Creating a Podcast using GarageBand Symphonic Band Project: An Introduction to Musical Instruments

GarageBand Here we will record our voiceovers, create background audio tracks, and later create the actual Podcast. Open GarageBand and select: New Music Project.

Create a new track – select Real Instrument Track – this allows you to record a live instrument. In this case it will be your voice.

Record your voice for each informational segment. 1 st turn off the metronome - go to controls and click on metronome to uncheck.

At the bottom of the screen press the record button to start and stop recording. The microphone is above the laptop screen. Record each of your information segments as separate loops. Record button

As each segment is being recorded the track will light up as red. When it is complete, it will turn purple. To stop the cursor from moving ahead, press the space bar. If you make a mistake, just click on the track, press delete, and rerecord that segment. To listen to each loop, bring the cursor to the beginning of the loop and press the space bar or press play on the bottom controls.

Creating audio tracks for your background music Open a new track – this one will be a software instrument track. Test loop files – click on the eye button to open the loop list. This maybe located in a different place depending on your version on garage band.

Click on each category of loops to find available tracks to use. To sample a loop, click on it. When you find one that you want to use, click and drag the loop. If the loop is green, drag it into your new track. If you loop is blue, drag it onto the gray space below your new track. It will automatically create a new track for you. Green loops are electronic loops while blue loops are live recordings of musicians.

Loop editing options You can layer the loops on separate tracks so they will be played at the same time. You can lengthen a loop by bringing the cursor to the top right corner of the loop. When the arrow turns to an arrow curving left then click and drag right to lengthen to the correct length. You can shorten a loop by bringing the cursor to the bottom right of the loop. When you arrow turns to a bracket with two arrows pointing out, click and drag left to the correct length.

Sound Editing options To make the music levels balance out with the voiceovers, you must choose one of these options. 1. Individually adjust sound levels for each track. Click on the pan triangle locate at the bottom of each track to open the volume editing controls. Pan triangle

To set the volume, click on each point where you want to adjust the volume. Each point can be moved up or down for volume control. Each track can be set individually.

2. Select automatic ducking. Go to Control and click on ducking. This will automatically set levels so that the voiceovers will not be overpowered by the music. You will not be able to set levels individually in this setting.

Importing music For this project you will need to import an audio clip demonstrating the sound of your instrument. Copyright laws allow you to use copyrighted music for educational purposes, however it is limited to 30 seconds or 10% of the music, whichever is less.

To import music to your Podcast, you will need to import the music into iTunes. After importing, find it in GarageBand. Click on the media browser located at the bottom right had corner. The three browsers, Audio, Photos, and Movies will open. Media browser

Click on Audio, then iTunes. The audio file will be listed below. To import, drag your music into the gray space under the last track. To edit your music to the correct length, place the vertical play line to where you want it to start or stop. Press “open apple T”. This splits the audio track at that point.

To delete the segment you don’t want, click off the track and reselect the segment you don’t want. Press delete. Again, you can adjust the volume settings as you had previously with loops using the pan triangle. Imported tracks tend to play at very low volumes so be sure to bring the levels up and adjust other tracks accordingly.

Sharing with iTunes When you are satisfied with your voiceovers and audio track, you will need to compress your garage band file into a single audio file and share it with iTunes. Select share at the top of your screen and Send Song to iTunes. Rename you file so as not to get confused with the compressed and original file. It will take a few minutes to compress the file. iTunes will automatically open.

Starting your Podcast Now that you have your compressed audio file, you will now need to work in a new garage band file. This one will be a New Podcast file so you can add pictures, not an option in a music project in garage band.

As you have already shared your audio file with iTunes, you can find your audio file using the media browser. Drag your audio file into the track labeled jingles. Jingles Track

Importing pictures You will need to find pictures to go with your audio tracks. Pictures can be found on the internet, however, you must follow copyright laws. To find pictures where photographers have given others permission to use their pictures, go to

There are many different levels of permission granting so you will have to narrow your search to view only photos that are licensed to share. Click on the Find button. Find Link

Do NOT assume the pictures you find are all licensed for use!!!

How do you know if the work is licensed for use? Each photo has it’s own license agreement posted, so you will have to search for photos first. At the top of the page are the websites you can search from. From previous experience, the easiest place to locate license agreements in on Flickr and wikimedia commons.

Flickr Let’s use one of the pictures you see on the homepage to find where the licensing agreement is. Click on the first picture on the left.

Licensing Agreement Now scroll down to the bottom of the page. On the right side you will see a section called Additional Information. Below you will see highlighted in blue, “Some rights reserved”. Click on this.

Attribution

What it states here is that you are allowed to use this work for your own purposes as long as you attribute this work to its owner. To do this, you will need to copy and cite this photo. Highlight this area and paste it into a PowerPoint presentation.

References In Powerpoint, you will need to make up a page that lists your references. Each photo must be attributed. To do this, list them under the heading: References Photo 1, (cited page) Photo 2, (cited page) When you have completed your reference page, save it as a JPEG onto the desktop.

Saving your photos Now that you know how find shared photos and how to cite them, now you can search for photos you want to use! To save a photo, press ctrl and click on your photo. A small window will appear. Click on “Save Image As…”

Save your picture as a JPEG Name your image as photo1.jpeg Make sure the pictures is saved to your desktop Go to the bottom and save as JPEG Picture.

Import your pictures to iPhoto To be able to access your photos in GarageBand, you will have to import the pictures from the desktop to iPhoto. Open iPhoto from your applications. Once open, highlight all your photos on your desktop, click and drag over all the files. Drop them into the i P hoto library. If you like, you can edit pictures in iPhoto, but that’s another lesson.

Adding photos from GarageBand Back to your podcast! If you click on photos in the media browser, you will find all the pictures you saved, including your Reference page. Drag each photo to the Podcast track, located as the uppermost track. Just like when you were working with loops, you can adjust the length of the picture to line up with your audio track (open apple, “T”).

To preview your Podcast In GarageBand, on your menu bar, select Share, then highlight, Export Podcast to Disk... It will ask you to rename your final Podcast. Please name it as: last name, last name, instrument. Save it in your $ drive. Open QuickTime Player Open your file - it will be a MPEG 4 file. Your project will be located in Music:GarageBand:your file.

Finished Product!!! You can continue to edit and preview your work. When you feel you are finished, please save your file Open FINDER : MUSIC folder:GarageBand:your MPEG file. Separately, open STUDENT DATA file:MUSIC PODCAST file. Drag your MPEG file into the MUSIC PODCAST file. Remember, you will need to hand in your Podcast story board. Please put these in the portfolio of the first person listed on the file.

THANK YOU!!! Thanks for all your hard work! I’m sure your Podcasts will help future musicians choose the right instrument for them! Be sure to check out each other’s Podcasts on my website and make comments!