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I found that the freeware program Audacity does everything you need to start adding audio to your blog posts, if this is something you want to get into. This combined with the Blubrry Powerpress plugin for wordpress and you can make some really decent audio clips to insert into your blog posts. But I also am going to talk about some tips for recording your podcasts.
One trick I have learned is to record your podcasts in sections at least until you are a proficient enough speaker that you can speak entire paragraphs without making any errors or blunders. I will often speak only a single two or three sentence paragraph, save it and then create another one after. I will then take these separate audio snippets and re-record any that did not sound good, when they all sound okay to me I use a merger program to join the audio into a single mp3 file and then upload it to the wordpress blog.
So that is a high level summary, lets get started with the details. If you don’t have Audacity installed, go get the latest stable version of Audacity 1.2.6. Also make sure you pick up the LAME Mp3 Encoder as you will need this library for Audacity to be able to export mp3 files.
Save both files to somewhere on your computer, and install Audicity, put the LAME mp3 Encoder somewhere in the audacity folder, and then open Audacity.
Click on Edit -> Preferences, then Click on the File Formats Tab
Click on “Find Library” and navigate to where you saved and unzipped the LAME Mp3 Encoder library. Once you select this file click OK and you now have the ability to export your recording as an MP3 file.
Now its time to start recording and saving your segments. First this is a very basic overview, I won’t go into any depth on manipulating the audio after you record it, just simple press record, speak into microphone, stop. You do need to trim any leading and ending audio off of your track so you have one clean segment.
Here is the basic audacity screen:Â (Click to Enlarge Image)
You simply press on the red record button, start speaking into the microphone and you can see the spectrograph show your volume levels as you speak. You want to keep it fairly level, if you see large peaks it means your voice is too loud, but if you see your entire audio is just very low and hardly grows past the center it means your voice is probably too low.
Once you are done recording your segment press the stop button. Then you will want to listen to your audio recording. If you don’t like it, re-record it over and over until your segment sounds the way you want. Once you have your segment, you then trim it. Watch the spectrograph for where your voice started in the beginning of your segment, and when it ended. Use the mouse to select the area’s of the spectrograph before and after your sound bite and delete them with the delete key.
Now once you have your segment sounding good click on the “File” -> “Export as Mp3″ menu item.
Save the filename and optionally add some ID3 tag data to identify artist, category..etc
Now create your additional segments and save them all separately. When you have all your audio segments created, it is time to combine them. When you save your audio files that you plan on combining, I recommend using a file naming format like 01 – Audacity Speech, 02 Audacity Speech, so you always remember what the order of the segments are.
Load your intro segment or your first segment then open your 2nd segment. Use Control+a to select all of your segment segment audio and then Control+c to copy the audio. Select the spectrograph of your first segment and click the “END” key. Then click control+v to paste your 2nd audio segment at the end of the first segment.
Repeat by cutting/pasting the 3rd, 4th and all other additional segments and pasting at the end of your first segment. Play back your audio after cut/pasting each segment so you can fix any issues before adding too many segments.
Now you can export your combined segment as in my case as Audacity-Speech.mp3, and then you can ftp or scp your mp3 file over to your wordpress blog, put it in your wp-content/uploads directory. Then start writing your blog post and include your mp3 file clip. If you don’t have the Blubrry Powerpress then I recommend using this plug-in for wordpress as it will allow the audio to display on both the homepage of your blog and when someone goes to the individual blog post itself. I had problems with nearly every other audio / mp3 plugin until I found the Blubrry Powerpress one.
Once you activate your blueberry powerpress plugin you must configure it, I am only going to walk through the basics:
From your WP-Admin panel, go to your Settings -> Blubrry PowerPress Menu
The minimum amount of things you need to set are the Default Media URL:
Then you have to configure the Presentation Part:
I always set the plug-in to put the audio player at the top of the post, so a reader can just click on the play button immediately if they don’t want to have to read or scroll through the post to find the play button.
Once that is configured you are ready to write your post. Go ahead and write your post, always have your posts at least somewhat written even if you post an audio have something for readers to read in case they don’t want to listen to audio.
Once you are finished writing your post, open your podcast episode tab inside your “Write a Post Screen”
Set the filename of the file you uploaded, and save your post.
Remember to always preview your post and make sure it appears and sounds the way you want it to be. Make sure the audio works, as you don’t want a broken post to be hit by your readers.
-Dragon Blogger
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Tags: audacity, audio blogging, blog audio, blogging with audio, blubrry powerpress for your blog, podcasting, podcasts in blogs, using audacity, using audacity for blogging
November 9th, 2008 at 9:02 am
My girlfriend has been thinking of creating her own podcast but she doesn’t know how to do it. Neither am I.
Thanks for this very helpful post. It doesn’t sound too complicated after all.
PinoyCopywriters last blog post..Reporter vs Expert – Why Most Bloggers Are Stuck Reporting
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March 10th, 2010 at 12:59 am
There are also some text to speech programs that could help in podcasting like odiogo. Other than podcasting, a lot of marketers are doing video casting as video materials tends to be more dynamic and viral.
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