How to Record Radio Drama with Skype – A Step by Step Slideshow

September 7, 2009 By 5 Comments

Lots of audio groups have success doing remote recording – having cast members from across the world record their lines independently and then email audio files of their lines to one producer who puts it all together. The baker with all of the ingredients from the cake, if you will.

Darker Projects, Brokensea, and Pendant Productions all come to mind as groups who regularly or occasionally use this method. And if you know what you’re doing, it can come out very well!

Of crouse, if you’re just starting out, there are a lot of beginner’s errors you can make that result in uneven, or unusable, results. Which it was why it was so great to come across this presentation by Richard Elen, who presented this talk at OpenTech 2009 in London on producing “Radio Drama At A Distance” using Skype:

Radio Drama At A Distance
View more presentations from Richard Elen.

Thanks, Richard, for this fantastic presentation. This really sums up just about everything the basic audio drama technician needs to know to get started. We’ll be corresponding with Richard via email and featuring his feedback here in a couple more weeks.

Filed Under: Articles, News, Radio Drama
  • http://brideswell.com Richard Elen

    I am glad you found my OpenTech presentation worthy of embedding.

    I’ve also used the approach of getting individual cast members to record their own parts and send them in for the producer to assemble and edit, as you mention in your introduction.

    However, in my view, the important thing is that there should be a *performance*: recording your own part “cold”, with no interaction with other performers, doesn’t really do it for me.

    The issue with any VOIP technique is one of audio quality, which of course recording locally can circumvent. However I would suggest that you still use the VOIP call to facilitate a live performance, even if you ask cast members to record locally.

    Also bear in mind that recording locally does give the producer a good deal more to do, so you need to allow additional time for the post-production work.

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  • http://www.radiodramarevival.com Fred

    Richard,

    I think you may an excellent point about recording “live” vs. “cold.” I love the idea of people collaborating worldwide but still being able to act off one-another, in fact, I think VOIP is basically the poor-man’s version of what top voice actors do when collaborating with other actors using studios with high-speed connections.

    It all depends on what you’re doing, but for creating a work that really benefits from a worldwide cast and with sufficient technology to do it, I think you outline a brilliant (and innovative) use of a Skype.

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