Learn Audio Fiction Archives - FinalRune Academy

Audio Fiction with Fred – Week 5

HOLY MOLY IT’S THE LAST CLASS! We talk about the final touches on a distribution mix, the differences between mixing and mastering, how to package up your show for distribution, and some 101 on distribution and marketing a podcast.

Now go out and make some great audio fiction!!!

Audio Fiction with Fred – Week 4

Week 4! We dig into the art of sound design and some more advanced dialogue editing/processing techniques

PRO TIP – NEVER NEVER plug/unplug a USB device while a recording is ‘hot.’ … you’ll see I almost blow up the whole class by trying to do that on this video, ha… the webcam was plugged into a USB hub, I thought it would be fun to show you how I dig through SFX on my libraries, which are all stored on a USB hard drive… well, my Mac didn’t like when I plugged in that new device and the webcam glitched and I nearly crashed the call. Luckily it managed to keep recording (whew!) and I was able to carry on via mobile, but I very easily could have ruined everything. So, see, I’m just trying to make all of these mistakes in realtime to remind you that everyone screws things up and to help you avoid some of the (just about all that are available for options) mistakes I’ve made over the years…

Advance to Week 5

Bonus vid

Ambient Reverb Bus chain tutorial (actually figured it out this time). This is the more advanced but EXTREMELY POWERFUL technique of sending dialogue and SFX submixes off to Ambient-Land to be acoustically treated as various locations.

Soapbox – setting up reverb chain – Reaper

Bonus Video 2

Sound design tips using Reaper

Soapbox – Sound Design in Reaper – some tips

Useful Stuff

some useful websites as you start your SFX and music journey! the internet is FULL of lists and recommendations, so this is really just a starting place:

sounddogs.com – SFX website I showed, affordable rate commercial license
kevinmacleod.com – Creative Commons (non-commercial, attribution) Music
sessions.blue – Creative Commons (non-commercial, attribution) Music
soundrangers.com – SFX/music website with affordable rates, commercial license
audiojungle.net – affordable SFX/music for commercial license

Audio Fiction with Fred – Week 3

Week 3! We talk about directing and recording a show the basics of audio editing, an introduction to Reaper and Audacity, and what a dialogue edit looks.

Bonus Video:

Recording Session “The Bloody Mess”

Additional Bonus Material

Soapbox – Dialogue 102 with Fred, Part 1

Soapbox – Dialogue 102 with Fred, Part 2

Advance to Week 4

Some Additional Recommended Listening:

This is not even a start at scratching the surface of stuff you should check out, but here are a few shows I’ve been thinking about recently that do some interesting mix-ups of the way story is told

HUNGRY EARTH – decadent single narrator program with SFX and music underscore, from real-world location in south of England
https://soundcloud.com/corneliuszg/hungry-earth-mix01

TRACKS – a mind-bending, complex layered conspiracy thriller
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07nsf2x

JANUS DESCENDING – Nonlinear cosmic horror tale set in space. Oh yeah, it’s fun!
https://www.nosuchthingradio.com/janus-descending

PASSENGER LIST – One of the break-out fiction hits of the last year, which does a lot of really interesting things in the way it unveils the narrative
https://passengerlist.org/

BRAIN CHEMISTRY – A cryogenically-frozen man is revived in the future, to a world that is not quite what he expected. THE TRUTH show is consistently awesome and changes up format a lot, this one does some really neat things with POV and tells a story in a way that you really only can do in audio…
http://www.thetruthpodcast.com/story/2017/9/27/brain-chemistry

More resources for the radio history junkies:

I sent some resources to someone who was interested in more of the academic track understanding the emergent audio fiction scene — honestly these all need a post 2015 update but for earlier background this is some good stuff… thought I’d share with y’all

My senior thesis on radio drama – http://www.finalrune.com/dead/radio.htm
A paper by a colleague on the early days of radio drama emergence on the internet – https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/c5d3/b56c44ed19e37ff9769c03515dd422b24363.pdf
Interview with scholar Neil Verma about radio history – http://www.radiodramarevival.com/episode-484-going-deep-neil-verma-lights/

Audio Fiction with Fred – Week 2

Scriptwriting II, of casting calls, recording, and other fun stuff

You’ll learn:

