Paradicing

Audio Story Assignment

Ashley Abordonado · Audio Story Assignment

THE PROCESS
This all started with the inspiration of developing my website. How can I provide a more open, interactive community, and promote continuous learning of the importance of food, travel, and wellness and the important place that each of these topics holds to every individual? A podcast of sorts, that is what I wanted to add to my website. A section where I can interact and learn from my peers.

THE PERFECT PERSON
With a podcast/interview in mind, I thought about who best to interview. My sister in law and one of the caregivers to my mother when I am away from home. Jamie has cooked us meals that have warmed our hearts and spirits during many difficult times. She brings us together at the dinner table to share her love, compassion, and empathy. Which is why I wanted to share her with my listeners.

THE INTERVIEW
After deciding on who I wanted to interview, I reflected on what messages I wanted to be expressed through the audio. I wanted to include a guided thought process going into the interview. So, with the intention of discovering how Jamie “…incorporates her love for both the arts and food in preparing meals for her loved ones” I wrote out a couple questions that I assumed would bring those ideas to life.

THE RECORDING
With giggles and embraces, we sat down together and shared a conversational setting interview. While I had prepared questions for her, I did not just throw her into the mic. I had her read the questions previously so that she had an idea of what she wanted to include in her conversation with me. The entire thing was really organic and her words delivered honest whole hearted answers.

THE AMBIENT SOUNDS
One thing I always have heard in the background of some-of my favorite conversations with my mom and loved ones was the sound of her wind-chimes in the background. With Hawai’i’s beautiful comforting trade-winds bouncing off the chimes and providing us with soothing sounds that seem to align with our conversations. I wanted to share that atmosphere with my listeners. So, I simply went outside and stood next to her infamous wind chimes and let my mobile voice recorder soak in the soothing sounds.

THE SIGNIFICANCE
This interview/conversation is so significant to my website’s core of travel, food, and wellness. The conversation invites my listeners to another persons home as they share their culture, love for food, and the wellness food brings.

THE TECHNICAL JOURNEY
With what I had learned from our tutorials, I took straight to Adobe Audition and plopped my interview into my empty track space. I listened over and over and took notes of silence, “umm and likes”, stumbling over words. I then started from the beginning of the recording and started using the “razor tool” to remove any unwanted audio. I used the “select tool” to then piece the audio in place to my liking. I did this about a billion times and when I thought I was satisfied I found even more editing I could do. Eventually, I was happy with the final product of the interview audio.

I then dragged my wind-chime recording of 30 sec and replicated it 3x to fit around the edited interview. I centered the interview audio in the middle of the wind-chime audio. I then selected each wind-chime audio selected the square icon on the left hand side and adjusted the “fade in/out” of the sound to my liking. I then selected the yellow solid line and adjusted the volume to be lower than our voices during the interview.

WARM MAHALO,

Ashley

ashleyabordonado

March 10, 2023

COM561

6 responses to “Audio Story Assignment”

Anders

March 10, 2023 at 5:05 pm

Hey Ashley! I love your post. Your writing voice is very expressive and colorful.

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grantmolly1

March 20, 2023 at 8:43 am

Great work Ashley! I really enjoyed listening to your story and you can tell how passionate Jamie is about what she does and she really highlights the importance of food and cooking to an individual. Two edits you might consider, first when you ask the question “where did your love of food and cooking develop from”, about 45 seconds in, the transition is a bit clunky. You might consider putting more of a pause between your question and her answer. There also appears to be some of the word before her response still included in the clip. If you are able to trim that out and add a pause between the question and answer, the transition will flow more smoothly. Second, you might consider re-recording your question “what is the importance of cooking for your loved one”, the sound is somewhat distorted in the beginning. Because this is your voice, it is hopefully easy to re-record. I really love your use of the wind chimes! It very much set the tone for the interview. One suggestion would be to have a nod to the chimes in your opening, could you set the stage by describing where you are and describe the sounds around you? You might also consider lowering the volume of the chimes after the beginning of the interview and then boosting it at the end. Overall, great work! I really enjoyed listening to your story!

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futurepharmd

March 20, 2023 at 11:12 am

Hi Ashely,
This is a great start to your audio story. I really like your layout in breaking down your draft story process. I like the use of the wind chimes because they definitely have a relaxing and homey feel to them which fits perfectly with your interview. I also like that they sound blended together without any cut offs in between. I think a few areas you can improve on is by how you end the interview. I think as it stands the interview seems a bit short, but I understand this is a draft and it can be tricky getting complete points to fit in the time frame. I also think that you should close the interview considering how you are the interviewer. This way the listener also knows that you are wrapping up the interview as a complete topic. I think both of these tips will help ensure a smoother transition for the beginning to the end of the interview. Overall, really nice job!

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studebakerchanel

March 20, 2023 at 11:15 am

Ashley-
Great job! I love your topic, and I could really relate to your topic and your guest. I also liked your questions. Overall, I thought your sound quality was really good, and your guest was easy to understand, even though she seemed a little bit soft spoken. The windchimes are definitely a good vibe, and they added to the story. I wonder if they would have a little bit greater of an impact if they were sprinkled throughout instead of a constant track in the background?

Your story seems a little bit short. You may want to consider adding some closing thoughts of your own, or maybe a call to action for folks to subscribe to your blog for more content? You could also add in some music and the beginning and end to add a few more seconds. I felt like the end came too soon and I wanted more.

Good luck finishing it up!

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K. Klein

March 20, 2023 at 12:12 pm

Hi Ashley, I really like what you’ve done for your Audio assignment. The wind chimes were a lovely way to tie the whole piece together, and the meaning behind including that sound is really beautiful. The questions you ask and Jamie’s answers are heartfelt.

My suggestions are really more on the technical side, not about the content. The pacing in your introduction felt so natural, but the pacing sped up as you started asking the interview questions and incorporating Jamie’s replies. In the instructions Jordan provided for finishing up this assignment, he wrote “conversational stories will benefit from the occasional pause, since this fits with natural speaking patterns”. I wonder if you can include in some extra pauses, particularly between your question and her answers, as well as between each answer and moving on to the next question? You’re well under the 3 minute maximum, so I think you’d have space to do so, and it would make it easier for the listener to really soak in the beauty and wisdom of how Jamie views food as a labor of love and art. Plus the wind chimes would continue to be a nice filler so you aren’t left with just blank space.

The other suggestion I have is to adjust the sound levels to match. The volume of your spoken voice is softer than Jamie’s, so when she first spoke I was almost startled. I believe you can easily raise your volume level or lower hers a bit in Audition so they match. There’s also a loud sound of some kind at the 1:13 mark—I’m not sure how you could address that, but I bet there’s tips and tricks online that could help you remove that sound without needing to re-record that portion of the audio.

Overall, great work! I think the “fixes” you might make are relatively minor, and you’re close to your final product.

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ashleyabordonado

March 30, 2023 at 9:29 pm

Aloha,

After reading the feedback from my classmates I was able to reflect on my piece. I found changes that I would like to incorporate in my final draft of my audio story which would include additional spacing between questions and answers, adjusting the volume so that both the speaker and interviewee are projected at the same range. Additionally, I would like to play around with the volume of my ambient noise and make possible adjustments where I find it needed. Finally, I may want to include a closing statement to seal the interview.

Mahalo,
Ashley

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