DJF wrote:
"Thanks for the sleepless night! Just got to the last episode, and so far this adventure is excellent. If you don't mind, what program and microphone did you use to create the mp3's?"
Thanks DJF! Glad you enjoyed Cheers! For software, I used "Cool Edit 2000" (www.syntrillium.com) to record the narration. I downloaded and purchased the full program, but a free demo version is available. The program allows you to record sound and save it in all kinds of different formats. The MP3 conversion-compression is much better than any other utility I've tried, so the resulting files were much smaller (which is important, because all those files once zipped, have to come under the two-meg upload requirement here at Zeus Heaven). Thanks again to Cleavus on the forums for pointing me to Syntrillium's website. Using Cool Edit, in order to get the smallest file size possible, with the least degeneration in sound quality, I opened each new file with the following parameters: Sample Rate - 44100; Channel - Mono; Resolution - 8 bit. Then I recorded the narration. Then I hit "SAVE AS"; chose MP3 format and using the CoolEdit Presets, chose the "32 kbps for voice." After fooling around with various settings, I found the above gave me decent voice quality with the smallest file size and highest compression possible. (I was anxious to make sure the files were small enough to fit within the upload limit. As it turned out, the adventure STILL didn't fit the two meg limit, so I had to get rid of a third colony and downsize the adventure accordingly in order for it to come under limit.)
For hardware, I used a cheap microphone I purchased at Office Depot for about $10 or $12! It's a "Labtec AM-242 NCAT." A better microphone -- one that softens breath pops and exhalations on such consonents as "p" -- would definitely be nice! If anyone knows of such a mike, please share that info with us!
Have fun!
Best,
Maggs