Update: July 31. My first LibriVox book!

I spent this year learning how to be a proof-listener at LibriVox, although the project I was listening to got abandoned by its creator, and that means for long stretches of time there wasn't actually anything to do, although I checked in every day just to be sure.

Then, after I finished my Newcastle presentation (that was a huge project for me, even though the presentation itself was quite short), I decided the time had come to do my own audio, because I really wanted to start doing LibriVox versions of the African folktale books I had worked on, only a few of which are at LibriVox now. So, I recorded my audio test, and that's how I found out that the background noise here at my building (my unit is near the air handlers on the south end of the building) is a problem for audio too! (Things were different back in the woods of North Carolina which were very, very quiet.) Luckily, the Twisted Wave browser-based recording software I'm using has a noise reduction effect, and a nice person at LibriVox taught me how to use that, and after running that algorithm, I passed the test.

Then, I started recording, and it's gone great! I'm doing Stafford's Animals Fables first (I'll save thoughts about what's next for another post), and those are really short, which makes them easy to record. I have to run the noise reduction after each one, and occasionally I have to do the normalization for the volume because I read on the loud side and probably have the mic a little too close. But that's okay; it only takes a few seconds to run the noise reduction.

I got a desktop soundbooth thing with foam panels that I thought might eliminate the background noise, although it doesn't seem to have helped much. But because it has a mount for the microphone and folds up so nicely, I decided to keep it because it's actually an easier way to store my mic than what I was doing before. And it's also just a nice ritual to unfold that when I sit down to record, and then to fold it up and put it away when I am done (it sits on top of the jigsaw puzzle table which, thank goodness, doesn't seem to be of any interest to the cats when I put the rubber mat down on the puzzle to cover it up).

So, my goal is to read 4 stories every day; I just finished story #20 today, which means I'll actually be done in just 4 more days. Pretty amazing! The whole process is so smooth, and good software support for keeping track of everything. It is going to be really exciting when I finish up! Here's what the "magic window" looks like right now. :-)

I also picked up a proof-listening project (it seems only fair that I should be doing proof-listening whenever I have a book in the queue to be proofed!), and it is really awesome: a supplemental volume of Burton's 1001 Nights. So that is a real pleasure to listen to. It is LONG, so that means it will go on for a while, and that's good too because the reader is really experienced, and I don't think I'll have to ask for re-edits very often. So far I found just one little thing he had dropped out; other than that, I can just kick back and listen. That's a very different experience from the book I was working on where the reader was really struggling with the old-fashioned English; I suspect that's why she dropped the project. Burton's language is old-fashioned for sure, but the reader moves right along and doesn't let it throw him. I feel lucky with the book I am reading; it is very easy to read by comparison!

My next update will be when I finish the recordings for Stafford. I am so curious what happens next! Hopefully I will pick up a proof-listener who can do that part of the process but, even so, I'll be ready to propose my next book when that recording is all done, yay!