Recording in the Field


One of the great things about podcasts is that they can carry programs created anywhere. With some simple tools and basic techniques, you can record a podcast as easily in the park or the local coffeehouse as in your studio. With a headset microphone plugged into your laptop computer's sound card, the world is your studio! We have recorded simple podcasts in airports, on airplanes, in conferences rooms, and on the back porch. The real fun, though, comes when you want to take advantage of your remote location's unique qualities, rather than merely creating a standard podcast from a non-standard location.

When you get out of the studio, you really begin to take your listeners to places they couldn't go without your help. Rather than simply telling them about a street festival, you can let them walk along with you, hearing the sounds of the crowds and vendors and talking to the artists and neighborhood leaders who put the festival together. Instead of reading the names of the winners at the Friday night dirt-track races, you can take them into the stands to hear the roar of the engines and the thump of dirt clods landing around youand you can ask people in the stands who they're rooting for and why they come to the races every week.

Moving your podcast into the field changes the basic dynamic of the recording and the experience you create for your listeners. While great content is still the most critical ingredient in a successful podcast, the right tools and techniques are the equivalent of a writer's well chosen wordsthey can make the experience dramatically more vibrant, immediate, and real for those listening to the podcast.

Your headset mic and laptop soundcard can allow you to record a vocal track in spite of a remote location. Working with remote locations can require a different approach to recording, and a different set of tools. In many remote sites, for example, a laptop computer is too large and unwieldy to make a useful recorder. If you'll be standing or walking around with your recorder in your hands, for instance, a laptop computer is almost impossible. In the same way, if going "on location" involves talking with other people for your podcast, the headset microphone loses in efficiency far more than it gains in enforced intimacy.

Working with Ambient Noise

Sound-seeing is taking the listener to a particular place at a specific time, allowing them to hear the sounds of a situation as though they were walking alongside you. Sound-seeing is all about making the most of the ambient sound, highlighting the aural landscape of a location to make the place seem real and immediate to your listener. In most cases, an omni-directional microphone is the best option because it "hears" sounds from nearly every direction, just as your ears do when you're walking through a location.

tip

Recording your narration of the sound-seeing podcast in your studio gives you time to listen to the ambient sounds and plan what you will tell your listeners. It's easy to record the narration in pieces that refer to the photograph you post, the sound recording you've made, or links to other websites.


The difficulty can come when you're trying to narrate the ambient sounds as you present them. If you want to narrate as you're walking through the scene, you'll need to make sure that the microphone is close enough to you, and oriented properly, to ensure that the narration is louder than the ambient sounds and distinct enough to be easily understood by the listener.

Since it can be difficult to walk around, narrate a podcast, watch relative levels, and monitor a recording all at the same time, you will probably want to record your narration after you've recorded the sound-seeing ambient tracks. This gives you the opportunity to think about what you've heard and record a great narration in your studio. You then get to edit the tracks together, using a program such as Audacity or Propaganda, adjusting the relative levels of the narration and ambient sounds for greatest impact and intelligibility.

Of course, sometimes you're recording in the field but you don't want to focus on the ambient sounds. It may be that you're trying to interview someone or focus on a particular sound, and you don't want to include every surrounding sound at the same level. In these situations, you'll want to think about using a cardioid mic (for close-in vocals), or a shotgun or parabolic mic (for focusing on particular long-distance sounds).

Figure 7.2. Sound-seeing podcasts can give your listeners a real sense of a placeit's an exciting programming option to experiment with.


Regardless of how you decide to handle the ambient sounds, they are the critical component that separates field recordings from studio recordings. In the studio, ambient sounds are reduced to non-existence, while they are the critical component in a field recording. Learn to listen in 360 degrees, focusing attention on the sounds around you, as part of your preparation to take your podcast recording into the field. The result will be a podcast that's more interesting to far more people.

The Absolute Minimum

Successful recording comes from planning carefully and keeping your eye on a couple of things, then capturing your own fascinating, enthusiastic self. Do a little bit of planninghave at least a rough idea of the topics you want to cover before you hit the Record button. Keep an eye on the recording level so your voice is what people notice, rather than the distortion. Finally, keep your surroundings in mind, whether that means keeping your microphone from brushing against your shirt or understanding that the garbage truck rolling past on the street will probably drown out your voice. It seems like a lot to keep track of, but with just a little practice, you'll find yourself able to automatically get the technical parts right so you can pay attention to what matters mostyour content.

  • Plan the broad outlines of your podcast before you start recording

  • Let yourself be natural while you recordif that means walking around then walk around

  • Be aware of your recording levels so your sound is neither too soft nor distorted

  • Interviewing others can add variety and interest to your podcast

  • With the right equipment, a podcast can be made virtually anywhere

  • If you pay attention to the sounds around you, you can help your audience "sound-see" the place where you record




Absolute Beginner's Guide to Podcasting
Absolute Beginners Guide to Podcasting.
ISBN: B001U8C03Q
EAN: N/A
Year: 2004
Pages: 167

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