9 min
Better podcast audio from a bad room, 5 Tips to improve it NOW Podcastification - podcasting tips, podcast tricks, how to podcast better
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- Technology
A bad recording space can ruin your podcast audio.Yes, I said, "ruin" it.
What makes a room a bad place to record? There are many things but here's a list of the TOP 3 room issues, that I'm going to help you address in this episode:
A large room.Lots of hard surfaces in the room (walls, floors, furniture, glass, windows, etc.).A hardwood or tile floor.
All those and more cause the sound waves your voice is producing to bounce around the room, creating echoes and residual noise that your microphone can (and will) capture.
Once I've stated these 3 issues so clearly, the solutions to them are pretty obvious - but I'm going to walk through my favorite ways to solve them.
Then before we finish, I'm going to cover some extra steps you can take to take serious control of your sound quality.
1. Get out of that large roomThink of it this way:
The more space there is between your mouth and the walls of your room, the more distance the sound wave has to travel.
And as sound waves travel, they get wider, like ripples in a pond.
That means by the time they hit that wall 15 feet across from you, they have a LARGER profile.
Then they bounce off the wall and head toward another.
Eventually you'll have lots of large sound waves, bouncing from wall to wall, and into each other, causing an echoing nightmare from an audio quality perspective.
The solution is simple: Move your recording space into a smaller room.
The less square footage, the better.
2. Get rid of the hard surfacesOf course you can't remove walls and windows, but you can add things to the room to make them less hard.
Simple things like:
Wall hangings, tapestries, curtains, canvas pictures, etc.Overstuffed furniture instead of "hard" furniture.Place a thin blanket over your desk surface.
Get creative here. Anything you can do to make hard surfaces soft will make your room a better recording space.
Some people go all the way and purchase acoustic foam to hang on the walls.
And it doesn't have to be expensive stuff. You can use eggshell type foam mattress toppers if that's all you can find.
It may not be "studio quality" foam, but it beats the hard wall you have now.
In all honesty, that's what I've got hanging on my walls right now.
TRUE STORY: When I first began podcasting the only place I could set up my desk and studio was in our walk-in closet. I didn't know it at the time, but that was the best move I could have made, acoustically speaking. The hanging clothes and small space made it an ideal place to record.
3. Cover the floorIf the only thing you did to improve your podcast's sound quality was to cover your hardwood or stone floor with an area rug, you'd be amazed at the difference it makes.
And it doesn't have to be a hideous shag rug, just a normal area rug will do the trick.
When you do this you're eliminating the effect of one of the most sound-reflective hard surfaces in your room.
The echo will diminish. The "room noise" will decrease.
Guaranteed.
Extra steps you can take to improve the sound quality of your podcast studioThese extra steps have to do with changes you can make to the equipment you use.
You might be thinking about the dollar signs the moment you hear that, but I'm going to give you a couple of options that don't have to be expensive.
Change your microphone
You don't necessarily need an expensive microphone, but you do need the right kind.
There are two basic kinds of microphones - condenser microphones and dynamic microphones.
What you want for podcasting is a dynamic microphone.
The reason is in
A bad recording space can ruin your podcast audio.Yes, I said, "ruin" it.
What makes a room a bad place to record? There are many things but here's a list of the TOP 3 room issues, that I'm going to help you address in this episode:
A large room.Lots of hard surfaces in the room (walls, floors, furniture, glass, windows, etc.).A hardwood or tile floor.
All those and more cause the sound waves your voice is producing to bounce around the room, creating echoes and residual noise that your microphone can (and will) capture.
Once I've stated these 3 issues so clearly, the solutions to them are pretty obvious - but I'm going to walk through my favorite ways to solve them.
Then before we finish, I'm going to cover some extra steps you can take to take serious control of your sound quality.
1. Get out of that large roomThink of it this way:
The more space there is between your mouth and the walls of your room, the more distance the sound wave has to travel.
And as sound waves travel, they get wider, like ripples in a pond.
That means by the time they hit that wall 15 feet across from you, they have a LARGER profile.
Then they bounce off the wall and head toward another.
Eventually you'll have lots of large sound waves, bouncing from wall to wall, and into each other, causing an echoing nightmare from an audio quality perspective.
The solution is simple: Move your recording space into a smaller room.
The less square footage, the better.
2. Get rid of the hard surfacesOf course you can't remove walls and windows, but you can add things to the room to make them less hard.
Simple things like:
Wall hangings, tapestries, curtains, canvas pictures, etc.Overstuffed furniture instead of "hard" furniture.Place a thin blanket over your desk surface.
Get creative here. Anything you can do to make hard surfaces soft will make your room a better recording space.
Some people go all the way and purchase acoustic foam to hang on the walls.
And it doesn't have to be expensive stuff. You can use eggshell type foam mattress toppers if that's all you can find.
It may not be "studio quality" foam, but it beats the hard wall you have now.
In all honesty, that's what I've got hanging on my walls right now.
TRUE STORY: When I first began podcasting the only place I could set up my desk and studio was in our walk-in closet. I didn't know it at the time, but that was the best move I could have made, acoustically speaking. The hanging clothes and small space made it an ideal place to record.
3. Cover the floorIf the only thing you did to improve your podcast's sound quality was to cover your hardwood or stone floor with an area rug, you'd be amazed at the difference it makes.
And it doesn't have to be a hideous shag rug, just a normal area rug will do the trick.
When you do this you're eliminating the effect of one of the most sound-reflective hard surfaces in your room.
The echo will diminish. The "room noise" will decrease.
Guaranteed.
Extra steps you can take to improve the sound quality of your podcast studioThese extra steps have to do with changes you can make to the equipment you use.
You might be thinking about the dollar signs the moment you hear that, but I'm going to give you a couple of options that don't have to be expensive.
Change your microphone
You don't necessarily need an expensive microphone, but you do need the right kind.
There are two basic kinds of microphones - condenser microphones and dynamic microphones.
What you want for podcasting is a dynamic microphone.
The reason is in
9 min