Jey's Podcasting Journal

Shipping your work consistently is more important than shipping perfect work occasionally. That's not an excuse to ship shoddy work. But sometimes the best we can do within the deadline is good enough. Our deadline is the promise we make to our audience. 

And if you are making lots of mistakes while you are recording. Don't stop the tape. Keep going. Sure start again, but keep the tape rolling.  

Use the automation and template tools in the apps you are using to save time. Today I give you a couple of examples using Auphonic.com and the Auphonic phone apps. 

Yay! I'm finally on Apple Podcasts!!!! Celebrate! Ahem. 

But back to this episode. I walk you through the basic settings to use for Auphonic Productions at Auphonic to make your show broadcast ready. 

I'm still only using my phone to record, edit an publish this show. 

The episode art is the latest pillow fort that I'm testing. It's my armchair with a couple of floor cushions propped up either side of me. I'm kneeling in front of the chair talking into it. Good sound but not comfortable. 

Today I'm exploring the typical settings we use when recording our shows. 

Using the Auphonic Edit app for Android as an example of a typical recording and editing app, I talk about the best file formats for editing and exporting, sample rates and mono versus stereo. And getting ready to upload to Auphonic.com where we will treat our recording to make it sound great. 

I recorded this episode on a Samsung Galaxy Note 4, using the Android Auphonic Edit App. I recorded in my bedroom, standing up and leaning into a closet full of clothes. I hand-held the phone and didn't cover the mic with anything. 

I processed the sound for this episode on Auphonic.com using the following settings:

Filtering: On.

Adaptive Leveler: On.

Noise & Hum Reduction: On.

Loudness Normalization -19 LUFS.

Output file format: WAV 16-Bit PCM Mono. 

Do you notice how loud this sounds compared to my previous episodes?

Auphonic provides a simple and free mobile audio editor and recorder perfect for phones. 

Check it out here: https://auphonic.com/help/mobile/index.html.

Learn how to use the materials around you to improvise a vocal booth. 

Where you record, your show is as important as the microphone you are using.

Start paying attention to the sound you are getting in the places you record in.

Reverb is the echo you get when sound bounces or reflects from surfaces back into your mic. 

Hard, bare surfaces and empty space = more reverb. 

I used my Samsung Galaxy Note 4 to record in my car, kitchen, kid's bedroom, my closet and one other place to test out how you can change just by changing your recording environment. 

Understanding your typical recording environment is essential before buying your first mic; otherwise, you might waste money on a mic that doesn't perform well in your recording location. 

Use a sock or foam windshield (see the episode art) over your phone to see what that does to reduce popping and reverb. 

Experiment in different locations where you might record. Train your ear to notice reverb and sources of noise. 

What's the most important factor when deciding the duration of your first episodes?

How can you avoid popping sounds on your phone mic? 

That's what we are discussing today. 

This is guide to how I published my trailer on Anchor.fm

Anchor is free!!! It's not perfect. But did I mention it's free? It's a great place to start your podcast journey and experiment with the format and your capacity to create something wonderful on a consistent basis. 

This is a super long episode (never again!). I recorded it and edited it on my phone. Editing it took a long time but I got there (it's why this shipped late). 

I talk through the options that your are presented with when publishing your first show and episode or trailer.  Although I'm focused on Anchor the decisions are common across most podcasting hosts. 

This is my first episode published using only my phone.  Everything in this episode (and the trailer) including the artwork and music was created and edited on my phone.  Here is a summary of the steps:

Preparation:

1. Create a name for your show.  You can search on Podnews.net to check if the name is taken. It is possible to duplicate an existing name for a podcast - but why would you want to?

2. Think about a description for your show. Describe who your show is for? What is in it for them.  How you want your audience to change after having listened.  You can always change this later so keep it simple if you get stuck.

3. Create some artwork for your show. It MUST be square and between 1500 pixels by 1500 pixels and 3000 pixels by 3000pixels. It must also be less than 500KB in file size. Getting these requirements wrong is the most common reason podcast directories will reject publishing your show on their platform. Canva is a great, free,  online-app to create art.

Game Day:

4. Download and install the Anchor app on your phone.

5. Record your narrative into the Anchor app.

6. Edit the narrative using the Anchor app to remove parts you don't want.

7. Add music (use the free music in Anchor).

8. Give your show a name and description

9. Add the artwork. 

10. Create the name and description for your episode.

11. Publish your episode.

12. Let Anchor handle the distribution of your podcast to major podcast directories.

That's it.

You have created your podcast. It will take a few days to get on all the main platforms but you should be on Anchor.fm immediately. Followed by Spotify an hour or two, after that. The podcast directories will email you when your show is live on their platform.

You can also check which platforms you are published on by searching for your show on Podnews.net

The most important platform to reach is Apple Podcasts. At the time of writing, 65% of all Podcasts are downloaded from Apple Podcasts.

Over the next few days I'll breakdown what each of these steps mean. In the meantime experiment or get ready to experiment.