- Download Audacity, the free audio editor. Use free Audacity software to record and edit sound on windows, mac and linux.
- Apr 11, 2020 This is a real hindrance if you plan on recording background music or a jingle for your podcast. A multi-functional digital audio workstation, GarageBand, is an amazing piece of software that acts as a virtual music studio. And all of this right inside your MacBook.
- GarageBand is a digital audio program available for Mac OS and iOS devices. GarageBand helps you create music, podcasts, and other audio recordings. Program multiple loops and other features in a music file, download music recordings and edit them. The program is part of the iLife software suite and has been available to Mac users since 2004.
- Download GarageBand for iOS to turn your iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch into a full-featured recording studio. GarageBand has had 1 update within the past 6 months.
In this video, you'll learn how to record, edit, and export a podcast episode using GarageBand. (This video uses GarageBand version 10.3.2) Time Stamps.
As you may know, I recently started two different podcasts. Let’s not confuse these with podcast episodes as I’m talking about shows. I started The Polyglot Developer Podcast and The NoSQL Database Podcast. Creating a podcast has been something I’ve been thinking about for a long time and it turns out it wasn’t very complicated to do.
Using GarageBand for Mac, which is free, I’m able to produce high quality podcast episodes with minimal amounts of time. The two shows that I produced have been very successful, so I thought I’d share my methods.
First off, let me start by saying that I’m using a Blue Yeti USB microphone. These things go on sale all the time on Amazon so if you can pick it up for around $80.00 then you’re doing pretty good. Second, let me say that I’m using a Mac computer that is running GarageBand 10.1.0, which at this time, has no podcasting presets built in. We’re going to see how to make things sound good!
The Microphone Settings
When it comes to the hardware, I have my Blue Yeti gain knob turned all the way down to zero. I found that if I increase the gain things get a bit noisy. Not only does it pick up everything, but the audio begins to sound a bit grainy. The microphone also has a knob with a bunch of sound settings like stereo, cardioid, bi-directional, etc. If I’m doing a solo podcast I always have my microphone set to cardioid because it mutes the rear of the microphone eliminating echo from sound bounding off the wall that I’m facing.
In the Mac sound settings I have the input gain set to maximum. Let’s be clear, the hardware knob on the microphone has zero gain and the software gain in the Mac settings has 100% gain. You may need to fiddle with the setting to find what works best for you.
GarageBand Vocal Options
When you open GarageBand you should find yourself viewing a popup window with many different audio options. For example it might contain a piano, guitar, microphone, etc. You want to make sure to choose the microphone option because we’re going to be doing vocals, not instruments.
With GarageBand open, you’ll notice no podcasting presets. If you’re coming from a version of GarageBand earlier than 10.1.0 then you might remember such options, but they’ve since been eliminated in this version. Instead you’ll see the following options:
We’ll be paying attention to Narration Vocal and Natural Vocal because I feel those two sound the best.
When you record something with the Narration Vocal you might notice it to be clear, but loud. I also found it to have a strange sound about it that I couldn’t explain that prevented it from being natural. This is why I chose Natural Vocal, however, that alone never gave me the sound quality I was looking for. By default, Natural Vocal has a lot of echo.
This is where I started to customize my presets.
My GarageBand Podcast Preset
With the Natural Vocal selected, I dropped down to the setting knobs. More specifically, put your attention at the Echo Amount and Sends Reverb.
When bringing those knobs to zero it removes the echo problem entirely giving a very flat and clear sounding vocal.
![Garageband Podcast Software Free Garageband Podcast Software Free](https://www.omnicoreagency.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Garageband-e1436621475548.png)
Editing the Recording
You’re going to find yourself needing to split and re-arrange your recording clips. When I started I thought I would be able to avoid this, but I was wrong.
The most common thing I find myself doing is splitting a clip. To do this, move the track head to the spot that you’d like to split at and press the Command + T key on the keyboard. This will slice the clip at that point. After you can freely drag the clips around as you please. Reasons to do this might be removing foul language from your podcast, changing volume levels only for certain clip spots, or adding audio between two clips.
