Tag Archives: podcasting

Media 1, Thoughts

My weekly media moment

In our Workshop this week we were encouraged to consider a “weekly media moment” – an interesting or instructive encounter we had with some form of media. Last night I went to see a conversation between Ben Birchall and Starlee Kine at the Wheeler Centre on all things podcasting and storytelling.

I don’t know why but a lot of American podcast hosts are in town at the moment. PJ Vogt (of Reply All) appeared at the Sydney Writers Festival over the weekend, and Hrishikesh Hirway (of Song Exploder) will also be at the Wheeler Centre in a couple of weeks. Perhaps they’re on some kind of podcast host field trip, I’m not sure.

Starlee is a journalist, writer and radio producer with whom I first became familiar through her work with This American Life, where she worked as a story producer for over a decade. She’s something of a confessional storyteller: her radio stories generally revolve around events in her own life, and as such have an irresistibly charming personal touch to them. I find this kind of personal memoir to be among the absolute best form of media when done right, but unfortunately it’s very difficult to do right and can often result in boring, interminable waffling from people I don’t care about.

Last year Starlee wrote and produced the first season of her new podcast Mystery Show, which for many reasons I consider to be the best podcast ever made. It’s a complete reinvention of the form, differentiating itself from the accepted “formats” in common use, and Starlee’s personality and open, conversational nature give rise to some incredible conversations from unlikely places.

To hear her speak was wonderfully compelling. Among other topics she described the process she follows to create, develop and execute her ideas into finished form, which is something radio producers rarely do for competitive reasons. The thing that surprised me most was that Mystery Show existed as a pilot episode for two years while she searched for a platform that would take on the show. (Presumably This American Life passed on it to make Serial – probably a sound decision.)

I’d never really considered that creating a podcast pilot and trying to sell it (as a TV producer might do) could be one way to get a podcast idea off the ground. I’ve created a couple of podcasts in the past but they were small exercises between me and my friends, not intended to be treated too seriously, and we just kept pumping out episodes as quickly as we could make them.

Obviously in Australia there are no large-scale podcast networks like PRX or Radiotopia, which makes it difficult for Australians to sell podcast ideas (other than to Radio National), but since Science Vs made it to Gimlet Media last year it’s not out of the realm of possibility that an Australian podcast might again be picked up in the U.S.

Now I just need an idea…

Standard
Media 1, Workshops

The elements of a podcast

In our Workshop this week we spent some time listening to the “Sleep” episode of Radiolab, a science/discovery podcast produced by WNYC Studios, and noted down some of the elements that make up narrative audio:

  • Music
  • Narration
  • Interviews / conversations
  • Sound effects
  • Atmosphere / sync sounds
  • Archival recordings
  • Vox pops

Apart from archival recordings and vox pops, the Radiolab episode used every single one of these elements — and in fact, often several were in use simultaneously.

Personally, I’ve tried to listen to Radiolab in the past (because the subject matter interests me), but in general I find their style far too busy and overly constructed to comfortably listen to. Compared to a show like This American Life or Planet Money, which are relatively unadorned and mostly let subjects/interviewees speak in full sentences, Radiolab barely goes a second without using some kind of audio edit, either by the host chiming in to lead the narrative, or an inserted sound effect, music, etc. This cacophony of sounds overwhelms my ears and I lose track of the narrative thread, which is a cardinal sin for documentary podcasts like Radiolab.

This episode of Planet Money, which aired this week, seems by comparison much easier to follow:

It still uses all the same elements as Radiolab (plus vox pops), but they are layered in a far more spacious way so they don’t conflict with one another.

A narrative documentary podcast is one format my group is considering for the audio essay in Project Brief 4, so seeing and dissecting how the professionals do it will help immensely.

Standard
Media 1, Thoughts

Vocal timbre

This week’s lectorial on the elements of sound, in particular timbre, got me thinking about just what it is about some voices that make them more or less enjoyable to listen to than others.

99% Invisible is a podcast I should love. As a former designer myself I have a sharp appreciation for the tiny, seemingly insignificant details that designers spend hours upon hours slaving to get perfect. The hidden complexity of everyday life is fascinating, and indeed so would the podcast dedicated to finding and explaining that complexity — except for one thing.

I can’t stand Roman Mars’ voice. It’s literally the only thing stopping me from listening to the show. He gets so close to the microphone and has an irritating half-whisper that sounds like he’s doing a voiceover for a late-night phone sex commercial, but apparently a lot of people find it soothing and therapeutic. Judge for yourself:

By contrast, Zoe Chace has worked on Planet Money and This American Life and is often said to possess one of the most annoying voices on radio — but she’s easily one of my absolute favourite presenters. She has an unusual combination of timbre, accent and vocal fry that for some reason I just love — I recognise that her voice probably isn’t the most suited to traditional ideas of news/economics reporters, but perhaps that’s part of why I like it so much.

I still don’t really understand the mechanics of vocal timbre, and why exactly I find some voices irritating and others irresistible, but it’s interesting to note just how much of a difference it can make.

Standard