Who will do what?
There are several different tasks that may need to be carried out in developing an audio-print package. (See opposite page.) On a small project You may be able to do everything yourself. That's part of the attraction of working with this user-friendly medium.
On a larger, more ambitious project, you may need help. For instance, you may want to rent a few hours in a recording Studio with the services of an audio engineer (perhaps £25 or more per hour, even out of London). You may even want to budget for the fees of an outside production company that will handle not just recording, but every task you care to delegate to them. (See page 100.)
Some possible tasks in making an audio-print package
- Developing the original concept
- Finding/briefing writers
- Writing the script
- Finding interviewees
- Interviewing them
- Finding and briefing actors and presenters
- Clearing copyright
- Finding music
- Arranging travel and accommodation
- Booking recording studios
- Recording the tape
- Editing the tape
- Presenting or speaking "links"
- Duplicating cassettes
- Designing the print materials
- Writing the print materials
- Checking safety/security aspects
- Arranging for evaluation
- Managing the whole project
- Others? (What?)
Working with outside producers
You and your colleagues may have all the equipment, skills and time you need to produce all your own audio-print packs. Then again, having tried producing one or two of your own, you may feel you need professional help for later projects-at least some of the time. So you may need to commission an outside producer-either elsewhere in your own organization or in a different organization altogether.
I guess you'll know whether your own organization has a unit that can help with audio production. If so, your first step may be to find out what it can offer.
But who else might you go to for help outside your own organization? One way to find out might be to contact firms listed under "Audio-visual services" in the Yellow Pages for your local regions. Another might be to contact the producers at your local radio station. They may be able to work with you themselves. Or can they put you in touch with any former colleagues now working as independent audio producers?
Using an outside production group may involve you and your colleagues working closely and creatively with them for weeks or months. So do your best to choose partners you can get on with, and set up a clear and professional relationship with them right from the start. Asking questions (tactfully) like those on the opposite page may help you in this.
Production plan
Whether you and your colleagues are working alone or with the help of outside professionals, you will need a production plan. This will need to cover items like the following:
Roles: (What needs to be done, and by whom, in developing and producing the script, the audio and any printed materials?)
Production facilities: (Where and by whom will the tape be recorded, edited and copied?)
Budget: (What costs will be involved in developing and producing the package?)
Working with outside producers
If you are thinking of working with an outside production group-even one from elsewhere in your own organization-here are some of the questions you may want to ask:
- Will the producers be able to fit in with the culture of your organization? (Not all outside producers will be equally on your wavelength, so try, if possible, to discuss your project with more than one.)
- How long have the producers been producing?
- Which organizations have they produced for previously?
- Are the producers willing to introduce you to other clients?
- Have the producers any experience of working on your subject?
- Will they let you listen to some examples of their previous productions?
- Will the people who developed the material you are shown be working on your project?
- If not, who will-what audio material have they produced previously-and what skills will they bring to your project?
- Will the producers be sympathetic to the kind of audio package you want to produce? (You may need to play them examples, e.g. from the audiotape in this package.)
- Which tasks will the producers carry out, and which will you?
- What will be the key stages or "mileposts" in the project?
- Who has the ultimate authority to approve or "sign off" all the key stages or mileposts?
- How will payments be related to the sign-offs?
- How will budgets be set and presented?
- What documentation will be produced?
- How will any necessary copyright clearances be handled?
- Who owns the copyright of the finished package?
Questions a producer might ask you
I showed the questions overleaf to Michael Bartlett of Business Sound. He responded by listing the kinds of questions he might need to ask you:
- How long do you think the finished production will be? (Most people over estimate the duration required.)
- Is that duration to be all on one side of a cassette (with the other side blank) or will the duration be split across two sides?
- If the latter, where is the logical place to make the split?
- How complex is the production? For instance, how many interviewees are needed and where are they located geographically? Can they all be in the same place at the same time, or must they be visited separately? (This obviously has an effect on the time involved and the travelling expenses.)
- How many cassettes do you want duplicated?
- Will the cassettes have on-body printing or printed labels?
- Will the cassettes have an inlay card? If so, will the client supply the art work?
- Will the inlay card be printed in one colour, two colour, four colour or full colour?"
Actually, those look like questions we ought to be asking ourselves even if we are doing our own production.
Getting your recording conditions right
Audio quality is certainly not all down to what equipment you've got. In the words of my colleague, Jack Clegg—an audio engineer and producer for nearly 40 years—"it's not so much what you've got, as what you do with it". Jack suggests that the art of successful sound recording lies in looking for ways to maximize the sound you do want to appear on tape and minimize the background noises that you don't want. In short, optimize your recording conditions.
- Find a room that is convenient to work in. It doesn't have to be "sound-proofed", but try to avoid one that is too echoey. For instance, a softly furnished bedroom would be better than a sports hall.
- Put a notice on the door: "Recording in progress. Please do not knock or enter."
- Disconnect the telephone or ask for calls to be transferred.
- Switch off any computers, faxes or other equipment that may suddenly draw noisy attention to themselves.
- Check the furniture you'll be using in case it is liable to squeak, or groan or make scraping noises if moved across an uncarpeted floor.
- Try to arrange the pages of your script in such a way that you won't be noisily turning over pieces of paper-e.g. gum them to card or enclose them in transparent plastic folders.
- Sit quietly for a few minutes, listen to the room, and look around:
- Is that the next door neighbour getting ready to tune her car engine? (If so, close the window.)
- How long have those starlings been squabbling in the roof-space? (Shoo them off or move rooms.)
- Is that dog in the garden likely to start barking if someone goes by?
- Is that hum coming from the heating system or the strip lighting? Can it be turned off?
