Location Dialogue & Ambience: Record your Essay

Objective: Improved familiarity with handheld digital audio recorders.
Assessment: Your grade will be averaged with other project scores.
Submit:  .wav files to smb://anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> SP23 | 453 >> your studio >> ESSAY >> your name

1) Record one minute of room tone.
2) Make a recording of your Drag Me To Hell essay (submitted earlier in the term).

  • Use the audio recording booths in G7 and 109.
  • Check out a Zoom H4 or Tascam DR40X recorder from equipment loan.  Use the recorder’s integral (or XY) microphones.
  • Record your voice:
    1. to a .wav file
    2. at a sampling rate of 48kHz
    3. to peak at -6 dB.
    4. with a resolution/depth of 24 bits.
  • Capture repeated takes until passages of your narration are error-free.  In a later assignment you will be editing the best of various takes into a smooth whole.

3) Upload your recordings to the server.  Make back-up copies of your files in two other locations (Google Drive and a laptop, for instance).
4)  Please do not edit or otherwise alter your recordings until instructed to do so.

Location Dialogue & Ambience: Edit your Essay

Objective:  Improved familiarity with audio editing software
Assessment:  Your grade will be averaged with other project scores.
Submit:  .sesx files to smb://anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> SP23 | 453 >> your studio >> ESSAY >> your name >> Audition

1) Because Audition’s waveform mode is destructive, back-up all your recordings in at least three different places:  the server, one on-site location (like an external hard drive), one off-site (like Google Drive).
2) Open a new Adobe Audition session using the podcast template.  Please be aware of the template’s default effects rack settings in each track.
3) Insert the recording(s) of your Drag Me To Hell essay in the “Host” track.
4) Edit your reading using the “move” and “time selection tools” to remove mistakes of delivery.
5) Select all the edited clips.  Apply an appropriate preset from the Essential Sound panel.
6) Add fades at the beginning and end of clips to minimize abrupt changes of volume.
7) To accompany your reading, download at least two tracks from Blue Dot Sessions to smb://anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> SP23 | 453 >> your studio >> ESSAY >> your name >> Music.  You need not add the music to the session until directed to do so.