This morning, I met with Jane Zhao (Lisa Spiro was unavailable) at the DMC and talked about what we could do for our podcast. She said that there were three types of podcasting we could do:
- audio only (an mp3 file)
- enhanced podcasting (an m4v or mp4 file with audio track and a picture slideshow, kind of like a PowerPoint)
- video podcast (another m4v or mp4 file with a video and audio track)
I have a feeling we will either want to do an audio only podcast or an enhanced podcast, since the video podcast would probably be stepping on the movie group’s toes a little bit. Audio podcasts are the most compatible, since an mp3 file can be played on just about any device, whereas the enhanced or video podcasts will require a device that can handle video (so it wouldn’t work on an iPod shuffle, for example). Since one of the things we’re considering is a walking or driving tour of Dowling spots around Houston, it seems like we would probably want to use the most compatible medium possible. Another thought I had was that, time permitting, we could do both an audio only and an enhanced podcast. That way, people who just wanted an audio file could download that, but people with a device that can play video (because the world is slowly being overrun with video-capable smart phones and mp3 players anyway) can have that option.
There is a fair amount of equipment at the DMC available for us to either check out or use on site. There is a tiny recording booth at the DMC that could maybe fit 2 small people. It’s not sound proof, but it’s pretty quiet if you’re there at a time that the DMC is not busy, and it has a microphone and a computer. There are also small audio recorders available for 3-day check out that record to either mp3 or wav files. There is also a free editing software called Audacity, which is available for PC, Mac, and Linux. If we decided to do an enhanced podcast, we would need to edit in GarageBand or any video-editing software. There are 7 audio & video editing stations with Audacity, and 5 stations with Audacity and video-editing software at the DMC which we can either reserve or just show up and use. (Jane said the mornings were generally pretty quiet at the DMC.)
Once our podcast is ready for publishing, we have to find a site to host it before we publish it to iTunes. (Apparently, iTunes doesn’t host any of the podcasts in the iTunes store, instead it links to another website and downloads the podcasts from there.) We can either put it on our Rice personal webpage called the U-Drive or we can use a free podcasting hosting website like PodOmatic. It offers 500 MB of free space with a free membership, and more if you pay for it. Jane said 3-5 minutes of audio podcast generally take about 3-4 MB of space, so 500 MB should be plenty big enough for our podcast.
The last thing I asked Jane was about how much time she estimated recording and editing our podcast would take. She said that the recording generally did not take too long, but she did strongly suggest we be picky about the quality of our initial recording instead of relying on the editing process to fix any mistakes. In terms of editing after we recorded the podcast, she estimated it would take about 2-3 hours for a 20 minute podcast. She also noted that most podcasts were a series of shorter 5-10 minute episodes, so, instead of one long podcast, we could also make a series of shorter ones. Finally, she suggested we add a jingle at the beginning and end of the podcast, which I personally think would be a great opportunity to mash up Irish & Confederate music.
On the technological side, it seems like recording and editing the podcast should be fairly simple and not too time consuming. Now all we have to do is figure out what we want to record…
I am relieved to hear that podcasting is a feasible option. I’ve never heard of “enhanced podcasting” before, but it sounds like a potentially viable option for people who are not directly at a Dowling site; however, I’m not sure if we can manage something like that in the time we have left. For those who are checking out the podcast on their computer and do not plan to listen to it at Dowling’s statue, it might be easier for them and for us to just have an audio podcast accompanied with online pictures of maps and footage of the various Dowling locations we wish to discuss. I have never used an audio recording program (and have never heard of Audacity), but I hear garage band is pretty simple to use. I know you said we would need to use Garage band to do an enhanced podcast, but is it also smart to use garage band for a normal podcast?
Just wanted to chime in to say that it should be possible to ultimately host your audio files on the Dowling website itself, so you don’t have to worry about which server to put the podcast on.
Yeah I think we might want to focus on just getting an audio podcast ready, but maybe leave a note or something to a future group that might want to take it upon themselves to add photos of the places and maybe a map or something. I think we can use GarageBand for a regular podcast, too, I’m not entirely sure what the advantages of Audacity are except that it’s a free program… I’ve messed around in GarageBand a little bit and it seems pretty easy to use, so I see no reason not to just use that instead of Audacity…
I have never done anything like podcasting before, glad to see this doesn’t look to hard. I’m not sure that anything beyond just an audio podcast is a possibility right now. If we are in need of a relatively quiet place to do a recording and can check out the recording equipment, I am more than willing to volunteer my apartment as a place to record.
I have used Garage Band, mainly for music recording but never for a large file. It’s nice to see that editing for the podcast is easier and quicker than editing for a movie. I think that would be an easy program to use for making our podcast.