Audacity ® is free open source software for recording and editing sound.
Features
Audacity is a fast multi-track audio editor and recorder for:
- Windows 98 and later
- Macintosh OS 9 (Audacity 1.0 only) and OS X
- Linux/Unix and other *.nix-based systems
Audacity supports several digital audio formats with support for 24 bit and 32 bit sample formats as well as 16 bit. Supported formats include:
The Audacity Wiki (an online editable public resource and pages by multiple authors) contains tips, tricks and information about Audacity and digital audio. Anyone can edit pages to make them more useful or relevant. You can go there by clicking on this link:
Audacity online Wiki
Learn a bit more about Audacity by exploring links on this page: About Audacity
Where to get it
The Audacity program is available from the Audacity downloads page at http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ .
Get your Music into Audacity
Option 1: Start with an audio file like an MP3 that you already have on your computer: import it by clicking Project > Import Audio. If the audio file is saved the wrong format, it will not import into Audacity. In iTunes, you can convert it through the Advanced menu. Select the file in the iTunes library > Advanced menu > Convert selection to AIFF > an AIFF version will appear in the library window. if you arent sure which one is which, go the View menu > View Options and check ‘Kind’ to display the kind of file first.
Option 2: You can also record music from records or cassettes (see Transferring tapes and records to computer or CD) or any audio that is playing on your computer. For example if you heard some music on internet radio that you thought would suit your purpose, you could (on Windows or Linux) record it into Audacity - see http://audacity.sourceforge.net/help/faq?s=recording&i=streaming . On a Mac, you’d use a tool like Audio Hijack to record sounds playing from an application such as your web browser to an .AIFF audio file.
Option 3: To import music from a CD into Audacity you need to extract the audio from the CD to a WAV or AIFF audio file by using a program such as iTunes and import that audio file into Audacity. see below for setting this up correctly.
CD–EX is a good free Windows program to extract CD audio.
Or you can use Windows Media Player if you are on Windows XP (click Rip > Format > WAV lossless, or iTunes (either on OS X or Windows). First set the “conversion format” in iTunes Preferences under Advanced > Importing > Import using AIFF (or WAV) encoder”. Click “Audio CD” on the “Source” pane on the left. Select the tracks you want to extract and right-click on them and click the option “convert selection to AIFF”.
On OS X, CD tracks should also appear as AIFF files in the Finder, so they can simply be dragged into Audacity or imported from the CD with Project > Import Audio.
[edit] Create your Voice Track
1. To create a voice track record it with your microphone on to a new track in your Audacity Project. As the voice recording will be on a different track from the music, it can after recording be edited entirely independently of the music (see “Editing and Effects” below).
To record with your microphone, you set the recording source to microphone in Audacity’s mixer toolbar input selector http://audacity.sourceforge.net/onlinehelp-1.2/toolbar_mixer.htm (or, if you are on OS X, you set the microphone as the default recording source in Apple Audio-Midi Setup). Then press the red Record button.
If you want to be really professional, why not do a level test of your voice before you record for real? Click on the downward pointing arrow in the right hand (red) recording level meters http://audacity.sourceforge.net/onlinehelp-1.2/toolbar_meter.htm and click “monitor input”. While speaking into your microphone as loud as you would for the loudest part of what you want to record, adjust the recording level slider (by the microphone symbol) on the Mixer Toolbar http://audacity.sourceforge.net/onlinehelp-1.2/toolbar_mixer.htm so the recording meters are almost reaching the far right-hand side (but not far enough to bring the red hold lights on). If the recording level meters are not visible, go to the Preferences and check “Enable Meter Toolbar” on the Interface tab.
2. To record your voice track while listening to your music track, check “Play other tracks while recording new one” in the Audio I/O tab of Audacity Preferences, and press the red Record button. The Preferences are under usually under the Edit Menu, but on OS X are under the Audacity menu. Note: obviously you must use tight fitting headphones to record while listening to a music track, to avoid your microphone picking up the music playback in your voice recording.
