Between the DrunkAndRetired.com podcasts and RedMonk Radio, I do a lot of podcasting. While I’m editing episode 47 here, I thought I’d be arogent enough to write down some editing tips. These aren’t tool tips so much as tips on approaches. <link to Distributing the Future tips

• Cut that shit out: to me, editing is 80% deleting audio out. When Charles and I record, we can get up to 2 hours of content. Some of that is crap, but most of it is just average. For the most part, you want to cut out both the crap and average stuff. That said, I have low standards ;>
• Cut out dead space. If you’re having an ad hoc conversation like we do in the DrunkAndRetired.com and RedMonkRadio podcasts, there’s always going to be a lot of pauses where people are either thinking of something to talk about, or responses to people’s questions. There’ll also be a lot of “uh dead time” where someone is brain-storming out-loud, but in an incoherent way, like, “well, uh…you have the compiler…and the whutzit…splice that…OK…I think I got it now…” and then they spew out coherent brain-storming. You want to keep the coherent brain-storming, and cut out the incoherent stuff.
• Practice in medius rex. As I recall, in medius rex means “in the middle,” which is to say you should start in the middle of things: mid-laugh, mid-explanation, etc. A lot of times in conversation, you build up to a topic, often disclaiming a lot before hand in the hopes of fending off counter-attacks (maybe that’s just me). One of the commentaries for Chappelle’s Show put this another way: get in and out of a scene as quick as possible, do the joke, and exit right away. Still another way of thinking about it: everyone loves the chorus of a song, the rest is just waiting for that chorus.
• Kill your darlings: this is an old writing tip. If you find yourself really liking something, question if you should include it. This is a defensive move as it’s easy to leave too many things that you like. My general rule of thumb is that if we’re repeating ourselves, even if it’s funny and/or good, I cut it.
• That said, archive your darlings. While you may cut good stuff out of your show, it’s worth it to save them for later use. For example, we’ve had two Out-takes episodes on weeks where we didn’t record anything. They were easy to put together because I’d archived the little darlings along the way, so I just slapped them together. Also, by saving them, it’ll make it easier to cut them out of your episode, meaning you’ll do it more.
• Don’t cut too close, or it sounds jumpy. The goal here is to keep the pace natural. If you cut too many things out — like someone taking a sip from their coffee, lots of “uh’s,” etc. — the pace starts to sound too rapid and choppy. I’m not one of those “maximize audio input time” people, so I don’t relish the end result of the pace being faster.
• Feel free to split one recording into multiple episodes. As I’ve noted a couple times in the show, we usually get two episodes worth of audio out of one recording. This is great, because it means we don’t have the pressure to record every week.
• Identify the podcast and episode at the beginning. As long time listeners will know, each DrunkAndRetired.com podcast begins with someone say “DrunkAndRetired.com Podcast, Episode X.” The thinking here is that people who can’t see the MP3 description — like folks using an iPod Nano — can quickly find the episodes they want to hear. I had this problem before getting an iPod because my MP3 player displayed the MP3 filenames in 8.3 format. Weird, huh?
• Try not to surf the web — or write blog posts like this ;> — while you edit, it’s distracting. I should follow this rule, but I don’t.

So, now everyone can spot all those times that I don’t follow my own advice ;>

Tags: podcasting, podcasts.