Podcast
This podcast is accessible at https://on.soundcloud.com/bN5iYGBcuvVwfiNKA
Introduction and rationale
Podcasting can be described as, “Radio’s flirty first cousin, podcasting arrived quietly as a tech innovation in 2001 and as a term in 2004, then exploded as a pop culture phenomenon in 2014”, (McHugh, 2021). This podcast is called ‘Fashion Diva’ which is a podcast all about the newest fashion trends, expectations, and best award show looks whilst also offering fashion advice. I chose to interview an expert in fashion advice, Sarah Finnan, Deputy Digital Editor of image. i.e. We talked about the fashion trend ‘denim on denim’ and had a relaxed discussion about what our opinions were on the trend. Then I asked Sarah many questions on where to best buy denim and how to best style ‘denim on denim’ in order to give lots of information to our listeners on the topic. In the end, I recorded a vox pop to ask students on the campus of Dublin City University about their opinion of the new fashion trend and whether or not they will choose to embrace the new trend.
Post-covid, fashion podcasts have become more popular but only formatted as mini-limited podcast series. “Fashion is a system that is normally represented by still and moving images, and many different platforms have been used for its representation in the media. However, the intimacy procured by audio content is valuable to narrate and create a relation of proximity with the consumers, podcasting is also a way for brands to reach new audiences, create user engagement and add a new medium to their communication portfolio”, (Morais Fernandes, 2022). I chose to do a podcast as my format for this assignment because podcasts have become vastly popular especially in Ireland, “One in three Irish people listen to a podcast every month, according to the 2019 Reuters report”, (Kelleher, 2019).
Fashion is a very difficult genre to choose for a podcast as it’s hard to describe something so visual. It’s not a popular genre for podcasts either! According to Edison Podcast Metrics, 2023, the top five most listened-to genres of podcasts are 1. Comedy, 2. Society and Culture, 3. News, 4. True Crime, 5. Sport. The objective of my podcast was to entertain the audience, and maybe the episode could be used as a way for people to help pass the time as it's not too intense, and they could listen to it passively. I was hoping the listeners would use my podcast as a way of gratifying their needs. A study based on podcast motives, “Identified five motives, including entertainment, library building, time-shifting (i.e. convenient and on-demand access), advertising (i.e. consuming advertising and supporting advertisers), and social aspect (i.e. interaction with friends and other audience)”, (Chan-Olmsted Wang, 2020).
I used intro music at the start of the piece to give the podcast a brand so when people hear that piece of music, they know they are listening to ‘Fashion Diva’. The intro music was also used as a bed for the intro of the podcast where I could introduce myself and my guest. I also used music to help Segway from the interview into the vox pop, to clearly show and distinguish that we were moving from an interview to a vox pop. I conducted a vox pop at the Dublin City University campus and used music again to Segway to the outro.
Methods and techniques
I emailed Sarah to ask if she was interested in taking part in the project and she agreed. I rented out a radio studio in Smithfield in Dublin. I recorded the interview using the equipment in the studio and edited the interview using Adobe Audition.
Firstly, I created a multi-track session and dragged all the necessary files into Adobe Audition. I snipped bits and mistakes I didn’t like using the razor tool. I dragged the yellow line to increase and decrease tracks but I mainly used the mixer icon to level out all the different tracks so they were all at the same sound level. I used the square black and grey icon to fade in and out the music in order to make everything flow nicely together. Finally, I exported the file into a WAV file by clicking, file, export, multi-mixdown and, entire session.
For the intro music, I set an initial tempo and then created a drum track to correspond with this. I then created a base synth to help create a more full sound. Following this, I created a synth lead line and added reverb and delay to get the desired effect.
For the Segway music, I used Garage Band and band camp. I first set the tempo of the track, and I then created a drum track using keyboard typing and the available drum machines in Bandcamp. I then selected a synthesiser and modified the sound to suit my needs. Following this, I created a bass track which was used to fill out space on the track. Finally, I applied reverb and delay to the separate tracks as necessary to get the sound I desired.
Limitations
A Challenge I faced when conducting this podcast was getting the courage to go up to students with a microphone. I was really shy and got embarrassed when people said no. Hopefully, over time and with practice, I will become more confident in approaching people. I think the audio quality could have been improved when doing the vox pop as I had difficulty recording in loud settings and knowing how loud to record the interview. I also had difficulty adjusting the sound when interviewing different students as each student’s pitch was different. I think in a future podcast, I would edit the vox pop in the middle of the podcast so the guest could comment on some of the public answers and then it would have ended a bit slicker. I also made the music too long, in the future, in the music production process I would make it shorter and again more slicker.
References
For the full list of references, see PDF