Introduction
You will be working in pairs today to learn how to use Audacity. By the end of the class, the goal is to have a roughly 2-3 minute recording where the two of you discuss ideas for what you’d like to as a class during Weeks 12 and 13, interspersed with music and sound effects. It should incorporate the following components:
- Brief musical introduction
- Main audio of your conversation
- A personal sign-off
Part I: Recording
You are going to record the conversation in pairs over Zoom, which will generate a .m4a audio file in addition to the normal video file that you’ve worked with before. I’m going to place you in pairs and put you into a Zoom breakout room as part of our main Zoom class session. Decide which person is going to be the one to host a new Zoom meeting, then make sure you share the Zoom link with your partner over Slack DM so that the other person can access the meeting. Leave the class Zoom whenever you’re ready, then the host should start the new session and your partner should join the new Zoom meeting. Have a short (2 min.) conversation about ideas for what you’d like to do as a class over the next two weeks - make sure if you’re the host that you remember to hit record!
The host should end the meeting, wait for the recording to generate, then find the audio_only.m4a file on your computer and send it to your partner over Slack DM. Rejoin the main class Zoom session.
Part II: Editing
Individually watch 5:00-11:15 of Pat Flynn’s “How to Record and Edit a Podcast in Audacity (Complete Tutorial)”. Then try to do all of the the following in Audacity:
- Start a new project and import the .m4a audio track of your conversation.
- Use the Selection Tool and delete or cut any leading or trailing dead sound or long silences in your tracks.
- If needed, use the Envelope Tool to adjust the volume of your tracks or specific parts of each track so they’re relatively even
- Import the the rockin’ banjo music we used last week for your video editing. I will share this over Slack #in-class channel again. Note: in the future, you can use YouTube’s Audio library Free Music to find music.
- Use the Time Shift Tool to have a roughly 10-second musical banjo intro.
- Use the Envelope Tool tool to fade the song out as it leads up to the conversation.
- Record a new track individually in Audacity where you “sign off” and say goodbye to your listeners, then use the Time Shift Tool to position that track at the end of your combined recording.
- Bonus: overlay a sound effect from YouTube Library Sound Effects somewhere in your recording.
- Export your edited audio as an .mp3 file and upload it to the #in-class Slack channel.