How to Record & Edit a Podcast in Garageband (Complete Tutorial) Video Lecture | Become an Expert at Podcasting - Career Development

hey it's Pat here in this video you're
gonna be learning how to use GarageBand
to record and edit your podcast I'll
show you how to make sure your mic is
set up properly how to make sure your
levels are exactly where they need to be
and also we're gonna do a fun little
test recording which you should do also
if you are using the software okay
really quick this is actually a lesson
that's pulled from my premium course
power up podcasting and I just wanted to
share it with you for free because I
know a lot of you are looking how to use
GarageBand so it's freely available to
you and it does reference other lessons
in my premium course but don't worry
about that just get right in learn how
to use GarageBand and crush it okay so
to start just hit empty project we don't
need to create a hip-hop beat or plug in
our guitars or anything like that we
don't want to choose voice either that's
for something else empty project is
where you want to start and then hit
choose and now it's going to open up
GarageBand but first it's gonna ask you
where the audio is actually gonna be
coming from like I said we're gonna be
using our microphones so select the
microphone under input you want to make
sure the ATR USB microphone is selected
and also that it's in input one like
this this little circle is really
important that marks the file as or the
the actual audio that's coming in as
mono meaning both sides of the the
speakers or both sides of the headphones
the left side and the right side are
gonna share the same the same audio if
you select input one plus two what you
might record would be just one side and
what you might import from like a an
interview or something might be the
other side and it's gonna sound really
funky in speakers and in headphones so
you want to make sure that it's just the
single circle not the sort of Venn
diagram looking double circle and you
want to make sure your instrument is the
ATR USB mic if not you want to click on
this arrow this opens up the Preferences
and here you can then re select the
input device that you want we have it
set correctly right now the output
device is simply that when you hit play
after you record something where's the
sound going to come from that you can
listen to system setting is fine if you
have your headphones plugged in that'll
work if we have some other audio that
you want to listen through that's fine
too you'll actually notice that the ATR
USB microphone can also be used as an
output device if you look at the back of
your microphone there's a little
headphone jack there too you can use
that if you want doesn't really matter
now if you want to get back to this
preferences later on if you want to
change things just head on over to
GarageBand and hit preferences and that
opens up this same window but again we
just want to make sure the ATR select
and then we're gonna hit choose or
actually create and we're off all right
and this is garage man and the first
thing you'll notice is that as I speak
you'll begin to see movement and color
here for this first audio track and
that's good we want to see movement
because that means Garage Band
here's our audio I'll tell you more
about what the colors mean in a second
and how to adjust it if you need to but
I will say that if you don't have any
sound coming through it either means you
don't have the microphone selected or
it's not plugged in so you want to make
sure that you go to GarageBand in
preferences and make sure that your ATR
USB microphone or your mic of choice is
actually selected you can also select it
down here in case in the input for this
particular track in case it's not there
as well you can see it there also make
sure just side note that it is indeed on
mono the single circle not on stereo
which you'll notice up here if you're in
stereo it'll have two sort of layers
here that the bar is you'll see two of
them we want to just see one there for
when we're recording through GarageBand
if that's still not working and you're
not hearing any audio come through or
seeing any audio come through it might
just mean that your microphone is not on
again the audio Technica's sometimes
fools you because it has a blue light
even if the thing is not on the blue
light means it just has power flick it
on and then you should be fine now don't
worry about all this too much because
there's a lot that you actually don't
need to worry about like this compressor
and these controls down here down here
there's the equalizer too which allows
you to change a few things and again a
lot of this is made for musicians which
is why you see things like the bar and
the beat and the tempo and the key
signature and the time signature we
don't need any of that stuff we want to
keep it simple so to remove all this and
actually just show the time which is
what we want to know how many how long
we've been recording for just click on
this arrow here to share the time as the
display mode and there you can see as we
begin recording the seconds and minutes
will display there we can also turn off
this count in we don't need four counts
before we hit recording we're not
singing a song and then finally the
metronome we can turn off because we
don't need to hear clicks because
there's no measures we're just simply
recording our voice now what's cool
about this is you'll see that the audio
that's coming through is coming and it's
kind of hitting mid-range to the to the
orange and that's totally fine we do not
want this bar as we speak to get all the
way to the end that's called clipping
and if you clip in your audio file it
means that people listening on the other
they're gonna hear distorted distortion
if we don't want that now if you are
speaking and it's clipping for you it's
getting it like deep into the red here
at the very end you can actually adjust
your recording levels down here using
this control now if I were to go down a
little bit you'll notice that my voice
begins to get a little bit softer and if
I go a little bit higher you'll notice
that I'm actually gonna go too high so
that becomes distorted now and you'll
see that just that does not sound good
you want it to be kind of like 85 80 %
or to the point at which you are always
speaking in the yellow and that's gonna
take some practice and that's the whole
purpose of going through this test
recording you're gonna actually do a
test recording in just a minute and