![Software Software](https://is1-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Purple113/v4/7b/09/af/7b09afa7-95f3-352b-d531-b2b45c907bd0/mzl.iuhvggpm.png/552x414bb.png)
Conclusion
Podcasting is not difficult and you don’t need to spend thousands of dollars on equipment. I am a hobby podcaster with no professional studio knowledge and my podcasts are coming out great. I am constantly receiving inquiries on when my next episode is going to publish which means I didn’t do too bad of a job.
I did do a step-by-step recording of what I wrote about in this blog article. I encourage you to watch the video below in case something wasn’t clear or in case you wanted to see and hear what I was doing using the same equipment.
Nic Raboy
Nic Raboy is an advocate of modern web and mobile development technologies. He has experience in Java, JavaScript, Golang and a variety of frameworks such as Angular, NativeScript, and Apache Cordova. Nic writes about his development experiences related to making web and mobile development easier to understand.
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A multi-functional digital audio workstation, GarageBand has been the motivation behind the growing popularity of podcasting. This software has improved podcasting progress by bringing down the barriers to create quality audios. Because of GarageBand, a lot of iOS and macOS users have been able to produce thriving podcasts. It allows creating, editing, and mixing sound effects to create professional audios.
Podcast software, free download
Through this article, we will be discovering how GarageBand is useful in the process of creating a podcast.
Setting up a new project
- After opening the GarageBand app, on the main screen, go to New Podcast Episode and type in a name to the podcast file.
- The podcast screen varies a bit from the screen for GarageBand music. Above the list of tracks, lies a special Podcast Track that can be used for dragging photos or other artworks from the iPhoto Library or any other library.
Choosing the voice type
An essential step towards creating a podcast is plugging in the microphone, and choosing an audio track. Irrespective of whether it is a male or female voice, you can go ahead and simply click on the red-colored Record button and start talking.
Moreover, once recorded, the audio file can be edited and tweaked easily; hence there is no worry about the initial recording.
Adding effects to the podcast
After the recording is done, the next crucial step is to edit the podcast using various GarageBand tools. Below is a compilation of the most astonishing editing tools by GarageBand that’ll help you complete a great podcast:
- Trim
This tool helps you crop an audio file, by shortening it. All you need to do is drag it in from the side. Free download zip opener software. The trim option can be used to trim a specific part of the music file music, to have an appropriate track length, as per the requirement.
- Split Regions At Playhead
Next up is the Split Regions at Playhead tool. Using this tool, you can split a selected section into two individual regions, and these can then be edited independently. This is an efficient time-saving tool that assists in connecting separate sections of a track. The ‘Delete and Move’ option assists in eliminating the part of the track you wish to exclude, carrying the sections right after to move ahead in the blank space.
- Automation
After editing a track using any of the above tools, the resulting audio may seem like an abruptly ending file. Now, since GarageBand does not offer a Fade tool to help you work on the edited file, you will have to make do with the automation tool to work on the volume changes.
Free Garageband Software For Mac
Volume automation is a default GarageBand tool. However, a lot of distinct tools can also be automated by simply selecting from the track’s dropdown list.
Editing Podcast In Garageband
Export the final podcast
It is essential to monitor the final track before moving on to the exporting part. Once that is done, the only step to achieve is, exporting the track, as a separate audio clip, to upload the podcast for further sharing.
It is noteworthy that MP3 is the most preferred format for podcasting, mainly due to its compressed size. And, the smaller the size of a file, the easier and quicker downloads, and a better listening experience. Yet, to be sure of the quality of the audio, it is suggested that you also export an uncompressed WAV file. The host, as well as the mastering tools like Auphonic, will directly encode the file into MP3 format in the process. Hence, if you are not sure about the file formats, it is advised to upload the file at a high-quality file format.
Garageband Podcast software, free download
Once the podcast file has been exported successfully, you can listen to the outcome to check for any errors or probable quality issues. After all of this is done and your podcast is good to go, upload the same to Auphonic, or straight to the host for distribution purpose.
The end note
Free Music Software Like Garageband
These are the primary go-to steps that must be followed, to record a podcast using GarageBand. Once you are through with these, you will have the knowledge that can be used in future projects. Overall, these steps do not only guarantee a way to help you to create a podcast but also serve as the audio quality checker.