Completing the first episode of my podcast series was a bit difficult. I had a number of ideas of how I wanted to create the podcast, in order for it to be interesting and ear-grabbing. However, the more different I tried to make my podcast, the more messy it became – so, I followed the age old rule of K.I.S.S (keep it simple stupid).
Collecting research was the easiest part. Since the topic of unemployed graduates is a growing concern, there were many news articles online that I could use. I decided to include an interview in my first podcast versus reading off facts, because I felt that it would provide listeners with a truer perspective/outlook on the struggle that university students and recent graduates are currently facing in the job market. Thinking of questions, however, was probably the toughest part, since I only wanted to know one thing for this episode: what do students think they need to get hired? Therefore, taking from what I learnt from the first assignment, I went with the flow of the interviewee. To my surprise, this worked out perfectly and opened up to an array of questions and more discussion. Yet, I found that my interview sounded scripted but in reality my interviewee was very nervous and robotic (not in my control!).
In terms of music, I ended up purchasing a fairly cheap instrumental from audiojungle.net. I assumed it was better to play it on the safe side, before copyrighting or infringing on someone else’s intellectual property.
I taped both the interview and my individual monologues in a walk-in closet. I found when I did this for the previous assignment, it eliminated any echoing or fuzz from being recorded in the background. Being anal and somewhat of a perfectionist, I spent a total of 6 hours recording, in order to get the perfect take – crazy, I know! It was important to me that I was not only linguistically clear and loud, but also that I had personality in my voice.
Editing took no time at all! Audacity was easy to use and I learnt a few helpful tricks on how to use the software on Youtube. There were not many speech ticks that I had to cut out, only long pauses.
Overall, completing my first episode was a great experience; however, for the next two I will be sure to start way in advance.
#PODCASTS 