Guide to Authoring Podcasts at College Park

This is a guide for creating podcasts for the College Park web site. While not a complete instruction manual, it is enough to get someone started in the event that the usual podcast author is not available.

Software Needed

• CDEX for extracting audio files from audio CDs (ripping software).
• Cool Edit Pro, Adobe Audition, or Audacity for audio editing.
• ID3-TagIt for adding ID3 identifying tags to MP3 files.
• Macromedia Dreamweaver for creating and uploading web pages.
• Microsoft Word or compatible program for reading church bulletin files from the church secretary.
• Adobe Acrobat Pro or other PDF creation software for converting bulletin to PDF.
• Windows Media Player, Real Audio, or other media playing software to listen to MP3 files before posting.
• Firefox, Opera, Internet Explorer, or other web browser.
• iTunes to check podcasts. You may also want to check with a second podcast subscription program such as Juice.

Most of these items have at least one free option. The exception is Dreamweaver, an outstanding web authoring program. The best free alternative may be n|vu, but we have not tested this.

Get the CD

The operator of the sound system records each service as an audio CD. Pick this up after the service.

Extract Audio from CD

The CD audio is extracted to a monaural MP3 file using the free CDEX.

Settings:

• 64 kbps MP3.
• Mono.
• Use F10 to extract a "section" of the CD. This lets you extract the entire CD into one MP3 file.

Edit Audio

The primary editor used is Cool Edit Pro v. 2, now available as Adobe Audition. Similar capability is found in the free Audacity. These provide visual representations of the waveform and the ability to amplify selected portions.

1. The MP3 file from the previous procedure is imported into one track.
2. Each section of the file (each speaker, each musical selection) is examined. Any spikes, usually due to sibilants, should be zoomed in on, highlighted, then reduced by 8 dB.
3. Each section (each speaker, etc.) should now be highlighted. Then expand the selection to the nearest zero crossings of the waveform. (This eliminates distortion that would otherwise be caused by introduction of discontinuities in the waveform on amplification.
4. Amplify the section. If speech, amplify to maximum volume. If music. amplify to 3dB below maximum volume.
5. Move the recording of worship later in the track to leave room for an introduction.
6. Record an introduction to a second track.
7. Background for introduction:
• Insert background music for the intro in a third track before the beginning of the recording of the worship service.
• Pull down the volume appropriate for background music.
• At an appropriate transition following the introduction, reduce the volume to zero.
8. Align start of service with end of introduction and background music.
9. Insert to a fourth track a recording of the closing, or record a new closing.
10. Save as an MP3 file at 32 kbps. File should be saved in a directory of the web site. Current structure is http://www.collegeparkbaptist.org/service/20/yy/mm-dd/main/yyyy-mm-dd.mp3, e.g., http://www.collegeparkbaptist.org/service/20/06/10-29/main/2006-10-29.mp3, for a recording of the October 29, 2006 worship service.

Alternative to steps 2 - 4: for automatic volume adjustment, use the free "levelator" from gigavox.com. This requires that you extract audio from CD as a wav file, rather than as an mp3.

Insert ID3 tags

1. Use the free ID3-TagIt to add Artist(College Park Baptist Church), Title(sermon title), album (CPBC 2006, for example), and a church photo to the Mp3 file.
2. Select "play" within ID3Tagit. This should bring up Windows Media player. Look for correct artist, title, and photo displayed with the player.

Create PDF of Bulletin of service.

1. Get Bulletin in electronic document (usually Word format) from church secretary.
2. Use application such as Adobe Acrobat Pro to export this as a PDF file.

Create web page and other files

Our standard web authoring program is Dreamweaver. It is essential that a web authoring program be used that:

• generates non-proprietary html.
• generates clean html that can be reasonably edited by hand (in other words, no FrontPage).
• supports SFTP file transfers.

Using this web authoring program,

1. Create a file with the extension ".ram" pointing to the MP3 of the service. This will be the link for pseudostreaming RealAudio.
2. Create a file with the extension ".m3u" pointing to the MP3 of the service. This will be the link for pseudostreaming through the default media player (such as Windows Media Player).
3. Create a web page for the service, with links to the bulletin, the m3u file, the ram file, and a link to download the mp3 file.
4. Upload to web site using SFTP secure file transfer.
5. Create links from the home page and from http://www.collegeparkbaptist.org/service/services.shtml to the web page of the service.
6. Create a link to the page describing our podcasts and how to subscribe to them.

Test web page

In your browser, check links from home page, services page, and all links from within the newly created web page for the service.

Create Podcast

1. In your web authoring program, edit the file "service.rss" in the root directory of the web site, adding a new "item" entry for today's podcast. Use other "item" entries as a guide.
2. Upload.
3. Run iTunes to confirm that iTunes fetches the new podcast. (You will need to have subscribed to our podcasts first.)
4. Visit the link "https://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZFinance.woa/wa/pingPodcast?feedURL=http://www.collegeparkbaptist.org/service.rss" to tell iTunes to update its index to include this podcast.

College Park Baptist Church