Technical+questions

Last night I took home a TuneTalk and recorded an unscripted, short voice memo/podcast. I connected my ipod to my mac and contrary to the TuneTalk instructions, iTunes did not ask me if I wanted to import the voice memos (I recorded 2). So I had to use Senuti to download the voice memos to iTunes. I then dragged and dropped the memos to my desktop and imported them into Audacity, combined them, took out the pings and pops and exported them to mp3. My question is why did I have to use Senuti and how else can one get voice recording off an iPod onto a computer? ecc

Seems the easiest way is to record directly into Audacity or Garage Band. Then there is no getting the file from the iPod into the editing software. It goes directly there. Of course, there is the issue of portability. The ipod is portable. However, the iPod cart, not so much. ecc

Last week Andrew and I plugged a BOCES iPod with a voice recording from the Summer Institute into his Macbook. iTunes immediately recognized it and asked if we wanted to download it. We were also able to copy it from the iPod in the Finder. Maybe I couldn't do it because I'm running Tiger at home (older version of OSX) and not Leopard. This makes using the iPod easier. There's still the issue of the portability of the iPod cart. ecc

I just uploaded a podcast with music edited and recorded with Audacity to the Samples page. The editing of the vocal track was actually as easy if not easier than it is with Garageband, but the adding and editing of the music is more difficult. I had to use a workaround to set different volume levels on the music track. But at least it isn't impossible. I used a free mp3 download from a Canadian record label which I found by doing a Google search. I will look for other free, legal mp3 downloads and post links. Also, iTunes is a free download for Windows as well and can be used to create mp3 files from CD tracks. I also just realized that we will need Lame mp3 downloaded (free) in order to export to an mp3 from Audacity. ecc

Karen showed me how to fade out music using Audacity, so that the audio editing is pretty easy now. I'll play with it over the long weekend. ecc

Kathy mentioned Freebeats.com and soungle.com as free music sources ecc