The latest edition of my book, Take Control of Podcasting on the Mac, Second Edition, has been released! It took five months and a lot of sweat, but it’s out and I am extremely pleased with how this edition came out. One thing I always wanted to do was cover audio effects and include sample recordings illustrating what they do. This edition includes these as well as coverage of new programs WireTap Studio and Ubercaster. It also updates the other tools for the latest versions and contains substantial rewrites of much of the rest of the book. Finally, it also includes a new section on interviewing techniques.

From the Book’s Web Page:

Beginning a podcast is easier than starting a radio station, but it's still hard to assemble your hardware and software, and learn the tricks of the trade. You can easily meet that challenge with start-to-finish guidance from long-time podcaster Andy Affleck...

The ebook begins with a look at how to plan a podcast's topic, format, and polish. Then Andy focuses on choosing the right microphone and audio software, followed by step-by-step instructions for recording using Audio Hijack Pro, GarageBand, Sound Studio, WireTap Studio, and Übercaster, with advice about conducting interviews by phone, iChat, and Skype. Once your audio is in the can, you'll learn how to use audio plug-ins to make the recording sound better, complete with downloadable sound files to supplement the text. You'll also find out how to edit out any awkward bits, plug in additional audio, and mix tracks. Finally, the ebook covers how to encode your podcast, add useful tags and chapters, find a publishing tool, and publish your podcast for the world to hear.

Links:

• Take Control of Podcasting on the Mac, Second Edition
• Promo
• Podcast

Tags: writing, Podcasting, books, audio, mac

My review of WireTap Studio has been published and is up on TidBITS' website. I really enjoyed playing with this tool and as much as I am huge fanboy of Rogue Amoeba's products, I have to admit that they've been leapfrogged by Ambrosia. Of course, that means that the next releases of Fission and Audio Hijack Pro will both be very exciting as I have no doubt that they will, in turn, leapfrog Ambrosia.

I would love to start producing podcasts again, especially my long dormant Take Control of Podcasting Podcast. What I lack is a studio (I had to move my desk into the back of the kitchen for many reasons -- right near an old, noisy refrigerator) and every day my aging 1.25GHz PowerBook G4 just seems slower and less able... we're going to get a new, hot stuff iMac soon and when we do, I fully expect to go a little crazy on that and other projects. So, I'm itching to do more with these audio tools but don't feel I really can just yet.

For now, I'm content to digitize old cassette tapes and clean up the audio as best I can.

Tags: writing, tidbits, mac, audio, Podcasting

My latest article for TidBITS is now live. "Cook from your Mac: 10 Recipe Tools Compared" has been many months in the making. It took more work, more testing, and a lot more time than I thought it would but I am very pleased with the results. And I found a program, MacGourmet, I love using and have been moving all of those recipes lying around the kitchen on little pieces of paper into it. Now I just need to stop playing with it so I can actually get back to cooking! Update: The article finally went out in an issue of TidBITS and I'm starting to get some email feedback. I'll respond to the more interesting comments in this blog in a day or three. Thanks for the comments!

Tags: recipes, cooking, Software, mac, tidbits