Today we're going to look at how to get really good quality audio for your podcast.
We're going to talk a bit about the equipment you need, how it all connects together as well
as what settings you might want to use to make sure you get the best quality.
So firstly you're going to need a microphone, and there are loads of different options that
will work great for podcasts, for all manner of budgets. Here I've got a Shure SM7B, this
is quite commonly used in a podcast scenario. This is an example of a dynamic microphone
which just refers to the way that the microphone actually picks up sound. Another common dynamic
microphone you might see is something like the Shure SM58, this is one of the sort of
industry-standard microphones for live vocals, but it also works great if you want a handheld
solution for podcasts, and the good thing about both of these is that they have built-in
windbreaks or pop shields. So the big fluffy bit on here, and the grill on here will protect
your recordings against 'P' and 'B', your plosives, from causing pops and crackles and
basically overloading whatever you are recording onto and ruining your recording. So the other
type of microphone commonly used is a condenser microphone like this, this is a large-diaphragm
condenser, its an AT2020 by Audio Technica. Condensers vs dynamic microphones usually
offer a bit more detail, especially in the higher frequencies, but all of them sound
great on vocals, and it kind of depends on what type of voice you have and your budget,
any of these would work absolutely fine. The one thing to consider with a large-diaphragm
condenser like this, and most other ones, is that they don't have a built-in pop filter,
it does have a grill on it, but if you get close to it, you will find that your plosives
cause issues. So you'll need to make sure that you have a pop filter which is basically
a piece of fabric that goes in between the microphone and your voice, and just takes
care of all those plosives for you. So these are just three options of microphones, there's
tons of others that you can choose from which are perfectly valid and great for doing podcasts.
The other thing to consider is microphone technique and that is a really big factor
in the sound you are going to get from the recording. So my advice is that once you've
got everything set up, put some headphones on and do some test recordings and basically
just take your microphone and try it really close to your mouth, further away from your
mouth, maybe off to the side slightly and find out what works best for your microphone
and your voice type.
So once you've chosen a microphone, it's about how to place it. Now you have traditional
mic stands that you can use which work great, and if you're going the handheld route, that's,
fine, you've just got to make sure you aren't moving your hand around too much so you are
getting lots of scuffling sounds. But using something like this is actually a really cool
way of having the microphone on the desk, you can move it around, and it's always set
up ready for you to go. So this is an articulated boom arm, you can pick them up quite cheap,
so check them out.
The next thing is something to record your microphone to, so you can get portable recorders
which record to an SD card, you plug a microphone in. But in terms of getting the best value
for money and the best audio quality for money, getting an audio interface to plug directly
into your computer is probably the way to go. So this is EVO 4, it's our two-channel
audio interface, so you can have two microphones in at the same time, perfect if you are co-hosting
or you have a guest on your podcast. It's completely run off your computer via USB so
if you are remote, you can just have your laptop, an audio interface and your mic or
mics and record an entire podcast. On the front, you have a headphone output which is
great if you want to hear what is happening live, but one of the things that separates
EVO 4 form other audio interfaces is the Smartgain feature it's got on it. So this green button
here, basically lets you automatically set your input gain for your microphones. So I'll
give you a quick demonstration of just how quick and easy it is to get levels set. We've
got the SM7B plugging into Input 1 with an XLR cable. Then all you need to do is press
the Smartgain button, the channel or channels you want to set the gain for, so you could
do yours and your guest mics at the same time. Then press the button again. So now it's going
to be analysing our microphone and you just have to talk into it exactly how you are going
to be talking in the podcast. Usually it's a good idea to try and speak as loud as you're
going to speak in the podcast, so if you're going to have a heated debate or if you're
going to be telling jokes and people are going to be laughing, then it's a good idea to try
and do that. So after you've been talking for a bit, the Smartgain button will flash
green which means that it's finished analysing and it's set the level for you. If you want
to set the level manually, you can just press the channel that you want and then adjust
on here and it will change the gain. And the same goes if you don't have an EVO 4 audio
interface with Smartgain, you can manually set the level of your audio interface, but
we'll get into the audio software now so you can actually see how to set your level manually
if you'd like.
It doesn't really matter what audio software you use it just depends if it gets the job
done for you. Each of them have different features and different levels of complexity
to them. One of the benefits so buying EVO 4 is that you actually get a free copy of
Cubase LE, which is an audio software which has editing capabilities, it's got some mix
capabilities, basically its got everything you need to get started with your podcast.
Whatever audio software you end up choosing, its a good idea to create some sort of template
system. This means you could have tracks with the set processing already on it so that you
can just edit and export and it's ready to go. You could have your intro jingle or outro
jingle or even sponsored content on separate channels, and everything can be nicely labelled
and ready to go just to make it a lot easier for you.
