During December my friend and fellow mental health blogger Aimee Wilson has been recording a series of daily vlog (video blog) posts. (You can find them on her YouTube channel.) I was fascinated by the insight these gave into my friend’s life and was inspired me to try something similar. With that in mind I have been exploring how to record and share short audio posts. Hopefully these will be as interesting to our audience here at Gum on My Shoe as Aimee’s vlogs have been to me.
The Technology
I wanted to be able to complete the whole workflow on my Samsung S9 phone and to record using my VicTsing Bluetooth Headset. I spent a fair amount of time testing various voice recorder apps but none picked up the audio from my headset. I finally came across Parrot Voice Recorder. It works well and I haven’t had too many issues with it. You can hear how I got on testing this setup in the first two recordings listed below.
I initially considered posting my audio clips to Soundcloud but the free option only allows for a total of three hours’ recordings. Fran and I have a YouTube channel and I decided to upload my audio clips there so they would be available alongside our other content. YouTube will only accept video files so I looked for a convenient way to convert the WAV audio files I’d recorded into movie files.
After a few tests I settled on Avee Music Player (Pro) which I used for the first five clips listed below. I have had some issues with exporting the video files, however, and at the suggestion of a friend (thanks Karl!) I used PowerDirector video editor for the final clip listed here. It seems more stable and I may stick with it in future.
The Recordings
Here are direct links to the recordings I have posted to our YouTube channel so far.
- Walking home : testing the Parrot Voice Recorder, part 1
- Walking home : testing the Parrot Voice Recorder, part 2
- On my way into work - Dec 11, 2019
- On my way home - Dec 11, 2019
- Marty talks about his journaling
- A few thoughts on politics and pathological positivity
Scroll down to play these recordings within this post.
1. Walking home : testing the Parrot Voice Recorder, part 1
[5:12] In this first recording I discuss the Parrot Voice Recorder app which I have been using to record using my Bluetooth headset. I converted the WAV file to MP4 using Avee Music Player (Pro) then uploaded the video to YouTube.
2. Walking home : testing the Parrot Voice Recorder, part 2
[5:46] Further testing with the Parrot Voice Recorder and Avee Music Player (Pro) apps.
3. On my way into work - Dec 11, 2019
[2:58] In this recording I discuss audio blogs / podcasts and my day ahead attending a wellbeing / mental health workshop at work.
4. On my way home - Dec 11, 2019
[11:57] Talking about the wellbeing / mental health workshop I had attended, with a shout out to my blogging bestie Aimee Wilson and her series of daily vlogs for Vlogmas 2019.
5. Marty talks about his journaling
[14:26] In this recording I talk about my diary writing / journaling which I have been doing for the past 45 years.
6. A few thoughts on politics and pathological positivity
[12:52] In this recording I discuss my political awakening and pathological positivity on the morning after the UK General Election. This video was created using PowerDirector video editor for Android.
Check our Podcasts / Audio playlist on YouTube for these and other audio and video recordings.
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