Here we are in Week 5 in Camp Magic MacGuffin and now we are working with audio. I was afraid I would find the tasks too difficult by now, but I am still coping. What I learnt in my podcasting EVO course last winter has come in really handy here. I did have a lot of technical issues with the first assignment and I still don’t understand why.
This assignment is about creating a bumper for DS106 radio. I recorded my voice in Audacity and exported the file to LAME. This part worked fine. Then I added some music to it. When I tried to export the new file, Audacity reported an error and couldn’t export the file. I ended up with Audacity’s own .aup file which was completely useless as I was unable to find any other program that would convert .aup to .waw or .mp3. What I did in the end was use Myna to create a new bumper. I still don’t know why I have this problem.
Anyway, here is my bumper:
When it comes to the radio, I am a complete amateur. I don’t know whether a radio bumper is supposed to sound like that, but I kind of like when people on the radio talk to me in an honest and simple way, as if I were one of them. That’s why I didn’t use any effects to alter my voice.
I hope I will have better luck with other audio assignments, but this problem with Audacity is still puzzling me. It seems to happen every time I try to export audio that is a mixture of music and speech (could it be the fact that it is also a mixture of mono and stereo?). The problem is new, but it seems to be here to stay. Any ideas what might be going on?
This assignment had to be one of the best assignments ever. I listen to the radio a lot and sometimes I like the bumpers more than anything else. Most bumpers are very catchy, and they don’t have many words in them, which makes it easier to remember. Although, this was one of the best ones, it took me a while to be confident enough to record it.
I feel that mine is very cheesy, but I had fun doing it. I first tried to write down something to say, but it didn’t seem right. As soon as I started recording the bumper, it all came together. All I did was play some background music and let words flow. I knew the background music had to be something “uppy” and would make people dance. So I chose to use Rihanna’s “We Found Love” (Yes, I am a Rihanna fan).
Hope you like it and I hope you find it catchy = )
Holy crow it’s been a busy week. Ā Had a couple of days of workshops with Diana Laufenberg. Ā Boy does she make me feel like a total slacker.
I’ve been kicking around the parks with the 2-year-old. Ā As a result, I totally neglected DS106. Ā I miss it. Ā The week doesn’t feel complete without doing something. Ā So here’s the first of what I hope is the first of several audio assignments.
I used Aviary’s Myna to chipmunk the B-52′s “Deadbeat Club.”
Now that we’re into audio week, it was hard to pass up the Mainstreamed Chipmunkd’ Audio Assignment 494. After hearing Jolie’s “You Can Call Me Al-vin” last night, I just had to try it myself. While I found the Genesis classic “Carpet Crawlers” mighty wonderful at any speed, I decided to up-chipmunk The Chipmunks’ recent version of LMFAO’s Party Rock Anthem.
I spent a bit of time working around with the settings in the djay app, by algoriddim. The interface is wonderful for mixing and playing with your recordings. Somehow, I wasn’t able to get the sound effects working last night (too tired to search the documentation), but I had lots of fun with the looping effect.
If Dave Grohl ever hears this he is going to find me and kick my ass…
I’m a big fan of the Foo. Ā On a scale of “1″ being very chipmonkable (Think Beyonce’s “Put a Ring on It”) to “10 being very un-chipmonkable (pretty much anything by Black Sabbath), Ā I figure they are in the 8-9 range. Ā Of course, I had to do it.
I used VirtualDJ Home on my Mac to play with the beats per minute and pitch until it was just a little faster, and way higher pitched. Ā Easy, fun… now thinking about recording some fellow teachers and ‘monking them.
I love those crazy woodland critters that can sing better than me. I have listened to many songs that have been chipmunk-ed. So I was highly excited to see this assignment. In Audacity, I changed the pitch of the song andĀ voilĆ ! I was done.
I love so many songs and couldn’t think of just one to chipmunk. Eventually, after careful consideration, I choseĀ You Can Call Me Al by PaulĀ Simon. Everything about it was just perfect for this assignment. Even if the singing is high-pitched, this song is still a favorite of mine.
I chose to do a Rihanna Chipmunk version. Yes, I LOVE Rihanna to bits, and I know all of her songs One of her songs I love the most is “Only Girl (In the World).” This song is very upbeat and a lot of people know it very well. Along with that, I knew that the chipmunk version would sound great to this song.
It was very easy and fun to do. I just opened the song on Windows Media player, clicked EDIT, and changed the pitch. I made the pitch very high, and it turned into “chipmunk” mode. I didn’t know how to upload that to my blog, so that is why I chose to upload it on SoundCloud. I hope you enjoy it!
To start off in Audio, I decided on the “Contest that nobody could win.” I love guessing games and especially musical guessing games. I clipped sections out of six songs and mashed them together in Audacity, which, is quickly becoming my favorite program on my computer.
Saying nobody could win seemed harsh to me, but I was so lost in which six seconds and which six songs to choose. Eventually, I scrolled through iTunes and saw a clump of songs by the same artist. I loved each song individually and decided, why not? So, guessing will be easy and there really isn’t a specific phrase it spells out. The only theme in this mashup, other than the artist, is the sections of song all (sort of) have a pronoun.
In my family, writing well is very important. Any piece of paper, text, email, or dialogue should be grammatically correct or else… I always liked pronouns. They are very social parts of speech. Pronouns remind us of someone or a group. He, She, We, They, even It all evoke an image in our heads. Pronouns are important and should not be ignored, but they are often taken for granted.
Jumping into the ds106 audio, assignments, I wanted to take on ones that had few takers so far- and I remain stumped why Suess It was not given some ds106 attention:
Take a Dr. Suess book, or perhaps the Berenstain Bears, or one of your own favorites, and read it to us. Give me your best Yertle the Turtle, or Lorax, or Mama Bear and have fun!
Now just reading a book to me is not really doing ds106 in the “bring us your A Game” style- that would be just following the task literally. I think it should be done in an over the top (or under the bottom fashion). The choice of a book for me was easy, not juts because of my regular inclination to do something dog related, but because truly, Go Do Go was my all time favorite Seuss book as a kid. My copy was covered in crayon sketches (the clean one above was given to me as an adult, and I have kept the crayons away).
So here is my wobbly imitation of Tom Waits reading this book
The background music is from the internet archive- a live recording of Hillbilly Jazz in Nashville (1975). This was recorded directly into Audacity, with the music imported. I like using the envelope tool to vary the levels of music to have it fade in and out, and drop under the spoken voice.
Camp is now over (see the final story. If you are craving an experience like this, head over to ds106 and see how to participate. For more on the Summer of Magic Macguffin, see.....
