Step-by-Step Instructions for a Successful Audio Book Recording
We’ve all heard the horror stories about audio book recordings. But there are ways to make the experience better for both you and your listeners. This post provides step-by-step instructions for recording an audio book. We’ll start with the basics and work our way up to a professional-quality recording.
What is an audio book
An audio book is a book that has been recorded on CD or MP3 player and then played back to the listener through a device such as a computer, stereo, or cell phone. This type of book is also called an audiobook.
Audiobooks have been around for a long time. In fact, the first audiobooks were created in the 1920s, when the technology of recording and playing back audio was first developed.
In the early days, people who wanted to listen to books but didn’t want to read them could use the technology to do so. However, audiobooks have become much more popular over the past few years. Many people enjoy listening to books because they can do so in the comfort of their own homes, and they can listen to them whenever they want.
Today, many people listen to audiobooks while commuting to work, running errands, or driving. They can listen to books at home, in the car, and even in the gym.
Equipment Needed to Record an Audio Book
We’ve all heard stories of people who make a lot of money doing something that seems simple. The truth is, there’s a lot of room for improvement when it comes to making money with your audio recordings. This post covers the basics of recording an audio book and the equipment you’ll need to do it.
Finding A Quiet And Treated Recording Space
Try to find a space where you can record undisturbed. This means no kids, pets, or visitors. It also means no phones ringing, computers humming, or appliances running.
The easiest way would be a walk-in closet or treat your spare room with foam. But this is a temporary solution at best. If you plan on making a career out of recording, you will need to build a recording booth.
Choosing a Microphone
When it comes to audio books recording, you want to go with the lowest noise floor possible. Microphones with a higher noise floor will tend to add a lot of hiss and noise to the recording. This is especially true when recording in a large room, or when the recording is being done at a low level. When you record at a low level, you are not really doing a great job of capturing the voice. In other words, you are not getting the most out of your microphone.
The best way to record audio books is to do it in a small room with good acoustics.
Choosing an Audio Interface
As important as a microphone can be, the choice of audio interface is just as important. The audio interface is the piece of equipment that will be responsible for taking the audio signals from the microphone and feeding them to your recording software. You can have a computer with a USB audio interface, but if you are looking for the best audio quality, you are better off with an interface that has a FireWire or Thunderbolt port.
Choosing A DAW Software
A DAW is an acronym for Digital Audio Workstation. It is the software that will be responsible for recording, editing, mixing, and mastering your audio. You will need a DAW software to be able to record audio and mix the audio with your music.
The DAW software will be responsible for taking the audio from your audio interface and applying effects and processing to it. The DAW software will then convert the audio into the format that your computer is capable of recording and play it back to you.
Going with a free DAW like Audacity is the easiest way to get started. It is easy to use, and it will work for the most part. However, if you are looking for something a bit more complicated, you should consider getting something like Pro Tools or Adobe Audition.
Choosing Microphone Stand
A microphone stand is the piece of equipment that will be responsible for holding your microphone. It can come in a variety of shapes and sizes, but the two most common types are the pop stand and the boom stand.
It is important that you choose a microphone stand that is stable, sturdy, and is not too heavy.
You will need to make sure that the microphone stand is stable so that it will not fall over when you are moving around with the microphone. The microphone stand will also be able to support the microphone in the right position.
Choosing A Pop Filter
A Pop Filter is a must have for your Audio book recording setup. It is a piece of equipment that will help reduce the pop in your audio Aka Plosives. Plosives are harsh and unpleasant sounds that can occur when you read words that have B’s & P’s letters like Pop :D.
There are two types of pop filters, one is made out of mesh and plastic, and the other is full metal. Choosing the first one is advised for low budget recording setups. The metal one is recommended for high-end recording setups.
Choosing a pop filter is important. It will reduce the pop in the audio and help make it sound a bit more professional and pleasant to listen to.
Choosing A Headset
A Professional headset is crucial when it comes to monitoring your recording and hearing the tone of your voice while recording at the same time. And also helps when editing the final drafts, A flat and balanced headset is recommended for this purpose.
Choosing a headset with a long cable will allow you to move the headset around while recording.
A dog training clicker
This clicker is like magic when it comes in editing your audio. During the recording we tend to mispronounciate and we’ll have to redo the mispronounced part, using a clicker will be a tremendous help in the editing, whenever you make a mistake just click the clicker so you can identify them later in the editing.
How to Record An Audio Book
So you do now have the equipment required for this job, you are now ready to start recording your book.
Step 1: Choose your recording software: There are many different options for recording audio books. We suggest using Audacity, which is free and can be downloaded from the website of Audacity.
Step 2: Create an outline: You must create an outline before you begin recording. This helps to ensure you don’t forget any important information. You can use a simple outline or make an outline that includes specific information about each chapter and section.
Step 3: Practice and record: Practice and record your book. Once you feel comfortable with the process, record your book.
Step 4: Turn on your recorder: If you are using Audacity, it should be turned on when you start recording. Click on the red record icon top left or just hit R on your keyboard and Space to stop recording. Remember to leave a three to five seconds recording the room noise, we’ll need that later. don’t speak or move during those seconds.
How to Edit Your Audio Book on audacity
Remember when we talked a dog clicker, this clicker will be a great help in editing your audio books.
Let’s setup a few things up first before We start editing.
Step:1 Open Audacity: Go to Edit in the top bar, then click on “Show clipping”. This step will allow you to see your clicking (those red line that appeared in the file) and you can identify them during the editing.
Step2: Removing Mistakes: Now that you can see red lines (clipping) in your file, Just scroll to the closest clip mark, and remove the mistake. You’ll get used to it with time, and won’t have to listen to the mistakes but just recognize the sound waves.
Step3: Compressing: After cleaning up your audio, you might can see some clipping marks, that’s fine, we’ll get rid of it, alongside making your voice sound a bit more amplified.
Double click on the whole audio, then head to effects, compressor, and hit ok. Your background noise & hiss might be higher, don’t worry we’ll fix that next.
Step4: Noise Reduction: Remember when we said you should leave a three to five seconds before or after recording without spoken word and nothing than room noise?Well now we can use that to remove the extra noise we got from compressing.
Highlight the hiss part, then click on effects, noise reduction, then hit ok. and the hiss DISAPEARED, Magic, right? haha.
Step 5: Exporting the final audio: The final part and most easiest one, just click on file > export > export as wave, then name your audio book file and hit ok. Now your audio book is ready to go.
Final Thoughts on How to Record An Audio Book in Your Own Home
In conclusion, we have all been there before, when we want to record something for ourselves. We just want to make sure that we get the best quality possible. But, we don’t know where to start. The good news is that there are some very simple steps that we can follow to ensure that we get the best audio quality
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