listen to yourself and just adjust
things as needed now you'll notice here
that this is audio one this is called a
track tracks are essentially like layers
they can live on top of each other and
you'll hear multiple tracks at the same
time and the best practice is to create
different tracks for different things
that are in your audio file or in your
podcast so for example this might just
be a track just to put the intro music
in and as you begin to see in the next
video you're gonna actually have tracks
for your intro for your actually let's
just do that now for your main voice
you're gonna have a track for example
for your music and you're gonna have a
track for for instance when you import
your interviews now what's nice about
like your music and your interviews is
you can literally just drag and drop
those mp3 files from your desktop or
your folder to inside GarageBand here
and it'll just show you the audio track
you can make adjustments from there the
music same thing with your main voice
you would just record that your intro
that's going to be something that you
just add in once and it'll be
automatically in your master template so
that you don't need to worry about that
again again we're the whole purpose of
this is to make it easy for you for
production going down the road but again
like I said we're gonna run some test
recordings really quick but I do want to
share with you a few other adjustments
that you might need to make as you are
going along and just I want to share
with you some of these things that will
be useful for you as you as you begin to
actually use the software okay so you're
gonna notice that every individual track
here 1 2 3 4 has its own unique volume
control you can raise and lower the
volume for that entire track in whole so
if you were to adjust this
the entire track would be louder if you
were to adjust it lower the entire track
would be softer that's helpful for
example if you have an interview that
comes in and it's just very soft you're
listening to it you're like I wish that
was louder well you can adjust that here
which is nice and what's also cool is
you don't have to be perfect try to get
it as close as possible for your ear and
the software both GarageBand and one
that I'll show you later
will help you what's called normalize
that meaning it'll match all the levels
property properly for the entire file
which is which is fantastic
now there are moments within a track
that you might want things to be softer
and louder and so you can't use this
adjuster here for that because for
example if I were to well if I were to
set it up so that you know the music
plays really loud and then it softens
and then my voice comes in well if I
were to lower the music completely well
you wouldn't hear the music at all so
I'm going to show you how to do that in
just a minute actually I'm going to show
you that while we do test recordings and
so just keep that in mind
other things to pay attention here are
this left and right thing you don't need
to worry about that too much just make
sure it's centered this is your pan
meaning you can adjust the volume to be
all the way on the left side or all the
way on the right side and since we're
doing podcasting we don't need to worry
about which side things are on so just
make sure that is centered and at zero
here is the mute button so if you have a
bunch of tracks going on and you just
want to like turn one off really quick
you can just press that button and that
mutes that track now if you just wanted
to listen to one solo track just hit
this headphone symbol and you'll see
that automatically mutes the other ones
and so let's say for example you just
wanted to hear only one track only and
just not hear anything else because
you're just working on this one right
there right there I just click on solo
in that and then you'll be fine from
there so now what I'm going to do is
actually do a test recording and I'm
just going to talk about what I had for
breakfast and then I'm going to show you
how to edit that thing and how to change
the volume and midway through and we'll
create a little track here before we get
into another piece of software that you
might use if you're on a PC for example
called audacity but let's just hit
record and start start going so here we
go hey this is Pat Flynn thank you so
much for listening in to this I want to
talk about my breakfast really quick so
for breakfast today I had a bowl of
oatmeal with some blueberries steel-cut
oatmeal actually and then I also had a
coffee and I was just fueling up so I
can create these videos for all the
awesome students of
power up podcasting thanks so much love
y'all bye
and there we go you can see the
waveforms came in and they are at
different volumes which is which is
represented by these different peaks and
valleys here and you'll notice that
there's some places where there is no
sound coming in those are typically
pauses and some parts are louder some
parts are softer the main thing you want
to look out for is after you record that
none of them are clipping meaning
remember that's when it's too loud when
it's too loud you'll notice that these
peaks and valleys go way beyond the
outer limits of this this display here
and we don't want that to happen so it
looks like we're all good
so let's actually click on this button
here to go all the way to the beginning
and I'm gonna hit play just so you can
hear what this sounds like okay this is
Pat Flynn thank you so much for
listening in to this I want to talk
about my breakfast really quick so for
breakfast today I had a bowl of oatmeal
with some blueberries steel-cut oatmeal
actually and then I also had a coffee
and I was just fueling up so I can
create these videos for all the awesome
students of powerup podcasting thanks so
much
love you all bye alright now let's say I
wasn't happy with that ending and so I'm
gonna grab what's called the playhead
here that's what this part is called I'm
gonna bring it back to about where I
think the the last part was I'm gonna
hit play just to kind of remind myself
thanks so much
love you all bye okay maybe I don't like
that maybe I want to go back here and
I'm gonna hit track or excuse me
edit and split regions at playhead again
that essentially splits these two
regions at where the playhead is at you
can also as a shortcut just hit command
T and that does that for you now you can
see I can actually move this part away
which is really cool or you even move it
into a different track if I wanted to if