Why I tend to structure in ~30min chunks and what exactly goes into each 30 minutes.
How to break apart a bigger narrative story, and my approach to writing when I know I’m attacking a big project and need to start somewhere.
Then, pivoting to SHORT SHORTs, and how it can actually be pretty hard to write a satisfying shorter piece!
Some thoughts on dramatic stakes, story elements, and building satisfying conclusions… In a lot of beginner writing I look at, I see a lot of big ideas and interesting concepts, but often a lot of loose threads and moments that feel unearned or could be chopped away by a good editor. It is hard to be your own editor! But it’s also important to understand that as a storyteller, your job is to distill a story into its essential elements… While in the real world we exist in this place where there are all kinds of unrelated things and things happen that are sort of random and there are side-quests that don’t really go anywhere… a good story will be crafted such that every component part has a job, which is to move the story forward. “Less is more” “Omit needless words” “Show don’t tell” etc.

Advance to Week 3

SCRIPT RESOURCES: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/p2q9updsk6b45wb/AAA4erkaRdHRcI1TsnJqTS7Na?dl=0

Please read the explainer file (in the Dropbox folder) for what’s in here and why I included it. Also, some screenwriting education recommendations from my Facebook friends!

Then we do a 180! And we start talking about pre-production and recording

Being a producer/writer is hard because the writer is going to write in things that the producer brain will say, “WTF are you insane?! how are we going to come up with 75 dancing mimes in an audioplay?!” and the writer will be like, “Uhhh you figure it out.”

And eventually the writer-me becomes the producer-me and the producer-me has to furrow the eyebrow moodily at writer-me, who by that point is hiding under the table and producer-me just has to figure out how to move on…

Never on a single project (one that I cared about anyway) have I not been intimidated by what writer-me came up with. To me, it’s important to continually challenge yourself artistically, and writer-me seems to have a diabolical desire to continue to push the envelope, whether that’s the technical elements of sound design, breaking format with story structure, writing in characters that I know I’ll have difficulty casting, etc.

So we’ll talk a little bit of the personal part of being a producer – how to recognize and own the fear/anxiety/intimidation/imposter syndrome and then learn to “Keep Calm, Carry On” and make a thing. Honestly this is the crux of the whole class; SO MANY PEOPLE get stuck in the process of trying to make something, and never bring it to fruition, because of anxiety inflicted at this stage. WE ARE GOING TO LEARN HOW TO POWER THROUGH THAT!

Whew… okay at this point you‘re thinking, “That’s a lot to cover” — but holy smokes, that’s hardly half of it!

We’re then going to pivot to one of the most important tasks of a producer, which is TO GET SOMETHING CAST!

I’ll share a casting template, and talk about where I go looking for voice actor auditions. I’m actually looking to cast one of my own short pieces so as to demonstrate how the process works so I may have a little bit of work on that to share.

Last but not least…

We’ll get into home recording — which could itself be an entire course!! — and I’ll be at your full disposal to talk about actually getting sounds recorded to gear… I will be happy to hang on doing Q&A about home recording set-ups until the cows come home, as I kind of am geeking out about this a lot right now and am really excited to see the innovations people are coming up with.

Though perhaps by way of background we can also talk about mic set-ups that you‘d use if a studio were still available, see this piece I did as a follow-up to PodTales late last year – https://www.finalrune.com/podtales-2019-microphone-workshop-redux/

Aside — my recommendeded kits for entry level home recording – https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1508692-REG/focusrite_scarlett_home_recording_kit.html — and — https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1389851-REG/rode_nt1_complete_studio_kit.html

If you are serious about doing VO work having some home set-up is really a great investment, and practically speaking the only way you‘re going to get gigs for some indefinite period of time…

Audio Fiction with Fred – Week 1

Week 1! Intro to Audio Fiction, radio drama history, audio scriptwriting 101

Welcome to Audio Fiction with Fred!

In the first week’s course, we cover:

Introduction to Fred
Overview of modern audio fiction including a dive into radio drama history in the USA 1930s – present
Audio scriptwriting – what makes an audio script work and what differentiates it from other media

Advance to Week 2

Recommended Listening

ALL OF THIS IS OPTIONAL. If you see something that jazzes you, go for it. No pressure. Most of these are picked for their relevance in the grand history of radio and illustrating production techniques over time.

