the guests to be featured and so on.

Ideas

Before recording, you must start by making a list of topics, a sensible order for the podcast episodes you will produce and an overall theme which will carry you forward smoothly from episode to episode.

Ideas can strike you when you are least expecting them. When a great idea strikes, but you’re travelling or at a family event, just note it down. Keep a small notepad, or use a notes app (like Google Keep).

Once you have the time and tools at your disposal, work out these ideas more fully.

News

You have to be up-to-date with the news that may be relevant to your topic.

For example, if you’re podcasting about technology and gadgets, keep an eye on tech news and develop contacts with people in that field.

You can draw on their comments for your research and even record them for your podcasts.

 Scripting

Unless you’re really gifted at improvising content, you will need a script for your podcast.

Your script should reflect your personality. You should feel comfortable while speaking it aloud, so that you can present the content well.

The script can be in the form of bullet points which you can elaborate on. Or you can write full dialogues which you can learn and speak. It really is up to you and your comfort level.

Uploading your podcast

If you are using Google Hangouts’ “On-Air” feature, it directly streams and then uploads your podcast to YouTube.

If this is not your choice of platform, you can always record using Rainmeter and Audacity, edit the recording as you wish and then upload it to hosting websites such as SoundCloud. There are many other podcast hosting and live-streaming websites such as UStream, Libsyn, and Podbean.

Anyway, in case you have doubts, the audio lessons in Sound Cloud are always there for you to hear.

The World of BloggingModule 6: Audio Blogging – Part 1

THE END

Creative team

ResearchFeroze Chandra

Script Parjanya Joshi

Design & illustrations Divya Varghese and Prashant Chaurasiya

Editing samata.shiksha team