Podcasting for Beginners

Podcasting for Beginners Staci Trekles Clinical Asst. Professor Purdue University Calumet [email_address]

Objectives: You will learn…
What a podcast is
What podcasts can be used for
How to find useful and fun educational podcasts created by others
How to bring podcasting into your own classroom lessons
How to record and edit an audio podcast with Audacity
How to publish your podcast files for others to download

What the heck is a “podcast”?
Simply stated, a podcast is a digital media file that one can play on a computer or any personal MP3 player (iPod TM not required)
Can be audio only or video and audio
People can often subscribe to any series of posted podcasts through “feeds” accessible over the Internet through any program that can interpret and “catch” them
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcast

What kinds of podcasts are people creating?
The podcast phenomenon is roughly 3 years old so there are LOTS of different podcasts out there
Media companies like TV networks, NPR, and other radio stations are now posting their content on podcasts so that people from any region can enjoy them
Thousands of “indie” podcasts are produced daily by people all over the world in all topics from business and world current events to music and pop culture

Educational uses of podcasting
Today, lots of schools and universities are publishing some lectures or other learning materials as podcasts
Students can subscribe via iTunes or another program and listen and re-listen any time they want to, as many times as they want
Research has shown that podcasting class sessions does not negatively impact class attendance or engagement (see http://elearn.arizona.edu/stuartg/ Podcast YourLectures2.pdf )

Educational uses of podcasting
There are also ton of great podcasts for students and teachers out there already that can add excitement to just about any class. Try some of these:
Grammar Girl: http://grammar.qdnow.com/
JustVocabulary: http://www.justvocabulary.com/
Poem of the Day: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/
Evansville iCATS Pod Academy: http://www.evscicats.com/podacademy/
Listing of many university and other educational podcast feeds: http://www.openculture.com/2006/10/university_podc.html

OK, I want to get involved! How do I get started?
Putting together your own podcast is easy!
All you need is a computer with a microphone (cheap is fine) and a quiet place to record
Whether you are running Mac, Windows, or Linux, many tools are available to create podcasts

Audio and Video File formats
It helps to understand a little about the common podcast file formats
MP3 - the most common audio format; provides good quality and relatively good compression so that files are not too big
MP4 - common video format that provides reasonable quality and compression
WAV- native Windows audio type; quality is not bad but produces large files sizes

Audio and Video File Formats
OGG - open source audio or video file format often found on Linux-based computers
WMV - Windows Media format, supports audio and video, often produces lower quality but higher compression
MOV - QuickTime format, supports audio or video and is capable or very high quality if needed (but, you’ll have a bigger file size)

Audio and Video File Formats
The format you choose depends a lot on your recording program and how worried you are about file sizes
In many cases, MP3/MP4 is the best choice because almost every computer and player program will work with them
However, you have more control over file size with QuickTime or Windows Media
Higher file sizes = higher quality and vice-versa; if quality is not so much of a problem then opt for more compression

Audio Podcasting with Audacity
The free audio recording tool for all platforms (Mac, Linux, and Windows)
Available for download: http://audacity.sourceforge.net
Allows you to record multitrack projects and export as WAV or MP3
You can also import audio files to edit or add them to your project

Starting with Audacity
You begin with a player bar with play, stop, record, pause features
As soon as you start recording, a new track will appear
Each time you stop and start recording again, a new track will start
To avoid this, press PAUSE instead of STOP while recording

Player Bar RWD, Play, Record, Pause, Stop, FFWD Tools Left and right audio input and output meters Cut, copy trim, and zoom tools Tracks appear here Project info bar

Recording and Editing
Once you have something recorded, you can see the waveforms and move, splice, delete, copy, paste, and transform
Click and drag over waveforms to select them before choosing a function to perform

Use the I-Beam to drag over and select and part of the track Upper Left-Hand Corner - Control Tools The envelope lets you select the entire content of a track The pencil (Draw) lets you edit a track level (zoom in first) The zoom tool lets you zoom in (Click) or out (shift+Click) on a place in your track Time shift lets you drag and move waveforms Multimode tool - lets you access any of the other tools at once with different shortcuts

Editing Toolbar
Cut
Copy
Paste
Trim away the audio outside the selection
Silence the selected audio
Undo
Redo
Zoom In
Zoom Out
Fit selection in window - zooms until the selection just fits inside the window.
Fit project in window - zooms until all of the audio just fits inside the window.