So we've previously set up the level with EVO 4 using the Smartgain and the SM7B and
now we'll just jump into Cubase LE which as I said comes free with EVO 4, get the channels
set up, get the audio in and out as it should, and then we can get to recording the podcast.
So now we are in Cubase LE and the first thing we want to do is make sure that EVO 4 is selected
as the audio device so that we can get the audio in and out. So here we go up to Studio
and then Studio Setup, and then on the VST AudientSystem, we just make sure that EVO
4 is selected. This option will be very similar in other audio softwares, it's usually in
a preferences menu or some kind of audio setup menu. So now we need to create some channels,
so we right click here, click Add Audio Track, and then here we make sure that the Input
1 is selected so that is our first channel on EVO 4, Mono configuration, Output Stereo
Out, and we can call it Host, now Add Track. Now if we had a second microphone we would
do that again and just make sure that input 2 is selected. So as you can see, we have
audio coming into Cubase, but before we move on, I just want to show you how to set the
gain in case you don't have EVO 4 or don't want to use Smartgain/ So I'll just turn the
gain all the way down on EVO 4, now you can see that there's nothing coming in. So what
we're interested in is this number here which is showing the peak level. We want to try
and get so at the loudest you are talking it peaks at around -10dB. This gives 10dB
of extra headroom just so if you are a bit louder when you are recording as opposed to
when you are trying to set the level, it's not going to clip and it's not going to cause
distortion and ruin your podcast. So I'm just going to turn up the gain on the SM7B and
then we're going to stop as soon as it hits -10dB. So it peaked at -7 just then so I'll
turn it down just a little bit. Reset that. And right now we're at a relatively healthy
level, -9dB pretty much. It gives us plenty of space above just in case we are a little
bit louder when we are recording. So we've now got the gain set manually, as you can
see it's a little bit more fiddly and you have to concentrate a bit more compared to
if you were just using Smartgain. This is one of the reasons why we wanted to include
something like Smartgain so you could just have a conversation with your guest and get
the level set without you having to be focused on the audio set up and then it's ready to
go.
So now we are recording audio into Cubase through the SM7B and EVO 4, and this is the
audio you are hearing right now. There is however one more thing that you might want
to consider and that's whether you want to hear anything in some headphones. Some people
feel more comfortable having headphones on while they're recording so that they can make
sure that they can hear if there are any issues as they crop up. Or maybe you're actually
having a remote conversation with someone. So lets just quickly go through how to get
headphones setup on EVO 4 to make sure you can hear everything that you want to hear.
So if you do want to be able to hear yourself or something coming back from the computer,
get yourself a nice comfy pair of headphones, its good to use an over the ear, over the
head style if you can because this will be great for longer podcast sessions and more
comfortable than using in earbuds or something that would come with a phone for example.
So you take these and you plug them into the front of EVO 4, and then you just need to
decide what it is you're wanting to listen back to. So if you're wanting to hear your
microphone, you're going to want to make use of the direct monitoring feature which EVO
4 has, the reason being, if you were to try and listen through your computer rather than
through your interface, your computer will add a delay as it's basically processing your
audio and then sending it out to your headphones and this can be really distracting when you
are trying to talk if you have a delayed version in your headphones. So the direct monitoring
feature basically takes your microphone and sends it straight out to your headphones with
absolutely no delay, and you can blend that in with whatever is happening on your computer
as well using the Monitor Mix feature. So you basically press the Monitor Mix button
which is above the speaker button, and then you rotate the knob, and then you can balance
between what's on your computer and whats on your inputs, so all the way to the right
is your computer, and all the way to the left is your microphones, and somewhere in the
middle will blend between both of them.
So one final feature for podcasters who might want to have guests on but they're not necessarily
in the same room using a different microphone, you can actually record the output of things
like Skype or Facetime or other video or phone call services using EVO 4's Audio Loop-Back
feature. Essentially it lets you record your microphone as well as the output of Skype
or Facetime on a completely separate channel in your audio software so you can process
them separately at different times. If you do want to find out more about this then check
out the card in the top right at the moment, or head to the description where there will
be links. So now you have everything you need to record your podcast, you have a microphone,
you have your audio interface which records your microphone and sends audio out to headphones,
and you have some audio software on your computer which everything is recorded to and obviously,
you can then go ahead and edit and mix it and get it ready for export.
If you found this video useful then please give it a like, if you have any questions
about anything I've said or any of the gear I've been talking about then please leave
a comment and we can start a discussion and don't forget to subscribe if you want some
more audio related or EVOrelated content.