Speaking Words

So, this month, thanks to it being my birthday, I did something I've wanted to do for ages.

I purchased a proper - real proper - microphone. Haha, I felt so weird spending money. Ahhhhh, the guilt, the shame. Why am I spending money on anything but bills and cat food.

Anyway - my anxiety over finances aside - I was really excited. Something I have wanted to do for AGES is to work on an audiobook version of my stories, but I've never had the tech to do it. I have all the technical know how, and the software, but not the hardware. Well - now - I can. Yay!

Over the last few days I've now been playing around with Orphans & Outcasts - as I want to add an audiobook to the uploading of the chapters to the website. I've been having a lot of fun. However - I have been hitting some snags.

Like - for example - my website provider doesn't allow me to directly upload audio and host it - I'm going to have to find another hosting site (like Soundcloud). But we'll see how we go. In the end I may just bite a bullet and cancel one or two of my Streaming services to pay for Soundcloud. Guess I'll wait and see...

Though, sometimes creativity can thrive in being restricted. So, who knows, maybe I just need to put my thinking cap on and work around the restrictions.

I guess I could always fall back on video instead of audio and just get Youtube to host the files. It's just, when something is a video, I feel like it should be visual as well as audio and I honestly don't want the pressure of doing animations for each chapter...

That was the point of doing audio.

Does anyone have suggestions - if I went to video to host the audio instead, would it be annoying to just have an image being displayed?

The other interesting thing that has popped up during this little adventure is just how hard it is to swap accents in the middle of reading a chapter. I'm having to learn to really slow down, make sure I'm reading each word correctly and allow myself breathing room between dialogue and prose otherwise I get really tongued twisted.

I'm having trouble with Titus' accent, which is supposed to border on being somewhat 'Scottish' - but I just can't get it right. I would actually have to get a proper scottish guy to voice his lines for it to be anywhere close to what I want. XD I just - I just can't do what's in my head - but you'll have fun listening to me try. I'm sure.

Here is the test I did for Khamsin's accent. I'm hoping to have a dialogue reference file for each of the characters - something I can keep going to back to, in the hopes I'll sound consistent.

I think I may need to ease back on this one. I can understand what I'm saying, but can you?

The biggest hurdle I have discovered - and it is something you are all really going to have to help me with over the next few months - is that I just can't gauge the right volume for the audio. When I have my hearing aids in, it's a false gauge of how loud something is, and if I don't have my hearing aids in, obviously I'm going to gauge everything incorrectly as well! I have NO idea how loud or how quiet to make something - I am fudging this. If I don't have my hearing aids in, I have to turn my speakers up to 100% to hear anything.

If I have my hearing aids in, usually its down to about 20% - but I just don't trust my ears. So yeah...

You'll have to keep me updated on if something is too quiet or too loud. ^_^;

Anyway - this has been one of the things that has been keeping me out of of mischief. Hopefully it should be a fun little sidequest. I look forward to sharing more with you as it progresses.