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Creating GET WISDOM 4: Choosing Software
Posted on Wednesday, November 28, 2007 at 9:05 PM by Jason Barker
In my previous articles in this series on creating GET WISDOM I've discussed selecting a microphone, interface, and channel strip. I'd like to continue the series by discussing the software I use for recording and mixing my program.
As with the earlier articles, I need to emphasize that this discussion is purely my personal experience and opinions, and does not imply any formal recommendation from the Department of Youth Ministry or the Orthodox Christian Network.
Before beginning work on GET WISDOM, my primary audio recording experience on a computer had been done using a free, open source program called Audacity on a computer running Windows XP. I was fairly pleased at the time (this was in late 2002) with the simplicity of the application and the quality of its output. Audacity - which runs on multiple platforms - is an excellent program for learning the basics of audio recording: it allows you to record, edit, and even engage in basic processing (such as noise removal). Because of its quality and the fact that it is free, Audacity is a popular choice with beginning podcasters.
I should point out, however, that Audacity is not designed for multi-track recording and mixing (multi-track simply means that each audio source - e.g., each host of a podcast, music used in the program, etc. - appears in a separate track in the recording). With Audacity, you would need to insert a musical intro, stop the music completely, record yourself speaking, and then insert the concluding music sequentially in a single track. This means, for example, that you would never be able to speak over the top of a musical track (like my wife, Jani, does in the life application segment of each episode of GET WISDOM, and as I do at the end of the episode). Because I knew that I would have things like voice-overs in GET WISDOM, I knew that Audacity would not meet my needs.
My hardware purchases largely used up the money budgeted for equipment to create GET WISDOM, meaning that I needed to minimize my expenditures on recording software. The Mackie Onyx Satellite comes with a copy of Mackie's Tracktion 2 software, but - as Scott Bourne predicts - I found this awkward for creating a podcast.
I was therefore fortunate that, because I am using a Mac running OS 10.4 to record, GarageBand 3 was preinstalled on my computer (iLife '08, containing GarageBand 4, has been released, but I have yet to upgrade). While definitely not a professional recording application - as Tim Gideon says, "This app is one that you'll graduate from, rather than grow with" - GarageBand's podcast recording features make it a very viable option. Gideon writes,
For podcasters, there's not much to discuss, and that's a good thing. The project window that pops up for sessions is incredibly user-friendly. You can record separate tracks for male and female vocals (with optimum EQ settings for each), a stereo track for music, and even a track for artwork—say, a photo of whoever's speaking—which pulls from iPhoto. These images appear when listeners watch the podcast in iTunes.
I am truly amazed at how easy it is to record and mix GET WISDOM using GarageBand. For a novice at audio recording and production, GarageBand is very intuitive and easy to grasp. Recording is remarkably easy, and the programmers have made it quite simple to edit and mix tracks (even including a "ducking" feature to automatically reduce the level of background music during voiceovers). It would be inadequate if you were wanting to record professional masters of your church choir, but it is quite adequate for basic podcast production.
At the same time, as Gideon says, I've found that I'm beginning to outgrow GarageBand. While I will continue to use it for at least a little while longer, I want far greater precision and control in editing than I am able to do in GarageBand. I also want more options for saving my recordings and converting them to WAV and MP3 files (instead of the very limited choices offered by GarageBand's extremely inconvenient - and quality reducing - process of sending compressed files from GarageBand to iTunes, where you then go through more steps to convert the file into other formats). I therefore intend in the future to transition to a more full-featured recording application.
There is very little to say about the settings I use in GarageBand, largely because I incorporate very few software effects; I do almost all of my processing using my DBX 286A channel strip, meaning that there is very little postproduction of that sort to perform.
Because I save GET WISDOM as a mono - rather than stereo - file (as do most non-music oriented podcasts), the input on each of my tracks is in mono. The only effect I include is - depending on whether the track contains my voice or that of my wife - the "Male Radio" or "Female Radio" Real Instrument from the "Podcasting" options, with only the default "Speech Enhancer" effect applied (set for either "Male Radio" or "Female Radio").
Creating the MP3 (using the "Share > Send Song to iTunes" command) is where things get a little tricky. I have the Audio Podcast export setting on "Higher Quality," which is the highest level in GarageBand; this sends the highest quality file to iTunes, where you convert it to MP3. In iTunes, I encode the file as an MP3 (for the podcast) at the "Good Quality (128 kbps)" setting, and encode it as a WAV (for streaming on The ARK) at a custom "44.100 khz, 16-bit, mono" setting.
If you look at the file info for the first three GET WISDOM MP3s, you will notice a difference from the MP3 of the fourth episode. While they all sound as if they're mono files (because the source audio tracks are all in mono), in reality the first three episodes were encoded as stereo files in full 128 kbps, while the fourth episode was encoded as a mono file in 64 kbps (which is the standard for podcast MP3s). I attempted to encode the first three episodes as mono files in 64k, and was baffled that they kept coming out as 128k stereo files.
I found that the problem was that in GarageBand I had left in the "Podcast" track, which GarageBand uses for including graphics and other elements for enhanced podcasts (even though I do not create an enhanced podcast). GarageBand therefore sent a compressed M4A file to iTunes, which iTunes read as a stereo file and therefore encoded as a 128k stereo file. When you remove the Podcast track, however, GarageBand sends an uncompressed AIF file to iTunes, which iTunes correctly reads as a mono file and therefore encodes as a 64k mono file. While the lower bitrate results in slightly lower audio quality in the mono file, it also results in a significantly smaller file, which is important for three reasons: 1) It is easier for people to download, 2) it reduces the bandwidth used on your server, and 3) since I allow people to stream the episodes using a Flash player (in addition to downloading the episode), the smaller size allows for easier and faster streaming.
For the Windows users who read this blog, I unfortunately to not have enough personal experience to give you meaningful advice. While the majority of my computer experience has been in Windows, I switched to a Mac before I began creating GET WISDOM, and thus only have experience with creating a podcast on a Mac. The main Windows application I have heard of podcasters using is Adobe Audition - for example, Leo Laporte uses Audition - but I have no experience with the application.
In my next article I will briefly talk about the music I use in GET WISDOM.
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