Audio refinements

With the clever cuboid acoustic foam covering, over my Blue Yeti microphone, the ambient background noise is dramatically reduced, and the popshield seems to eliminate plosives as well! A little tidier than my sello-taped flyswatter, I think.

Placement of an iPad at eye-level, with the laptop running the Garageband recording software, means that I can position the microphone about two inches from my mouth, and read intimately for the listening pleasure of my audience, with a much-reduced gain in the software. The whole approach is meant to eliminate any ‘effects,’ and to provide a listening experience that is as close as possible to the real thing.

What’s also particularly brilliant is that, with the sort of finessing I’ve mentioned in previous posts, thanks to Rob Dircks’ excellent synopsis, I’ve been able to register with ACX.com and avail myself of their clever Audio Lab assessment of a couple of files, both of which passed muster and for which no issues were identified with my current recording parameters.

So now I just have to:

• develop mouth and tongue exercises and warm-ups for facility in reading
• practise my acting ability to engage the listener
• re-record the first scene of Prequel: Aliendale for service, as an example
• develop better editing skills with Garageband (granted that it’s all a lot easier and smoother if I can just read straight through, with no interruptions at all)

And, oh yeah, continue to write! There’s always that, but just at the moment, I reckon that Prequel is half done, and I’ve discovered a catharsis point or two that should intrigue. So that effort is also progressing.