Musings of Two Creative Minds

Okay, so getting ready to record in the privacy of your own home. Sadly, this will not always be easy. Finding a quiet spot to set up is always tricky at best. But here are a few do's and don't's: 1 - DON'T use your bathroom! It may have great acoustics for singing, but for recording an audio book, not a great choice. Too much echo, unless of course you want that effect for a particular scene where the character is in a cave/tunnel.  But not ideal for an entire book. You'll drive your listeners crazy. 2 - Do not have any laundry, dishwasher, or loud fans going anywhere nearby. If you've got a really good microphone, guess what it will be picked up in the background. Not acceptable to ACX requirements. 3 - Make sure the windows are closed so you don't pick up outside noises, like traffic or kids playing. 4 - Be prepared to start over... repeatedly! Things happen. You accidentally step on something, or your clothing is crinkly, etc. Where something...

Okay, continuing with my adventures in recording audios, I left off last time with the image above. Now what you are seeing are the Blue Yeti Microphone, which had a huge amount of reviews over on Amazon. It's a very versatile microphone in the respects that it can give you several options for picking up sound. It can do 360, if you want a room full of people involved (or to pick up background sound effects), it can do 2-way where you're on one side of the mic and someone else is directly opposite you, while filtering out the sides somewhat. It also has a setting called Cardioid which is the one I use for audios, this allows you to not have to be directly in front of it at all times, so if you like to move a bit and perform as you record a scene, it catches everything you're saying. These will plug into your computer's USB port, so no special attachments. Also, the cord is very long (about 6-7 feet) so you have some freedom of where to set up to get away from you...

As many of you have learned from my last post, my great adventure in audio recordings has begun. So far I have recorded only the one short story "Wolves and the Northern Lights", which comes from our first anthology book "The Vampyre Blogs - One Day At a Time". But simply recording one story is a far cry from turning a full-length novel into an audiobook. However, that is indeed my long term goal. At this point, I'm keeping things simple for myself as I still get used to the equipment both for recording as well as editing to get the best sound quality for listeners.  To keep things manageable for myself, I'm planning on recording the rest of the 25+ stories from the anthology, as well as slowly begin recording it's predecessor "The Vampyre Blogs - Coming Home".  Like the anthology, that novel is mainly comprised of blog, e-journal, and e-diary entries from various characters in the book.  And I plan on doing different voices for ...

Okay, here it is folks. My first full-scale attempt at doing an audio recording of one of the short stories from our anthology "The Vampyre Blogs - One Day At a Time".  This particular tale features our vampyre Nathan, talking about Alaska and what it's like to have shape-shifting powers. *NOTE: Do not click on this image, link to audio is provided further down Please feel free to leave some comments below or at YouTube to let me know how I did. I'm hoping to fine tune my skills before trying for a full-scale audiobook version of the anthology and o ur full-length novels in the future. FYI, I'll be putting together a rather lengthy blog entry in the near future (possibly complete with videos including Blooper outtakes) demonstrating what lengths I go to get a good sound quality within the confines of my own home. I think I'll be able to give you all a few good chuckles as well as useful information. Just click on the link below to begin...

Every so often we come to a realization that something we've been doing hasn't been working as well as we'd hoped. Admitting you didn't do something right the first time is not a sign of weakness, it actually shows growth. Learning from your mistakes is just as important as getting things right the first time.   Recently, during a book release party (for someone else) a mutual friend who is a librarian started talking to me about the Para-Earths series. She's watched trends and keeps a close eye on what's popular in the industry and she pointed out to me that the Para-Earths might actually do better aimed at a Young Adult (YA) audience. This would still make the books quite available to the adult crowd of course, while opening the series to more readers.  I gave this a lot of thought, especially after several others readily agreed with her. So I spent the next week or doing some serious research into YA books. To my surprise, what I found there real...

Well, maybe you don't ask. But now you want to know, because once you fall in love with a book, you want more like it. Review it! Many online stores and book sites allow readers to post reviews. A person is more likely to take a chance on a book that 50 people say they loved than 5 people say they do. Recommend it! Readers have friends who read, and you likely have an idea of their tastes. A recommendation makes a person more likely to find out more about an unknown book. Some authors, such as J.K. Rowling, got further by word of mouth recommendations and kids buying it for their friends, than by traditional marketing methods. Gift it! I've been running a special-- the book retails at $12 each, but I've been running a 2 for $20 special via direct sales. It encourages people to either buy an extra as a present for a friend or talk them into buying one too and splitting the savings. And I'd never ask this, but two of my buyers spontaneously paid extra, so...

The first installment of "The Forever Detective" series is now available in Trade Paperback and E-Book formats And the review are just starting to come in... 5.0 out of 5 stars   " Clever writing without being campy " "This genre mashup of 1940s detective/vampire novel must have been a challenge for Helen Krummenacker to write, but she pulled it off beautfully...."   5.0 out of 5 stars " Fun Chandler-style with a twist "   "Had so much fun reading this book..." You can read the rest of the reviews by clicking on the link below: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07RSGKTDF