Author: Baynard Bailey

Academic Computing Consultant

Audio Editing for Podcasts with Audacity

 

Assignment:

For today you are going to create a five minute podcast where you interview each other about a topic.

First develop a set of questions (3-5 questions).

Record your conversation around the questions.

Edit your conversation down to five minutes.

Time permitting, add music, an intro, any non-distracting sound effects, and an outtro.

Export as an .mp3.

Please upload to our WordPress site with the category “Podcasting with Audacity”.

Audacity Resources:

Workshop Outline – tinyurl.com/VCMakers-Audacity

Audacity Overview / Zooms / Headsets/ Spaces to Record Sound

  • Zoom H1s can be signed out at Media Resources
  • USB headsets with mics at circ deck and Media Resources
  • 1-2 Rhode Lav mics
  • Basement of Chicago Hall has a space to record high quality audio, email babailey@vassar.edu or acs@vassar.edu to arrange a recording session (9-5, M-F)
  • Film has a whisper booth / Foley Booth (may be Film students only)

Downloading Audacity – http://www.audacityteam.org/ (Don’t use SourceForge).

Workshop Outline

Microphone setup – apple menu->Input/Output BEFORE launching Audacity

Launching Audacity

Security Settings

Tools Overview

Selection Tool  – you’ll use this a lot

Envelope Tool  – use this to adjust the volume, fade in, fade out

Zoom Tool  – use this to view the wave form close up, control click to zoom back out

Draw Tool  – for editing wave forms

Timeshift Tool  – for sliding tracks left or right

Make a quick recording

Checking your input source

Tracks

Stereo/mono

 

Basic Edits

Selecting  – use the selection tool to select pieces of the wave form

Deleting – edit menu, cut, or backspace key

Pasting – edit menu and paste, or apple – V

Shortcuts for repeating an insert – use the arrow key, then paste

Saving Files

.wav, .aiff – lossless, high quality

  .mp3 , .aac – compressed file, “low” quality, export format, not good for editing

.aup – Audacity project Files

 

Effects  

Amplification

Fade in/ fade out

Manual fade (Envelope Tool)

Noise Removal

Compressor

 

Importing Sound Files and Music

Practice Files

https://drive.google.com/driv e/folders/0BwJsmGvMifkLa0gwck5kM0F0NkE?usp=sharing

 

 

Exporting

Saving Files

Reopening Files

Exporting mp3s

Bonus Stuff – Trust your ears!

 

 

Resources:

Audacity Video Tutorials by Baynard

Audacity Tutorials in Lynda

Audacity Team Help http://www.audacityteam.org/help/

Audacity Tutorials http://wiki.audacityteam.org/wiki/Category:Tutorial

Download the LAME mp3 encoder from within that site

Google for help, lots of stuff on YouTube.

 

Open Source Sound – https://www.freesound.org/

Blog Post  on 20 top free sources

Getting two USB headsets to work:

This is built-in functionality for Mac OSX. Plug in both headphones, then open Audio Midi setup from /Applications/Utilities.

searching for Midi
Find the Audi Midi Setup by searching “midi” in the spotlight

Click the plus in the lower left corner and choose “Create Multi-Output Device.”

Make two usb headsets play together!
Make two usb headsets play together!

Check the checkboxes beside both headphones in the new panel on the right.

Uncheck the built-in output.
Uncheck the built-in output.

If you want to rename it, you can double click the new entry in the list on the left and give it a name like “Both headphones.”

Now you can choose the Multi-Output Device as the audio output in System Preferences → Sound. (You can also easily change the output by holding the Option key and clicking the volume menu.)

Setting up Two USB Headphones mics

A similar arrangement will work to create two usb inputs. Create an aggregate device for the usb headsets.

Make two mics record on separate channels!
Make two mics record on separate channels!

Check the appropriate boxes.

To record in Audacity onto two separate channels, choose stereo recording channel as your input:

Animation with FCP X

We’ll be using FCP X to create simple animations in this workshop.

Example:

More Examples

Animation Outline

  1. Learn about .png files (Common File Suffixes)
  2. Import .png into FCP X (why png?)
  3. Establishing a background
  4. Tweens (what is a tween?)
  5. Moving objects off stage to on stage
  6. Manipulating Size and Orientation, and Opacity
  7. Finding .png files
  8. Making .png files with Photoshop (details below)
  9. Putting it all together on your own
  10. Share to our WordPress site

 

Steps for Creating .png files:

Please download these .png files which we will be manipulating.

To create .png files:

  1. Download the image
  2. Open the image in photoshop (or make something in Photoshop)
  3. Copy the entire image
  4. Create a new photoshop document with a transparent background
  5. Paste the entire image
  6. Erase the parts you don’t want (magic wand the background if you are lucky and then press backspace or delete)
  7. “Save as ” .png
  8. Import to FCP X

Film Production: Working with Phones

Here are some ideas to shoot on your phones.

Please discuss with your partner and pick one that appeals to you for next week.

The goal is to spend 10 minutes shooting, and then to edit and publish it all in 90 minutes!

  1. Inform your parents
  2. Video Letter
  3. Thank You Video
  4. Movie Synopsis in 60 seconds
  5. Take a Stand
  6. One minute lip sync
  7. Book Trailer about a favorite book
  8. Movie Synopsis

Check out other episodes in this series:

  1. Ep.1: Welcome to Mastering Mobile Video
    03:46
  2. 2.
    Ep. 2: Best Practices
    04:20
  3. 3.
    Ep. 3: Working with Light
    03:02
  4. 4.
    Ep. 4: Capturing Audio
    03:36
  5. 5.
    Ep. 5: Shot Composition – Part 1
    02:23
  6. 6.
    Ep. 6: Shot Composition – Part 2
    03:18
  7. 7.
    Ep. 7: Telling a Story – Part 1
    04:06
  8. 8.
    Ep. 8: Telling a Story – Part 2
    03:00
  9. 9.
    Ep. 9: Uploading to Vimeo
    03:54
  10. 10.
    Ep. 10: Cool Gear
    00:05

Baynard Bailey

I am an Academic Computing Consultant for Vassar College.

Baynard Bailey

I have a Master’s degree in Education with a focus on Instructional Technology. I taught for 16 years before coming to Vassar. love to develop multimedia projects in support of learning and teaching.

I am VC ’90 and a product of Vassar’s Education department. I have K-16 teaching experience in Indonesia, Japan and the United States. My last job before coming to Vassar was teaching Computer Science and Information Technology at Carver Center for Arts & Technology in the Baltimore County School System.

What is Digital Storytelling?

“Digital storytelling at its most basic core is the practice of using computer-based tools to tell stories. There are a wealth of other terms used to describe this practice, such as digital documentaries, computer-based narratives, digital essays, electronic memoirs, interactive storytelling, etc.; but in general, they all revolve around the idea of combining the art of telling stories with a variety of multimedia, including graphics, audio, video, and Web publishing.

As with traditional storytelling, most digital stories focus on a specific topic and contain a particular point of view. However, as the name implies, digital stories usually contain some mixture of computer-based images, text, recorded audio narration, video clips, and/or music. Digital stories can vary in length, but most of the stories used in education typically last between 2 and 10 minutes. The topics used in digital storytelling range from personal tales to the recounting of historical events, from exploring life in one’s own community to the search for life in other corners of the universe, and literally, everything in between.”
From What is Digital Storytelling?