I were to do that you'll actually hear
that outro lay on top of the part right
before the out the the ending there so
I'm actually gonna play this it's going
to sound really bad because it's two
voices at the same time but you'll hear
it
some students thank so much up love you
I'm casting bye yeah that was kind of
weird so again we just wanted to delete
that so I'm just gonna highlight that
and click delete and there you go and I
want to rerecord the intro and to do
that I don't need it on a new track I
can just pick up right where I left off
hit record and just to kind of remind
myself I always kind of play the last
few seconds when I'm recording something
just so I know where I was coming from
of power
podcasting okay so I'm going to get to
the end here and thanks so much for
listening in appreciate you talk to you
soon bye
alright now let's click play or up
podcasting thanks so much for listening
in appreciate you talk to you soon bye
okay there you go now like I said
earlier you hack you can have multiple
tracks going on at the same time so I'm
actually gonna go to the beginning and
select the music one and I'm just gonna
hum some music and you can kind of hear
what that sounds like in the background
so I'm gonna do that really quick
hey this is Pat Lynn thank you so much
for listening in to this Oh see that was
kind of annoying because I was able to
hear my voice so what I'm gonna do is
actually go back undo that go back to
the beginning and I'm gonna mute the
intro so I can just hum music really
quick and then I'll show you how to
adjust the volume of that music did you
do did you did you did you do okay
that's all I'm gonna do for now but
let's play that back did you do did you
okay yeah that's that's kind of silly
okay now let's hear what it sounds like
with both things together
this is pathway and thank you so much
for listening into this I Hannibal now
as you can see that was maybe a little
bit too loud now we can do a few things
here I'm gonna actually select both of
these regions here and move them so hit
shift and if you want to control if you
want to actually control multiple
regions at the same time and move that
over I'm gonna have the music start so
the music will start playing and then as
I start to come in I'm gonna lower the
volume of the music and then actually
have it fade completely out so I'm gonna
just both of these there I'm gonna start
with the music have me come in now like
I said earlier to adjust the music
midway through you're gonna have to
actually go to mix and show automation
so I'm gonna click on music here to show
that one and volume now you'll notice
that there's like a faded yellow bar
here now if I were to click that will
turn on now the next time I click it'll
actually create a little bit of a button
or a dot so I'm gonna click where that
dot is there which kind of aligns with
where the intro starts there and what I
want to do at that point is actually
that's where I want the music to fade
out so I'm gonna click another button at
the end here and then what's cool is I
can drag this button down and this
changes the volume over time so you see
it starts at zero decibels here and then
over time it starts to fade out so let's
let's listen to only what that sounds
like so I'm gonna click solo and hit
play did you do did you so that's cool
that's how it fades out all the way now
let's play both at the same time and if
you want to turn the automations off you
can actually just click on this button
here that for whatever reason doesn't
show up until you turn show automations
on the first time but now I can easily
go back and forth but let me turn it off
I'm gonna make sure everything is on and
I'm gonna hit play and we'll we'll hear
what this sounds like did you do you did
you hey this is path lane thank you so
much for listening into this I want to
talk about my breakfast really quick so
for breakfast today alright and there
you go
now your task now is to create a test
recording and just play around with the
software a little bit adjust things and
learn how to split tracks and cut them
and move things around and delete things
that the one thing I do want to share is
this latest version of GarageBand
doesn't make it easy with related to
this playhead sometimes you might click
in this region above the playhead and
what that does is it toggles what's
called the cycle meaning that if you
were to actually highlight something
like this in this top part turns orange
now when you play it only plays this
region now this is helpful if you're
doing music and you just want to like
listen to one section over and over and
over and over and over again but it's
not very useful for us podcasters so you
can just turn that off if you happen to
just like randomly do that on accident
every once in a while like don't get
frustrated
I'm just click on cycle or press C to
turn that off and then just grab the
playhead and then move it to where
wherever you want it to go so now your
task is like I said create a test
recording talk about I don't know your
breakfast or how the course is going for
you you don't ever have to share it with
anybody it's gonna be nice to kind of
work out the kinks kind of get used to
talking to a microphone and not a person
which I know is gonna feel a little bit
weird to you just play around listen to
it and again the last thing don't worry
about what you sound like in terms of
like what your voice sounds like what we
want is good audio quality which is what
you're setting yourself up for right now
it does not matter what
your voice sounds like I know a lot of
people fear that I know that I fear that
it's what's taught me in the beginning
but honestly the only person that said
anything about my voice over the tens of
millions of downloads of my podcast
was was the voice inside my head it does
not matter alright so that was a deep
dive into using GarageBand to help you
edit and record your podcasts now
there's obviously a lot of other things
involved related to getting your podcast
up and running and if you aren't already
taking my mini course to help you all
the way through you can actually go
ahead and get access to that right now
for free by going to podcasting tutorial
comm and that'll take you through three
days to help you through all the steps
that you need to know this and all the
other things to help you get your
podcast I've been running so the world
can hear it so if you aren't yet already
taking my mini class go to podcasting
tutorial com