Podcast

ProfCast Thoughts … The Podcast

/ Cole Camplese / 2 Comments

After I posted about the missing podcasting link last week I got a couple of comments asking for my ProfCast thoughts … I am not going to do an all out review, but instead thought I’d share my thoughts as a Podcast … surprisingly not using ProfCast. Not that it isn’t a good tool, its just I needed to edit it a bit and that is the big hang up with that tool for me right now. I did have a chance to speak to the founder of the company that makes ProfCast and he assured me that good things are coming.

At any rate, take a listen to the podcast … it is only about 13 minutes long and weighs in around 7 MB.

Podcasting in WordPress 2.0

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Well, after lots of digging and running into dead ends I went back and reinstalled the WP-iPodCatter plugin for WordPress.  I had done that yesterday and it didn’t seem to be working until I added “enclosure” to the Custom Fields area of the WP write panel.  Once I did that, I could easily add the URL of the m4a file and it gets dropped into the feed.  I can then use the itpc:// protocol to let users auto-subscribe to my podcast feed via iTunes.

I have it working here at Learning and Innovation as well as my class blog.  It seems like a step backwards from the way WP 1.5 just added the file, but I could be wrong about all this.  At any rate using the plugin, adding the custom field, and dropping in the full URL of the file made it all work.

Podcasting with GarageBand

/ Cole Camplese / 5 Comments

So I’ve finally had some time to use GarageBand as a podcasting suite … I have to say it is very nice.  I told my students this semester that I would attempt to podcast as many lectures as I possibly can so after the class period is over so they can download and listen to me all the time 😉 … I’m sure all of them will take me up on that one!

At any rate, the first lecture based podcast of the semester is up over at my class blog.  I used some really cheesy built-in GarageBand jazz score for the intrto music just for the hell of it.  It turned out to be OK … other than the fact it is an introductory lesson and my first attempt at doing this in the classroom.  BTW, the feed over at my class blog isn’t working correctly, so there isn’t any real way to subscribe just yet.  I am told it is being looked at.

So, all I do is walk into class with my PowerBook, plug a wireless microphone into the sound input, set the input in the system prefs, open GarageBand and go to the preferences to make sure the correct input is selected there, and start recording.  At the end of the lecture I simply export my slides as images out of Keynote and drop them into the podcast track of GarageBand, record a quick date and time stamp for the front of the podcast, and add some cheesy music.

Tuesday’s podcast of my lecture turned out to be an edited 30 minutes.  It took me about an hour to get it all together, but I must admit I was still learning how to use the software.  I may try and be more selective with the editing, but who knows.  At any rate that’s how easy it is!  Now, if only iWeb actually let me publish to my PSU webspace as easily as it lets me publish to my .Mac space … then we’d be in business.  Hey, baby steps!

Blog Study … Podcasting Some Ideas

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Tonight Chris Millet and I sat down to talk about the blogging study he is conducting at the IST Solutions Institute here at Penn State. Chris and I headed down to the basement in our old studio to talk a bit about the study and to share some thoughts with the faculty participating … this is a 50 minute, unedited discussion. We didn’t have notes or any real notion of what we wanted to talk about other than how we’ve used blogs to power our classrooms. There are some interesting things. Enjoy it … the podcast is around 45 MB. Thoughts?

Direct link to the podcast.

iTunes Podcasting Stuff

/ Cole Camplese / 1 Comment

Here is a great little piece of info I just got … there is a protocol for subscribing to your podcasts via the iTunes Podcast Directory — how did I miss that one? All you do is drop your feed into a page (make a link) using the form, “itpc://feed.” Now that is cool. Here’s my feed running through the iTunes Podcast Directory. Now how nice is that … it is a hell of a lot easier than selecting the feed via the RSS or XML badge and using the Advanced>Subscribe to Podcast menu in iTunes … now in my syllabus I can just require iTunes (most of them are using it anyway) and put a big link to the podcasting channel on my class blog and simplify the whole thing. Makes me happy.

Podcasting with the Blue Ball Mic

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Here I am trying another microphone in my office on a really snowy cold day here in State College. This podcast isn’t much more than a quick status update on some of the things we are doing here in my new place … looking at what it would mean to really jump into the podcasting and blogging space here. We met today as a group to really just bring our thoughts and some issues to light. I thought I’d recapture some of the thinking we dropped on each other and just ramble a bit. The podcast is about 12 minutes long and weighs in at 12 MB. Might be worth downloading … I will say the levels are a little low on this and I think the Samson microphone is a better deal, but that’s Just my two cents.

Learning and Innovation Podcast for 12.15.2005–>

Podcasting with the Samson C01U & Audio Hijack Pro

/ Cole Camplese / 2 Comments

I can’t believe I am back to figuring out podcasting setups. When I started podcasting over a year ago with the From the Basement series, we had a great setup going. It was essentially a Radio Shack 7 Band DJ Mixer, a couple of PowerBooks, and a couple of microphones. What was great about it was how easy it was to setup and use — because we were using a mixer and a dedicated recording machine all the mixes could happen without issue. If you wanted to play iTunes, use iChat and Skype to talk to remote guests, and record the people in the room it wasn’t a challenge. The big issue was that it was a big setup — and forget about moving it around to do podcasts anywhere but From the Basement.

I recently got a new Samson C01U USB microphone and have tried a couple of times to get a decent podcast going with it. It is a great mic, but I haven’t been able to get my whole mix thing going. My big goal is to not use a bunch of goofy system settings to make it happen … I just want to be able to turn on my Mac, plug in my mic, open an application, and start recording … I don’t want to use SoundFlower or anything else — simple is the solution I am after. If this is going to make it to the classroom, it has to be easy. At any rate, here is a sample podcast that sort of talks about this post and some of the history and thinking behind it all.

This morning I am sitting down at my G5 and Samson to run some tests. I thought I’d report my findings here. The software and hardware I am using are as follows:

  • PowerMac G5 DP 2 GHz with 1 GB SDRAM (I gotta get more memory)
  • Samson C01U USB Microphone
  • Samson C01U software applet
  • Audio Hijack Pro
  • iTunes
  • iChat AV

What I want to do is have the mic and the additional software produce a single mix that is of good quality. The screen shot below shows the setup in action. You’ll notice that the Samson C01U software has the gain set to +26dB and that input on the Sound control panel is set to just above half. These are settings that I seem to have to play with quite a bit, but this seems to yield good results. In AHP, I have the microphone set to be hijacked and in the Effects pane I’ve added the “Application Mixer” effect for both iTunes and iChat … those are then turned to “Hijacker on” mode. You can then start recording and the audio from each of the external applications are mixed in with the audio coming from the microphone (my voice). I haven’t tried it yet, but I assume you could add as many applications you want by adding more Application Mixer effects. We’ll have to play with that as well.

Podcast Setup