Question about Audacity and other recorders

[amazingshite]

Just listening to episode 324. I also was wondering how to get Skype to work with Audacity.... But really my question is... which is the best? I have tried a program called WildVoice Studio...it makes my soundcard crap out. Also what really gives me awesome quality without my soundcard crapping out is TotalRecorder. I also have used Audacity, but it seems to pick up lots of background noise with my mic. So what's your opinion?

[sikboy]

I am the guy that called in and I like audacity. I use an imic which is an external soundcard and it cleaned up the sound a lot. The problem with podcasting is there is so many ways to do it and it seems like every site that you go to has the writers views on the best way to set things up and what equipment to use. I found that just expierimenting is the best way. People like Keith are few and far between. He tells the truth when it comes to the podcast community. They don't want other podcasts to do well. What is your podcast called?

[amazingshite]

Well, I have a short podcast, about 9 minutes long every other week. It's called the PSPMagic AudioCast. You can find it at http://pspmagic.wordpress.com/.
And if you see, I need to push out another episode. For my first two episodes I used Nero's recording application. I got good sound, but I had a cheap microphone. Then I went out and bought a 50 dollar microphone by logitech, I wasn't buying it for a podcast, just Skype calls. And then I found Total Recorder, which I was going to use. But I just stuck to Nero since I know it, and Audacity just seems to confusing to me.

[ooda]

Use Audacity, as once you get used to it then everything will be simple and straight forward, and it's a damn powerful program for what it is.

Anyway, with Audacity, it takes a little work to set up the background noise filter, but it's worth the effort. To set it up just start recording so you capture the background noise in the room. You then select a second of the recording where you aren't speaking, and use it in the Noise Profile in the Noise Removal effect. You then use the slider on screen to adjust how much background noise there is in the recording, and this is applied to how much of the recording you've selected, which should be everything. Mind you, this is done after you've recorded, not before.

This is how it's done on a Mac, but I assume it's the same on Windows.

[martin]

I use Audicity based on Keith's recomendation. It took us about 10 shows to really get the sound right.

Try lowering your mic in volume on the right of the screen and the raising the track level after recording. I'm assuming your not using a mixer but if you are you'll need to just keep experimenting with different levels. Just keep recording shit untill you get it right and then do your show.

[ooda]

Originally Posted by martin

I use Audicity based on Keith's recomendation. It took us about 10 shows to really get the sound right.

Try lowering your mic in volume on the right of the screen and the raising the track level after recording. I'm assuming your not using a mixer but if you are you'll need to just keep experimenting with different levels. Just keep recording shit untill you get it right and then do your show.

That and avoid having the volume too loud so it starts clipping.

[amazingshite]

Yea, I'm not exactly sure how to do what you said ooda, I couldn't select it and do what you said....does anyone else know how to do it, in Windows?

[martin]

Are you using a mixer? If yes, lower your gain. If No, lower your line input level. (On the right near the top in Audacity)

When your done, Selct the entire track and choose normalize in the effects menu. This will lower some of the really loud parts, bringing them back closer to the lower parts.

[amazingshite]

thanks guys for responding to all my questions. and still, I have yet another. I want to import say an mp3 file into audacity, so I can play it as my intro song, and then have it fade out so I can talk, im not exactly sure, i'll post an update in the morning if I figure it out or not

[ooda]

Originally Posted by amazingshite

Yea, I'm not exactly sure how to do what you said ooda, I couldn't select it and do what you said....does anyone else know how to do it, in Windows?

I'll try to find a walkthrough for Audacity on Windows...

Edit: http://www.prettytypewriters.com/bloggy/index.php?p=63

Reducing noise

Weve covered how easy it is to record into Audacity. A common use for recording is copying vinyl records. An often-heard gripe when doing this is that the hiss, pops, clicks and static are also captured, sometimes drowning out favourite songs. This column has previously looked at reducing background noise in recordings in Cool Edit 2000 (now discontinued); heres how to do it in Audacity.

Press -I to import the audio file of your recording, if you havent already just recorded it into Audacity. Next, use the selection tool to highlight a part of the recording that has no musical information just the noise that you wish to remove (try the first few seconds of lead in). You may need to zoom in a bit, as its worth being as accurate as you can. With this selected, go to Effect-Noise Removal and click the Get Noise Profile button. Next, press -A to select the entire recording. Go back to Effect-Noise Removal. Clicking Preview will allow you to preview the changes with current settings, or you can use the less or more slider to experiment. Clicking Remove Noise will apply the changes.

With a bit of experimentation, this method can also work for removing vocals and, to a degree, removing the music behind vocals.