And so on.
- Use a 'cardioid' microphone—i.e. a microphone that picks up noise chiefly from in front of it, less so from its sides, and scarcely at all from behind it. This will help you maximize the sounds you do want and minimize those you don't want to record.
- For the same reason, if you plan to record in stereo, use two cardioid microphones, if you can, rather than a single, so-called "stereo" microphone (which records equally from in front and behind).
- Make sure that you (and any other speakers) keep close enough to the microphone. (Trial and error will tell you the ideal distance-probably no more than about 30 cm.) Keeping close to the microphone is the most effective way of increasing the recording strength of the sound you do want and thereby drowning out the background sounds that you don't want.
- One way of ensuring such closeness is to use a "commentator's" microphone (about £200). This is attached to a headband and so remains at a set distance from the speaker's mouth.
- However much you may get intrigued by the content of what is being recorded, try to keep half an ear open for the unanticipated intrusion of unwanted noise. Be prepared to interrupt the recording if the noise continues, or to rerecord a passage afterwards if the original his been badly affected.
Saying your piece
Many people will be somewhat on edge the first time they sit down to do a serious recording-specially if other people are present. If you haven't done much recording before, here are some suggestions that may be useful:
- Get plenty of practice recording your own material on your own tape recorder before you begin recording other people's voices or having someone else record yours.
- You may find it useful to practise varying your intonation and emphasis. For example, try saying the sentence, "The cat sat on the mat", putting the weight on a different word each time, according to which of the following questions you are answering: What sat on the mat? What did the cat sit on? What did the cat do on the mat? Did the cat sit near or on the mat?)
- Get familiar with your script. Read it over several times (aloud) before you record. Change anything you find difficult to say. Mark up the words on which you'll put special weight. Mark the points where you can pause for breath (and let your listeners catch up with you).
- Get your breathing under control. Several deep breaths-slowly in and slowly out-before you begin should help you speak smoothly and confidently.
- Don't take a deep breath and then try to say as much as possible. Breathe normally.
- Don't slump forward over your script and so restrict your breathing. Some people suggest speaking your piece standing up-so long as you can do so without rattling paper or moving your face away from the microphone.
- Don't sneeze, sniff or cough (or not without noticing and re-recording).
Act natural!
- Don't be self-conscious. (It may sound difficult to avoid, especially if you are consciously avoiding being self-conscious. Perhaps the trick lies in concentrating on your learners and what you are trying to put across to them, rather than on how you are putting it across.)
- Imagine you are now talking to one of the individual learners (Sushma, Pete or Roz) for whom you wrote your script. Imagine he or she is four feet away from you across the table-so speak up (but there's no need to shout).
- Don't lecture. Keep it conversational. Talk like you normally talk.
- But take care not to drop your voice (as many people do) towards the end of a sentence.
- And, at the same time, don't try to compensate (as many broadcasters seem to) by always emphasizing the final word in each sentence.
- Don't put on a special voice or try to sound like someone else. Let your own interest and enthusiasm for the subject come across. That way you'll sound authentically "up" and hence get your listeners interested and involved.
- Don't gabble. Speak slowly enough to be followed easily-which doesn't mean dictation speed-but not so slowly that you sound bored, tired or flat.
- Don't raise or lower the volume of your voice in the hope of conveying emphasis or feeling.
- Don't be afraid to pause for breath. It is easier to shorten pauses by editing than to edit pauses into a non-stop stream of talk. (It also helps listeners feel you are speaking slowly even when you are not.)
- Don't eat, drink or smoke while you are recording.
- If necessary, record yourself over and over again, learning from each trial and, let's hope, getting more and more confident and competent. Practise-practise-practise!
- If you ever find that you (or any other speakers) are getting dull or dreary when speaking to the microphone, try speaking to one another instead. With some topics, colleagues interviewing one another may work up a better head of steam than they would with a straight talk.
Interviewing
- If you are interviewing someone:
- Chat with your interviewee beforehand and get him or her relaxed.
- Make sure your interviewee knows how long the interview is to last, what you want out of it and give him or her a chance to get used to the microphone.
- Agree the main line of questioning (but not necessarily the precise questions or their order) in advance.
- Ask the questions that will draw out the information your learners need to hear, and probe where needed.
- Ask only one question at a time.
- In asking your questions, sound alert, interested and spontaneous—like you really want to know.
- Listen to the replies. (Think how often you've groaned when you've heard an interviewer ask for information which the person has just supplied as part of their reply to the previous question!)
- Don't be afraid to ask follow-up questions (or at least depart from your intended order of questioning) if a reply throws up some new line that you think your learners would like to hear pursued further.
- Whatever question you ask next, it should normally relate to what your interviewee has just said. If it doesn't, make this clear to the listener, e.g. "Now let me ask you about something rather different".
- If you plan to have several people in discussion on your tape, be careful:
- Three or four people on the go in one session is about the most that any human ear can cope with.
- Try, if you can, to choose people whose voices are easy to tell apart-e.g. men and women, different accents or pitch or vocal style.
- If you have no choice of speakers, make a point of mentioning names often enough so that the learner knows who is talking. (Radio "conversation" programmes or panel games like Radio 4's Start the Week and Midweek or just a Minute and The News Quiz may give you some clues as to how this might be handled.)
Getting it right
- Whether recording on your own or with other speakers, listen to the tape before going home for the day. If anything needs re-recording, it will usually be easier to do it there and then while the mood lingers. (And getting other people back to re-record may be out of the question.)
- Check the recording also against any accompanying visual materials. Do the audio and print tie in together as well as they might? Do you need to alter or add to either of them?
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