3. After you have finished recording, just press “play” in Audacity to hear the result – the music track and your voice track will be mixed together just as they will when you come to “export” the recording as a computer audio file.
[edit] Editing and Effects
The Edit menu allows you to do things like cut pieces out of the music where you don’t want it, and on the Effect menu to do things like fade the music in and out, and so on.
1. Select your track first, and dont apply effects whilst you are playing, recording or pausing the track. You can select all of a track by clicking on its Track Panel (where the mute/solo buttons are). You can select part of a track by clicking in the track and dragging to left or right with your mouse, or with the left or right arrow keys.
Another useful tool is the Time Shift Tool <–-> top left of the Audacity screen (hit F5 to select it). With this you can move your music and vocal tracks back and forth so you get the music in the right place underneath your words.
2. Make the tracks as loud as they can be without distorting. To do this hit Edit > Select > All and Effect > Amplify and click OK. Then go the Track Panel of each track and slide the -…+ gain slider on each track to left by the same amount to reduce their volume. This is necessary because you have amplified both tracks so when played together they will otherwise distort. Now hit the green Play button to play the music and voice track together and watch the green playback VU meter next to the red recording meter. If the red hold lights at the right come on, move both gain sliders further back by the same amount.
[edit] Export and Publish your MP3
Once you have edited your recording in Audacity, you need to export it as an MP3 which is a universal compressed audio format that will play on iPods and other portable devices (and will also be suitable for others who may just want to listen to it on their computer) and which will also be small enough to distribute via the web.
1. To export your Project to an MP3, install the Lame MP3 encoder to Audacity - its an “optional extra”. Follow the instructions at Lame Installation to download and install Lame.
2. Click File > Export as MP3 which will mix your voice and music tracks to an MP3 file. A dialogue box will pop up asking you to edit the ID3 tags. These are tags which most audio players can read which give information such as the Title and Genre of the track. There is a short podcast tutorial here explaining about tagging MP3s in Audacity: http://www.creativecow.net/articles/mcmahon_frank/pod1/pod1.html .
Uploading to a website (podcasting)
Option 1: Once your MP3 is exported to your hard drive, you can upload it to your website and create a link for it. You can create a simple download link which is just the web address of the file e.g. http://www.mypodcast.com/podcast.mp3 .
However, if you give a plain text link like this, what happens when the user clicks on the link depends on their setup i.e. whether this downloads the file to their drive or launches their default MP3 player.
If you instruct your user to right-click the link, this will always enable them to download the file to their drive.
Option 2: If you embed your MP3 in your webpage using “embed tags” you can choose if your MP3 plays in the background or if the browser’s media plugin appears in the webpage, which will give the user an on and off button to play the file in the browser. You can also choose whether to autoplay the file on page load or not, and so on. This page shows you how to use embed tags: http://www.webreference.com/js/column20/embed.html .
If you want to make a plain text link from which users can stream your MP3 into their default MP3 player, you can just create a text file with .m3u (or .pls) extension and paste into it the full web address of the MP3, then upload the .m3u file to your webpage.
Many podcasts are distributed with what are known as RSS feeds, instead of (or as well as) offering downloading or streaming of the podcast content. When read with a feed reader program, these feeds offer a summary link to (or direct downloads of) recently updated podcast content. You can read about creating .RSS feeds for podcasts here .
If you do not have your own server or access to a website, there are other ways to put your podcast on the internet. Online services like BlogMatrix, AudioBlog, Liberated Syndication, PodBus and Podblaze offer space to upload and store your podcast. Some of these services offer free hosting while others will charge a small fee for different storage limits. Please refer to the different web sites for more information. To use a hosting service, simply sign up for an account and upload your MP3 files.
Finally, don’t forget to promote your podcast on the major podcast directories and search engines, such as iTunes and Podcast Alley .
