Creating My Radio Show Story
So, this technically isn’t an assignment for this week, but I do want to talk about my radio show story. It’ll make things easier when I have to write my Weekly Summary. I don’t have my radio story linked, though it is on SoundCloud, because I want everyone to hear it when listening to our radio show, not before!
For assignments last week, I made the beginning background sounds and the yowie call. These helped me to develop the setting and start thinking about the events of the story. These are the exposition and rising action of the story.
So, the first thing I did this week was write the story. This took a bit of time to think about. While I like to write, it doesn’t normally come immediately! I knew that the story would take place in Australia, like everything else I’ve done that has involved my character, and that it would involve the cryptid the yowie. I also knew that the story started with describing the setting, as that it what I like the write, as opposed to dialogue and action, specially since I had already made that beginning background sound. The story developed as I thought about what Bigfoot stories I heard, and what actions that would entail from the yowie and from the humans. I wrote the story on Microsoft Word, since I cannot improve or remember a whole story!
Then, I recorded myself saying it using Audacity. I recorded it in sections, based on paragraphs and dialogue, since I quickly realized that I could not do it in one go! Since it was over 4 minutes of dialogue, it took a while to get all of the segments done to my satisfaction.
I then added in all of the background sounds.
- I had listened to another person in my group’s story, where she had an intro, and added one in to, so listeners would know more about my character’s background before the story began. It ended up that we’re all doing that, so I am glad that I already did that! So, for behind that audio, I decided to use the music I used in my bumper, as I liked it and it distinguished this intro from my story, which has natural/man-made sounds, not music.
- I then added in the beginning background sounds, the thing I embedded above, to the project. I had to go and copy-paste the tracks in from that Audacity project, not the .WAV file, so that I could edit each of the individual sounds. Overall, I am glad that I made that as an assignment last week, because it worked well, though I did have to move around the sounds to fit in time with my voice, and to quiet them down so my voice was more easily heard. The cricket sound and the birds sound I extended for the whole story, and I also extended the creek sound a bit more than I had originally done.
- Then, I added in the yowie call, same as the one I link above. This also worked well, though I did quiet it down to make it seem more distance and not overpower everything else.
I have other sounds too, but I don’t want to say too much about them and potentially spoil anything! Most of the other sounds I used came from other things I made, such as the assignments I just talked about or other assignments involving my character. A few I did find on Freesound.org. I did create some sounds by editing existing sounds in the story. For example, there’s a different yowie call in the story that takes place after the first one (the one that I already and placed in the story), which I made by editing the first one. The running sound that I found on Freesound.org I also slowed down to make it seem like the characters started to run/walk slower than before. My biggest issue with the sounds was loudness. I had to quiet down pretty much all of them in order to hear my voice clearly.
In total, I have 17 different tracks with 11 different sounds downloaded from Freesound.org, 3 of which which are edited in multiple ways and places in the story. However, I condensed some of the same sounds (i.e. the yowie calls) that were at different times to the same track, so I actually have 25 different sound segments (sounds that are separate and can be moved individually to different places in the timeline). Many of the sounds I repeat, just in different places in the story, which is how I got so many! This is by far the most I have ever used!
Ultimately, I am happy with the story I created and the sounds that I used. I’m not sure if I’ll ever do this again, but it was at least somewhat fun to do and was definitely a learning experience!
So, here are all of the sounds I used in my story in no particular order (no spoilers!):
- Sound I originally used in my sound effects story http://ds106.francescamaisano.com/ds106/a-quiet-office-on-a-rainy-day/
https://freesound.org/people/rivernile7/sounds/234016/
Writing On Paper.wav
- Sound I orginall used in my radio bumper for our radio show http://ds106.francescamaisano.com/ds106/radio-show-bumper/
https://www.youtube.com/audiolibrary/music
Trapped
- Sounds I originally used in my beginning background sounds assignment linked above http://ds106.francescamaisano.com/ds106/a-hike-in-australia/
https://freesound.org/people/Yoyodaman234/sounds/349060/
Water Flowing Through Very Close Rapids 2
https://freesound.org/people/Yoyodaman234/sounds/348817/
Close Waterfall 2
https://freesound.org/people/Yoyodaman234/sounds/349077/
Hiking on Soft Ground 1 – Through Mud
https://freesound.org/people/iankath/sounds/262366/
Crickets
https://freesound.org/people/S.%20Dedalus/sounds/260104/
Birds of Noosa Biosphere Reserve
- Sound that orignally came from my yowie call assignment that I linked above
https://freesound.org/people/mariateresa_garcia/sounds/219719/
man-screaming.wav
- Sounds that originally I found for this radio show story
https://freesound.org/people/miekyj/sounds/326466/
https://freesound.org/people/miekyj/sounds/326466/
https://freesound.org/people/miekyj/sounds/326466/
https://freesound.org/people/miekyj/sounds/326466/
https://freesound.org/people/SoundsForHim/sounds/395564/
Running in forest/grass.MP3
https://freesound.org/people/OtisJames/sounds/215162/
thud.wav
My Featured image is a snipping using the Snipping tool of my Audacity project of the radio show story. You can only see 13 of the tracks! When working I have the tracks not collapsed (i.e. the normal viewing way) to more easily edit, but I collapsed them so the picture can show more of the tracks and give a better idea of the layering.
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