Project Editing Menus
The Project Menu imports audio, adds and removes tracks, and adds labels so you can keep “track” of your tracks
The Generate menu produces like tones and white noise
The Effect menu is where all the filters, like fades, compression, pitch and speed changes, happen

Analyze Menu
Performs silence, beat, spectrum analysis to see where your peak and low frequencies are
Helps to determine where quiet spots or very loud spots are

Track Info
All tracks have their own info bar, where you can raise or lower the gain to make it louder or softer, or mute the track or make it the only track playing for the time you specify

Tips for Great Podcasts…
With editing tools, recording a great-sounding podcast is easy!
Adjust gain and use fade-in and fade-out effects to adjust imported music/sound effects
Raise gain on soft voices; lower it on louder ones
Use the trimming options to remove pauses and “um’s” to sound more professional

More Tips…
Try to be in a quiet room when you record; the mic will pick up ambient noise and put it into your track
You can use the Pencil (Draw tool) to get some of the sound “spikes” out of your audio, but it can be time-consuming
Find royalty-free soundtracks and effects to add spice to your podcasts (see Resources section for some starters)

Exporting and Publishing
Click the File menu to export as WAV or MP3 (requires the LAME plugin - http://audacity.sourceforge.net/help/faq?s=install&i=lame-mp3 )
MP3 is more common and best for sharing with iPod users, and makes smaller files
Many people publish by posting podcasts on websites with RSS (Really Simple Syndication)
Your can use a service like http://www.podcastblaster.com/podcast-feed/ , then post on your server with your MP3 files

Easy Podcast Publishing
Blog sites and many other social sites automatically create feeds
http://www.edublogs.org
Other sites are dedicated to podcast publishing
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/
http://www.podomatic.com
http://www.poderator.com (outside storage space required)
http://www.podbean.com

Recommended Free Media Resources
Flashkit: http://www.flashkit.com
Pics4Learning: http://www.pics4learning.com
Wikimedia: http://www.wikimedia.org

More Resources and Free Stuff
Recommended free podcast and blog publishing sites
http :// www.edublogs.com
http://www.podomatic.com
http://www.podbean.com
http://www.poderator.com/
http://www.blogtalkradio.com
This article has advice on choosing a good service: http://www.problogger.net/archives/2006/02/15/choosing-a-blog-platform/
Also look at http://www.okaytoplay.com/wiki/Podcast_Hosting

More Audacity Help
User’s guides for Audacity: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/help/documentation
Audacity team wiki with lots of tips, tricks, and technical advice: http://audacityteam.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page
Great website with a full online workshop for educational podcasting: http://www.willard.k12.mo.us/co/tech/publishpodcast.htm

Resources for iTunes/iPod Users
Tips for finding and using podcasts: http://www.apple.com/itunes/store/podcaststips.html
Apple iLife tutorials for podcasts and more: http://www.apple.com/ilife/tutorials/
iWeb blog/podcast publisher tutorials: http://www.apple.com/ilife/tutorials/iweb
Tech specs for creating podcasts that can be caught through iTunes: http://www.apple.com/itunes/store/podcaststechspecs.html

Even More Great Resources
Also, Staci has a feed at http://stacitrekles.wordpress.com where even more useful info on a variety of topics will be posted
Stop on in and share your own resources or experiences, and download these slides as well as lots of other good stuff!

Thank you!
Thanks for the opportunity to explore podcasts with you today!
Feel free to contact us anytime with questions, feedback, comments, etc.
Staci Trekles
[email_address]
http://education.calumet.purdue.edu/Faculty/trekles

Podcasting for Beginners

by Staci Trekles

Accessibility

Categories

Upload Details

Usage Rights

Statistics

Podcasting for Beginners Presentation Transcript