Behind the Scenes: Roosters, Iron Men, Frying Bacon, and the sounds of Breakfast With the Author

One of the most fun parts of editing down the footage of Breakfast With the Author is putting together the soundscape. From the rooster crowing at the beginning to first strains of our title song, every moment of each episode is carefully calculated to come out sounding its best.

The rooster sound is a public domain .wav file that I downloaded quite some time ago from a free sound effects page, and the bacon frying sound effect and title song are both used under a generous creative commons license from SoundJay.com. The title song of the show, incidentally, is called "Iron Man" and can be heard in full on the SoundJay website along with loads of other great background music for your own projects if you so choose.

One thing that's been a real challenge for me as I've recorded these episodes is that the two cameras I use (an iPhone 4 in a custom tripod mount and a Kodak Z650) each have very different microphone gains. Which means one usually records too loudly and the other too softly. Sometimes the iPhone will lose the lower register of my guests' voices and I'll need to boost the volume/gain of the audio track or even occasionally swap in the audio from the other camera for that shot in the mixdown. Other times the Z650 will be so sensitive that it zeroes in on the stove fan in the kitchen and overlays everything with an infernal hum that will have to be fixed and de-hissed later.

For things like the on-location video shot at Jumbo's Diner in Gouverneur, NY, I had to actually strip the audio completely out of the original video footage and reprocess it in Apple's handy GarageBand software, extruding the voices, canceling out the at-times-overwhelming background noise, and then compressing it back down so it sounded normal. This ended up being the most time-consuming part of producing that entire episode, but at least now in the final version all the voices are audible. I can't say enough good things about the Apple hardware I use to edit and master the videos. There's no way I'd be able to achieve the final quality I get without it.

Coming Soon: Episode 5!

Episode 5 is going to be premiering very soon, featuring guests Lindsay Hunter and Natalie Edwards. Both former residents of the Sunshine State, and both very funny, entertaining guests, they made Episode 5 easily one of the liveliest installments of Breakfast With the Author yet. To whet your appetite during the countdown to our release, I wanted to post a couple of things. The video below is of Lindsay reading one of her pieces during AWP last year. She's one of my favorite live readers and if you watch this it'll be obvious why.



I wanted to find a video of Natalie reading as well, because she's equally excellent live, but instead I'm going to point you here to one of my favorite short stories of hers. This hilarious piece from the Rumpus.com does a good job of showing off her sense of humor.

Enjoy, and stay tuned for Episode 5!

At the Outset

Writers and Friends,

The idea for Breakfast With the Author came to me one night after attending one of my favorite reading series in the city, Orange Alert. Following the readings, I sat for what must have been 2-3 hours with a few of my writer friends and we drank and talked shop about writing. The environment was so relaxed, the company so utterly great, that we soon forgot how long we'd been there. As we reluctantly pulled ourselves away from this impromptu little gathering, it occurred to me how uniquely friendly and welcoming the Chicago literature scene is, and what a shame it was that not every writer, no matter where they live or what the creative climate in their hometown is, has access to such fun, informal, candid, enriching dialogue with other authors. Breakfast With the Author is my attempt to bring this sit-down, this little insider moment, to the rest of the world, and I very much hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

I'm posting this today exactly one year after the initial pilot podcast appeared. In that time, it has gone from just a basic vague idea to the sort of thing people know about me before we've even met, which continues to delight and astound me. I'd like to take a moment at the outset to thank my wife for being so supportive of this project and offer a kind thank you to all of the writers and editors who took the time to come and have breakfast with me. I make the show, but it's you that make it happen.

-Mark

Episode 4: Paul Hughes, Russell Lutz and Len Nicholas

Episode 4: Guests Paul Hughes, Russell Lutz and Len Nicholas

Episode 3: Davis Schneiderman and Lawrence Santoro

Episode 3: Guests Davis Schneiderman and Lawrence Santoro

Episode 2: Gina Frangello and Kathleen Rooney

Episode 2: Guests Gina Frangello and Kathleen Rooney