Is Garageband A Good Podcasting Tool?

Tuesday, August 7, 2007 | The Cheap Mac | Read or Post a Comment

Garageband Podcasting has hit the mainstream. In the UK, Queen Elizabeth’s Christmas speech will be available as a podcast.

How easy or difficult is it to create a podcast? Is Apple’s Garageband the right tool for a quality production?

Despite Adam Curry’s coronation as the Father of Podcasting, no one has done more than Apple to promote podcasting as a new form of media.

Apple quickly adapted podcasting to iTunes, the iTunes Store, and Garageband, all of which helped to push.... (excerpted).

1 Reader Comments

Bill Burkholder said:

I use an Electro-Voice RE-20 microphone. It’s a long time favorite of broadcasters everywhere. I bought mine in 1980 and it is still great. I plug it into a Shure impedance matching transformer and connect the other side of that to a Fostex MN-50 mixer with a built-in compressor. The output of that goes into the Mac, for mixing in Garage Band.

The point of this is to compress the dynamic range of the audio before it is digitized. Computers don’t do a great job of dealing with over-modulated audio, and the compressor eliminates that problem. I can get very expressive with my voice without worrying too much about distortion.

I’m thinking about buying a $100 tube pre-amp with a built-in compressor to replace the Fostex compressor and the need for an impedance matching transformer. That will add some warmth from the tube, while still compressing the sound.

If you really want to sound great, it all begins with a great mic. The EV is about $350 or so. Sennheiser and Shure make competitive models in the same price range. Try them all. Your voice may sound better with one particular brand.

Don’t forget that an equalizer and reverb tool can help you soujnd better, too. Play conservatively with the controls available in Garage Band and sweeten your voice(s) until the podcast sounds great.

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