recording lectures/seminars

Owlhead64 wrote:
I've read elsewhere that Garageband sometimes suddenly stops and isn't able to finish the job

there are much better apps for making simple audio recordings than GB. an audio editor might be a good choice:

http://www.bulletsandbones.com/GB/GBFAQ.html#audioeditors

(Let the page FULLY load. The link to your answer is at the top of your screen)

I'm also worried about the quality of the internal speaker

sicne speakers don't record, that wouldn't be an issue. the internal mic on the other hand is going to pick up every sound, including echos, in the room.

whether it will really pick up both the lecturer's voice from the front of a large room AND questions from audience members who will be scattered around the room.

the mic would record everything, but my guess is that the quality won't be very usable

I'm going to fiddle around with it for a while and then try to do some sort of comparison between it and Garageband.

it will likely look more complicated, and not be as full of eye candy as GB is, but personally i would never trust a one-of-a-kind performance to GB.

"In the Studio" it's great, I personally never had issues while recording, but if i had one shot at capturing something, GB still would not be my choice.

good luck

Have you thought about getting a cheap mp3 recording device for that purpose? It has a long battery life, it's unobtrusive in a seminar setting, the mics are better than GB's internal one, there's no moving parts that can create noise, you can put it right in front of the speaker, etc. You should get one with a USB connection for around 30 or 40 dollars (more for better sound quality), so you can process your recordings afterwards on the computer. As someone who does a lot of interviews I can only recommend that!

If you consider buying an Olympus device, you might consider looking at the ones that are a bit more expensive, like the DS-30 (90$ at Amazon). They have a very good frequency range (up to 18 kHz) and have a recording quality that I would qualify as "podcast" (not really radio, but really good).

Hello Christoph -
I saw this post you have on recorders. You seem to know what you're doing with voice recording.

I am recording my voice with a clip mic when I do a live presentation, then playing it back (via headphone jack out) into Garage Band to edit then make CD's. I'm not happy with the quality I have: Sony ICD 300, then I've tried 2 different clip mics, a EDS-3.5TCM then I got a Radioshack33-3013. Lotsa noise! There must be a better way.

I looked up the Olympus Device you list below. Is this Mac compatible to input the audio directly? Looks like the software is for PC only. I need a better solution, and am wondering if playback out of my recorder via the headphone jack is compromising the quality. Any suggestions would help. I conduct meditation seminars, and people want to use these CD's to meditate with and it should be somewhat good. My budget is small, so I can't go too expensive. Do you think I'm over doing it using Garage Band to do small edits?

Thanks so much. I'd really like to solve this!

Message was edited by: Suzanne Goulet

Suzanne Goulet wrote:
Hello Christoph -
I saw this post you have on recorders. You seem to know what you're doing with voice recording.

I am recording my voice with a clip mic when I do a live presentation, then playing it back (via headphone jack out) into Garage Band to edit then make CD's. I'm not happy with the quality I have: Sony ICD 300, then I've tried 2 different clip mics, a EDS-3.5TCM then I got a Radioshack33-3013. Lotsa noise! There must be a better way.

I looked up the Olympus Device you list below. Is this Mac compatible to input the audio directly? Looks like the software is for PC only. I need a better solution, and am wondering if playback out of my recorder via the headphone jack is compromising the quality. Any suggestions would help. I conduct meditation seminars, and people want to use these CD's to meditate with and it should be somewhat good. My budget is small, so I can't go too expensive. Do you think I'm over doing it using Garage Band to do small edits?

Thanks so much. I'd really like to solve this!

Transferring the audio via the headphone jack is forcing it to go through various contortions (conversions, actually), that degrade the sound.

Better is to record something, and simply transfer the digital file directly into your mac.

Not sure if these exceed your budget, but here's a link to the latest crop of popular portable recorders used for music (and therefore more than adequate for voice):

http://www.sweetwater.com/c1006--Portable_Recorders

The good thing about a voice recorder is that you don't have to schlep your Mac around but you can do the editing afterwards if that's ok with your workflow. I'm recommending the Olympus recorder (that's the only one I have!) because it has a good frequency range (up to 18 kHz) which really makes for a good audio quality. You can also attach external mics like your clip-on through a 1/4" jack - of couse I don't know about your mic's quality. The device shows up as a drive on your computer, so you don't need special software - you can just drag the sound files to your HD (it's in wav format, so you have to do some converting).

If you really want to record directly to your Mac, you'd need some kind of audio interface or a USB mic, both pretty bulky. If you want to go that path, you might look into the Zoom H4, it's a recorder and an interface at the same time. But a lot more expensive.

Hope that helps!

Thanks Christoph -

Yes it does help. If I go this route, and input the audio directly from the recorder, does it then go into Garage Band for editing easily?

Also, have you had any issues with the software for the Olympus? It looks like its only available for PC.


Thank you,

If you use the Zoom like an interface, it sends an audio signal to your Mac which you can record to GB. I would use an audio editor though, for stability reasons that you mentioned in your first post.

The question remains: Why would you need to record to your computer, especially since - as I understand - you are doing the presentation from the same machine? Recording the audio separately and importing the sound file seems the smoother road to me.

As for the Olympus: I don't use any special software, the device mounts automatically as a volume, and I drag the files over!

Hello Christoph -

A few comments/Questions:

Christoph Drösser wrote:
If you use the Zoom like an interface, it sends an audio signal to your Mac which you can record to GB. I would use an audio editor though, for stability reasons that you mentioned in your first post.

Use another audio editor other than GB? Is GB just to fat? What would you recommend instead?

The question remains: Why would you need to record to your computer, especially since - as I understand - you are doing the presentation from the same machine? Recording the audio separately and importing the sound file seems the smoother road to me.

I'm not recording to my computer. I record on a small digital recorder with a mic clip. then I do head phone out to GB when i get home. I think someone said that is not good for audio quality.

As for the Olympus: I don't use any special software, the device mounts automatically as a volume, and I drag the files over!

Awesome!

I'm going to buy one now.

Thanks for your help!

Message was edited by: Suzanne Goulet

Suzanne Goulet wrote:
Hello MattiMattMatt -

How do you think this recorder compares to the Olympus?

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/closeup/Pocketrak2G--Main

I haven't used either one, so I can't really speak from personal experience, but generally speaking, the Olympus is a voice recorder made by a company with a history making office memo machines, while the Yamaha is geared more to music and is made by a company with experience making music recording devices. Since recording music is more demanding than recording voice, I would expect the Yamaha to be better.

If your budget is limited to $80 and all you need is to record voice, then perhaps the Olympus is the best choice. But if you can spend twice that, the Yamaha is a higher end device with more memory, and would likely sound better for both music and voice.

Hello MattiMattMatt -

How do you think this recorder compares to the Olympus?

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/closeup/Pocketrak2G--Main


Thanks