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Unix Software for Recording Prose?

Posted by Cliff on from the applications-that-lie-slightly-off-the-beaten-path dept.

Dan Lyke asks: "Friends and I have gotten into reading short stories to each other. I'd like to start recording these. There are tons of decent audio recording apps out there for music and sound effects, but what I really want is something more oriented around recording prose; organize a longer recording session into sequences of "takes", with the edit decision list made in mostly real time (ie: that sentence was good, or re-take from the last checkpoint). A prototype is only a few tens of lines of wrapper code around one of the command line recorders, but I'd rather be building on other's efforts. Anyone out there got suggestions for Un*x recording apps centered around spoken word and prose?"

2 of 19 comments (clear)

  1. Recording audio is recording audio... by stubear · · Score: 4, Informative

    It doesn't matter what the audio is, working with a digital audio workstation and/or multitrack edtor is the same for all recorded sounds. You need to better understand the workflow I think, the program doesn't need to change for such a tiny niche idea.

    My suggestion would be to record your prose sessions and name them accordingly. Once you have all your source files, begin to sift through them and add region markers to the tracks, labelling them accordingly. Then go back and begin to cut and paste different regions together into one master track. Once you have your master track you can begin to smooth out the transitions between takes, sweeten the audio and save out a final audio file.

    By approaching the recording session this way you aren't wasting time going back and forth between recording and editing, allowing you to focus on getting the audio perfect the first few tries and learning how to sweeten audio better in post production.

    Now, I am not saying that recording music uses the same gear and setup as recording speech, I'm just saying the process is very similar, especially on a DAW or similar prosumer recording application on the PC. Micing properly is key to recording a successful audio session.

  2. Snack Sound Toolkit by pcrook345 · · Score: 4, Informative
    You could take a look at the Snack Sound Toolkit, which was originally developed to work with Tcl/Tk. It can now be accessed from Python and Ruby as well. There are a number of example programs included; with a little copying and pasting, you could probably create the application you desire.

    Once it's completed, you can bundle your application into standalone form, so your friends don't have to install the toolkit or Tcl/Tk to use your program.

    Good luck!