Probably my #1 pick for you to listen by Friday, if you have 10 minutes, Roger Gregg’s sketch on what makes a radio script, a radio script – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfPnacBKA0k
1hour – “On a Note of Triumph” by Norman Corwin – https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4668028 – Corwin was one of the true greats of the golden age of American radio, bringing a level of poetry to the form and pushing its boundaries. He is one of the very few radio creators to have works with historical significance, this one in particular as it commemorated the end of WW2 in Europe. Far from a rah-rah victory speech, it is a deep meditation on the sacrifices and meaning of war, especially interesting to consider given how differently America talks about its place in the world in 2020.
55 minutes – the original “War of the Worlds” by Orson Welles – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzC3Fg_rRJM – honestly the long shadow of WotW and countless remakes have burned me out personally, but, there is no doubting the importance of this show which perfectly captured the anxiety of the moment and shocked the world, and is one of the few radio events that remains strongly in public consciousness (who will create the Covid-era equivalent?) — for a fresh take on the concept, see the 2014 Wireless Theatre DEAD LONDON – https://www.wirelesstheatrecompany.co.uk/product/dead-london/
23mins – “The Thing on the Fourble Board” Quiet Please – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3DPsMrcjJ4 – FOR PEOPLE WHO LIKE SCARY STUFF. One of the most terrifying scripts from the old time era. Also in this vein, SORRY, WRONG NUMBER, THREE SKELETON KEY, and MARS IS HEAVEN. For extra fun hear David Rheinstrom and Gabriel Urbina’s commentary on this show –https://www.radiodramarevival.com/episode-442-going-deep-gabriel-david-thing-fourble-board/
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – only 1 min sample seems to be available online – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ew58TUFNF5g – Audible has the full thing (Look for Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy Primary Phase) – for fans of Douglas Adams, there’s nothing quite like the source material. Also, consider the quantum leap between live-to-air radio dramas and having access to layers of sound design, effects, etc.
Other interesting works
- There is a great collection “60 greatest radio shows” by Waler Cronkite but it’s really old (cassette!) and hard to find, however you can find the discography here: https://www.discogs.com/Various-The-60-Greatest-Old-Time-Radio-Shows-Of-The-20th-Century-Selected-By-Walter-Cronkite/release/4709902 and many of these shows are available on YouTube and elsewhere
- Firesign Theater – wildly experimental comedy albums of counterculture America 1960s and 70s. some of the earliest adventures into layered multi-track studio recordings, with some wildly hilarious monologues – http://www.firesigntheatre.com/
- STAN FREBERG! https://www.radiodramarevival.com/episode-410-stan-freberg-retrospective/
- BBC’s treatment of Lord of the Rings
- NPR’s Star Wars
- NPR’s A Canticle for Leibowitz
- ZBS – Jack Flanders and Ruby
- Bradbury 13 – 1980s era NPR-funded sci-fi series
- Seeing Ear Theatre, Sci-fi channel (now SyFy) early entry into online audio… WAY ahead of their time and unfortunately now they’re way behind… (sniff, sniff)

Resources

Radio Drama Revival – The modern audio fiction scene is thriving! For some more contemporary examples of great work out there, surf RDR, with over 500 (!) episodes over 13 years, there’s something for everyone! – http://radiodramarevival.com/
Celtx – There are many ways to make a radio script. While various distributors have preferences, I don’t believe there is a ‘right’ format. The script is really just a blueprint, what matters is the thing you build out of the component parts.

I prefer to use a screenplay-style for my scripts, and I’ll discuss my philosophy about what to put in an audio script in my course.

While I use Final Draft software, Celtx offers a very similar suite of features with a Free basic plan, which is pretty great.
Springhole (Idea Generator) – https://www.springhole.net/writing_roleplaying_randomators/plotgens.htm – OK so we need to come up with some ideas for short-form radio scripts to make in this class. FULL DISCLAIMER – I just randomly discovered this on the internet and hope there are not any weird scary things you can get to from this website. It seems to have some pretty hilarious and ludicrous plot generators so hopefully that helps you nail a story concept.
Sample Script – THE BLOODY MESS. This very silly story gives you a walkthrough of all of the elements of a short audio script and wraps up in 7-8 minutes, so it’s roughly the same scope of what I’m hoping students will be able to create with me in this course. In fact, as a learning process for myself I’ll be creating a new version of this show myself during our work together. The story structure of BLOODY MESS is pretty straightforward, but as we’ll discuss in the class, audio offers the ability to really mess with time, point of view, storyteller, and narrative structure.

Download “The Bloody Mess” (PDF)
Bloody Mess - FINAL-2020-4-28