A step-by-step guide to creating a podcast with Audacity

Here’s a step-by-step approach to creating a podcast in Audacity — a great free audio software program available at http://audacity.sourceforge.net

We hope you have an intro and outro for your podcast. If not, you can get them at http://audiobag.com/intros.html (yep, that’s us). Now let’s get started putting it all together.

~If you have an intro for your podcast, you’ll want to import it into Audacity first.

• Open Audacity
• Choose “File” from the menu
• Choose “Import”
• ~Choose “Audio”
• Locate and choose your intro from your computer hard drive

You’ll see that your first track has been created and it contains the intro. Now let’s import your show.

• Choose “File”
• Choose “Import”
• Choose “Audio”
• Locate and choose your show (the recording you made of yourself)

You’ll now see a second track under the intro track. You’ll want to align the beginning of the recording of yourself with the end of your intro. To do that:

• Make sure the track with your show is selected (not the track with your intro), place your cursor where the intro ends, then:
• Choose “Tracks” from the menu
• Choose “Align Tracks”
• Choose “Start to Cursor/Selection Start (you should see your recording instantly move over right underneath where the intro ends)

Now you’re going to want to add your outro.

• Choose “File” again
• Choose “Import”
• Choose “Audio”
• Locate and choose your outro on your computer hard drive

You’ll now see a third track is under the second track (your recording of your show). You’ll want to align the beginning of your outro with the end of the recording of your podcast. To do that:

• Make sure the track with the outro is selected (not the track with your podcast), place your cursor where the podcast ends), then:
• Choose “Tracks” from the menu
• Choose “Align Tracks”
• Choose “Start to Cursor/Selection Start (you should see your outro instantly move over right underneath your show)

To adjust any volume in any track:
Over on the left panel of the track you’ll see the words Mute and Solo. You adjust the volume with the slider underneath the Mute and Solo buttons

When you have the presentation sounding the way you want it, I suggest you export it as a 128 kbps MP3 file. You’ll find “Export Audio” under “File” in the menu.

That’s it! Congratulations. You’ve done it!

Advertisement