Voice acting

[WordCraft]

Would it be a good idea for CC to offer an Audio section in addition to video, text and graphical/photographic? Are businesses etc. looking for good voice actors to provide readings and snippets? I used to do this a bit for games in the past.

I've seen websites that offer these services, so I'm guessing it is viable...

Just a thought (whoever makes such decisions!)

[Evelyn]

Wordcraft, I'd like to know what software I use to record stuff and turn it into MP3s and podcasts. Can you help me out there? My research on the whole thing has been nearly fruitless... I'm feeling frustrated.

I agree that having a podcast section might be lucrative, though C-C doesn't do much to promote the visual arts so I don't know if this is the right venue. I wonder where a person could sell voice talent? Interesting! Elance, probably, you can buy and sell anything there. Podcasting could be the next big thing. Who'd have thought the human population would be so obsessed with Facebook, for heaven's sake?

[WordCraft]

Evelyn, it's simple. Download the free "Audacity" software for recording and editing. It has a link to the free LAME encoder which allows export to mp3. For interviews, if you have them, you can use Skype which can be recorded by Audacity.

I can write an article on the technical details if you wish

[WordCraft]

I wrote it, and it's been accepted

[Evelyn]

Yep, I knew you'd write it and it would be accepted. I'm fascinated by the whole audio/video angle of the Internet. Right now it's hard to find any good information about the nuts and bolts of it--the gurus say, "OMG put videos in your emails and podcasts on your blog" but not a damn one of them tells you how to do it.

I see an ebook in your future... that market isn't saturated. If you happen to write it, let me know, because you'd have your first sale right here.

[WordCraft]

Just PM me if you have any technical issues. It's not hard.

CC should do a podcast

An ebook? Hmm...

[Celeste Stewart]

I think WordCraft is finding his niche Nice article! Sounds like a winner.

[WordCraft]

I fear I have too many interests (and mood swings!) to have just one niche

I learned about podcasting when I was involving with modding (gaming) a few years ago. Something that has interested me lately, in this connection, is audio stories. A famous author (whose name I've forgotten!) did some releases of his book online in audio/podcast form for free, built up a huge following and, when he published his print novel, it went to #2 on Amazon with *no* marketing...

I see the people at Spotify are also now running an interactive audio story (with music) too. Actually, I think it's titled (or has an initial chapter) called Evelyn iirc

[BarryDavidson]

A lot of online publishers are looking for multimedia formats now. The only drawback is that it's mostly for fiction. My wife has been adding music to her online writing for years now, and even now has play-lists for each chapter. She's even dabbled in animation (such as MovieStorm) for some of her work.

Harlequin's new ebook website has an open call for alternate endings and multimedia stories. (There's also no upper limit on words which equals less slashing of your stories.)

I have seen a few job offers elsewhere in which the buyer wants a technical article with an audio presentation attached. They're usually not willing to pay much for it though so don't get too excited yet.