How to do an audio blog

I never knew how to make audio files (mp3s) on my computer until I discovered a project to read the Esperanto language translation of the Holy Bible aloud at Ken Caviness's page.

Here are the steps to get started with audio blogging:

1. Get a good headphone with microphone that plugs into your computer. Mine cost less than $30 at Walmart. I had to ask a girl that worked there to help me find it.

2. Get the free software Audacity which is an audio editor and recorder from http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

3. Play around with recording and playing back. It took me a while how to get it to 'read' the audio from my new microphone. Then I had to adjust it because it was recording my voice at very low volume, and when I raised the volume louder during playback, there was a hissing noise. But the adjustment was fairly easy.

4. Get an account at Ipernity. Ipernity provides a place to put up your audio files and pictures and such. When you upload a file, you will be able to get an embed code. You can put the embed code on your blog post, and the little audio player will appear on your post.

And that is how I audio blog. I think audio blogging is a natural for poets and writers. It's a way to give a reading to your fans/future fans from all over the world, not just in one location.

Preparing your audio blog

1. Write down the material you will be reading. (Print it out.)

2. Make sure the material is not too long. Something you can read in less than 5 minutes is great. Remember that people may not have long enough attention spans to listen to longer audio blogs. One poem (of less than epic length) or a short section from your novel is about right.

3. Practice reading it out loud several times. If there are phrases you always trip up on, repeat them over and over until you can get them smooth.

4. Record a practice run and play it back. Note any problems with the readings--- long pauses, putting the emphasis on the wrong word in a difficult phrase, speaking too fast--- and correct it in your next try.

5. After you have recorded, save it in an mp3 format. That means pressing 'export' and not 'save' in Audacity.

6. Upload your mp3 file to your ipernity page. Make sure the privacy setting is set to 'public'. Then you can use the embed code on your blog.

Have these instructions helped you? If so, be sure to put up a link to your first audioblog in this post's comment section!