Using Audacity to create a Podcast
Make sure that the microphone and sound
is correct in the control panel. Either
double-click the speaker icon in the
system tray or go to Start > Control Panel
> Sounds and Audio Devices. Click the
Advanced button in the Device Volume
section of the Sounds and Audio Devices
control panel.
With the Volume Control open choose
Options > Properties from the menu and
click the button next to recording.
Make sure the Select box under the
Microphone column is checked and the
volume is above zero or you won't be
recording anything. Leave the Recording
Control open so you can make
adjustments during the recording process.
Open Audacity and then open the preferences from File > Preferences
On the Audio I/O tab, verify
your sound card is selected as
the device for both playback
and recording. In the channels
dropdown box under Recording
choose 1 (Mono). Unless
you've got two microphones
stereo simply doubles the same
track, making the file size
bigger.
From the Quality tab choose
44,100 Hz as the Default
Sample Rate and 16-bit as the
Default Sample Format.
The File Formats tab controls the output formats
for your audio. To avoid accidentally
overwriting your audio files, select Make a copy
of the file before editing under the
To add LAME support to Audacity - First
download the latest stable version of the LAME
codec and unzip the files to a folder on your
hard drive.
Click on Find Library . Click Yes to locate the
lame_enc.dll file and browse to the location
where you extracted LAME.
With the LAME encoder
linked to Audacity you can
configure which bit rate to use
for encoding MP3 files.
Close the preferences by clicking OK.
Push the record button and start talking. When you finish recording press the stop button
or the space bar and save the file as a WAV. The save is important so you don't lose your
recording. After we edit we will export to an MP3 file.
Editing your podcast
As you can see by the
graphics, the time shift
tool
is selected. It is
used to move the entire
audio clip around inside its
track.
The cursor (little blinking
line across a track and the
timeline) will remain at its
position, so effectively you'll
be sliding your audio
material underneath the
cursor.
If you want to cut out that bit in the middle first we've got to select it.
Making a selection
To select the part you wish to cut, copy or paste to, use the selection tool
. If it's not
activated, do so now by clicking on it in the toolbar.
Press and hold the left mouse button while you drag the mouse to mark an area.
This area is darker than the surrounding
area of the clip. Note, that even though
you can mark an area larger than or
extending beyond the actual audio clip in
the track, the operations will only work on
the actual clip. Playback however will
work outside the clip.
Press the space bar to listen to the audio in
the marked area.
To extend or contract your selection, hold down the SHIFT button and click on the area
you wish your selection to extend or contract to.
If you click at a spot that is on the right hand side from the middle of the current
selection, you will set the right hand boundary of your new selection.
Cutting the selection
Cut the selection by selecting "Cut" from the Edit menu ...
Before the cut
or press CTRL+X.
After the cut
To undo this operation, select Undo in the Edit menu or press CTRL+Z
Copy will copy the selection to the clipboard. You can then paste that data back in to any
track by clicking where you want this audio to be inserted and select Paste in the Edit
menu, or press CTRL+V.
You can also copy material, make another selection with the mouse and then paste. This
will replace the selected material with the contents of the clipboard, no matter how short
or long either of them are. during all operations of this kind, the bottom row of the screen
will display two things, namely the start time and the end time of your selection.
Silencing unwanted music or audio
This operation flattens the selection. It essentially is a cut operation without deleting the
selection completely. After all, if you cut a second away, nothing remains. Using the
Silence operation will still leave you with a flatlined area.
When silencing parts between vocal lines, keep in mind that a sudden drop in background
ambiance can have an bad effect, so at the very least fade the area around the silenced
part, to minimize that effect. Rules to start with are, fade in quickly and fade out slowly.
Alternately, use the envelope tool
can change it later.
to lower the volume in that area. That way, you
Adding Music tracks
First save project for future edit, save often
Importing music
You may want to add music as an introduction or at the end. Go to the Project menu and
select import audio. You must have this music on your computer already. (you can find
free clips at freemusicdownload.com) Navigate to the place it is saved.
You will notice that it comes in on two tracks that is called Stereo track.
First decide how much you want at the beginning. Using the same selection tool you used
for audio select the first part of your music. Go to the Effect menu and select fade in, you
may also want to use fade out at the end.
You may not want music playing while you are talking or you may want it to play at a
lower level. You have several options, you can select the music that is playing during
your audio and then go to the Generate menu and select silence or you can select the
music and cut it and then add another track, paste and move it to the end of the audio.
Use effects to fade in or out.
Exporting into MP3 format
You will need to export the file as an mp3 file.
Go to File and select Export mp3, give you podcast a name, click on save.
You will see the following window.
This is asking for the ID3 tags which is information
that the computer uses when it uploads your
podcast.
Put the name of the podcast where it asks for Title.
You may also want to add date and episode here.
For Artist: put your name or email or school etc.
For Album put the name of the podcast again.
For Track Number put the number of the episode.
For Comments add a short description of podcast
For Genre: put anything you can change it to
podcast when it is in itunes or window media
player.
Click on Ok and to save it.
You have just created your first podcast.