Full Stack Creator

If your audio is great people can forgive medicore video, but if it sounds bad people will turn it off. This episode we are talking with mic and preamp reviewer Curtis Judd and podcast producer Ray Ortega the simple secrets to audio production for some common situations.

This podcast is brought to you by Epidemic Sound, where creators can easily license sound effects and music for all your creative projects

The priority for quick social media videos like Instagram stories is to keep it simple and sounding great. When you turn on the selfie camera, you‘re off to a great start because the mic is only an arm's length from you face and most phones have decent mics these days. Just be extra careful not make the biggest rookie mistake of covering the mic with your pinkie finger.

Portable mics for phones

Similiar to a phone selfie, the vlog format has the instant advtage of mic proximity. As long as you’ve plugged in a half decent mic, set the levels, and put on appropriate wind protection, it’s easy to get great audio. With this format, background noise isn’t a huge problem since it blends in with the overall context of the story you‘re telling. What matters most is that you can be heard clearly.

Mics for vlogging

If people are going to be watching your videos on TV, laptops or with headphones you owe it to them to keep the audio as clean as possible. When they are focused on you‘re talking head, details like echo and background noise start to matter more. So after you’ve taken the first steps of turning off the AC and unplugging the fridge (TIP: put your keys inside as a way to remember to plug it back in), it’s time to treat the room for reverb. In real life, reverb is easy to ignore. Put a decent mic in a room and every echo is a distraction. 

And make sure you get some good Sound Blankets

YouTube Studio mics and premps

All the rules of in studio videos apply, but your audience is listening a lot more closely so the pressure is on to make your audio production sound amazing. Ray Ortega has a great writeup on all your gear needs, but the basics are that you want decent mic that rejects background sounds, a low noise preamp and an echo free room.

Podcast mics and preamps

Less is often more in post production, but it is critical get the volume of your sound to match everyone else's. The easiest way is to run your final mix trough the free software Auphonic or if you're using Adobe Audtion, use it's match loudness feature. If you have background noise to cleanup, the absolute best is iZotope RX.

Special Guests: Curtis Judd and Ray Ortega.

Sponsored By:

• Epidemic Sound: All the music and sound effects a creator could ever need

Links:

• Curtis Judd - YouTube

Stephen Hackett of Relay FM joins me to talk about the history of blogging, and open vs closed platforms, and making a living online.

Special Guest: Stephen Hackett.

Sponsored By:

• Kronaby: Timeless watch design with smart features like notifications, music controls and automatic time zones.

Links:

• Stephen Hackett, Co-Founder Relay FM

The best of everything 2018 holiday special, featuring Matt Gonzalaz, Cameron Whitman, and Jordan Drake.

Tyler's Picks

Matt's Picks

Jordan's Picks

Cameron's Picks

Special Guests: Cameron Whitman, Jordan Drake, and Matt Gonzalez.

Sponsored By:

• Kronaby: Timeless watch design with smart features like notifications, music controls and automatic time zones.

This week i made fast friends with YouTuber Quinn Nelson of Snazzy Labs talking about the MKBHD blind camera phone shootout that we appeared in and then look back on 2018 to see how Apple did.

Special Guest: Quinn Nelson.

Sponsored By:

• Kronaby: Timeless watch design with smart features like notifications, music controls and automatic time zones.

Links:

• Snazzy Labs on YouTube

Marco Arment and Casey Liss are hugely successful podcasters on The Accidental Tech Podcast, but they've got an itch to create videos and have started to upload more to their YouTube channels. We talk about getting started in a new medium, the gear that matters and what it takes to be interesting on camera.

Special Guests: Casey Liss and Marco Arment.

Sponsored By:

• Kronaby: Timeless watch design with smart features like notifications, music controls and automatic time zones.

Links:

• Casey's YouTube channel

Making movies can mean a lot of different things. so we compared working with a full crew vs going solo. The gear, the business, and some tips for any shooter.

Special Guest: Nick Thomas.

Sponsored By:

• Kronaby: Timeless watch design with smart features like notifications, music controls and automatic time zones.

Links:

• NICK THOMAS | DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY

Working on the iPad Pro, Myke's adventures in video, and why we choose Apple.

Special Guest: Myke Hurley.

Sponsored By:

• Kronaby: Timeless watch design with smart features like notifications, music controls and automatic time zones.

Links:

• Connected - Relay FM

Marques Brownlee – MKBHD, is the one guy you want to atalk to bout your next phone purchase. But he's not just a gadget guy, his YouTube videos have developed into filmmaking skills to where he could easily be directing commercials for the products he reviews.

We cover the 2018 iPad Pro, Red cameras, Hasselblad and the iPhone XS vs Pixel 3.

Special Guest: Marques Brownlee - MKBHD.

Sponsored By:

• Kronaby: Timeless watch design with smart features like notifications, music controls and automatic time zones.

Links:

• Reply All podcast

I got a new drone so I brought in some friends, Martin Reisch (safesolvent) and Johnny Harris (creator of the Borders series on Vox) that create incredible creative work with the little flying tools.

Special Guests: Johnny Harris and Martin Reisch.

Sponsored By:

• Kronaby: Timeless watch design with smart features like notifications, music controls and automatic time zones.

Links:

• DJI Mavic 2 PRO Range Test

I got advanced access to the iPhone XR so I brought on one of my favorite Apple podcasters, Casey Liss of The Accidental Tech Podcast, to talk about. Casey has also been starting up a new YouTube channel so we talk about the experience of being a new video creator.

Special Guest: Casey Liss.

Sponsored By:

• Kronaby: Timeless watch design with smart features like notifications, music controls and automatic time zones.

Links:

• iPhone XR Hands-on - Tyler's YouTube