I see our radio show being more of a podcast situation. So I made my intermission similar to what I thought the intermission for Limetown Season 2 was like. Except for it going to commercial I make the intermission longer than just a few sounds.
I started with a sound of water dripping in a cave from Free Sound and duplicated the second drip as that was the one I liked better. I then went to a text to speech converter and had 5 different recordings of different voices saying each word of “Days of Crime and Roses will be back” and cut that together in Audacity. I then found a piano that sounded melancholy on Adobe Stock called “Who Takes Care of You” and once I heard more of the song and added it to Audacity I realized that I wanted to time the water dropplets to the beat of the music! So I did that and Im happy with how it came out.
I created this intermission for the Fearless Femmes Segment on Cyber 75 The Vibe Radio Show. It was a little off script and last minute than what we had originally planned for but it is still on track with our story line and it’s almost 2 minutes long so if we need a nice filler or a piece to help build our story line, I figured this would be perfect and a nice option to have if we need it.
It’s only Sapphria Mae who is talking and it’s mainly about her spilling the beans for her own personal gain, while also intending to try to keep listeners engaged with “secrets” or “tea”. Sapphria also talks about the other characters by their names, giving more exposure to who is who, and also to get listeners excited for the next part/or half of our segments. Also – She is a femme fatale, so this is perfect for her archetype traits.
I created this recording on my iPhone and then uploaded it to Audacity. I looked up the sound effects and the background music all on FreeSounds.org. I started the track with “elevator music” and a DJ scratch to let listeners know that this is a “break” from the show. Then I just played around with the track for a little bit until I was satisfied. One thing I made sure to do was to turn the background music at a much lower level than my audio recording sound so the whole thing wasn’t overwhelming or hard to hear me.
I had a grand ole time getting this playlist together. I think it not only fits with who I envision my course character, Bethany, to be, but it also brings out some interesting parts of her character.
Marlene on the Wall: This song reminds of her of her deceased partner, and the bond that she’ll have with him no matter what actually happened.
You Send Me: Their song- it just feels so warm.
Christine: She sometimes feels like Christine, disintegrating, someone with multiple faces.
A Means to an End: Besides just liking Joy Devision, Bethany likes the particular brand of melancholy that this song is.
I Wouldn’t Want to Be Like You: In her line of work, it stands to be a good reminder that she doesn’t want to be like those around her. This song is an after-work palate cleanser.
Good News: One of the more modern songs on her playlist, it serves to knock her out of her funks and remind her that there is a world outside of everything in her head.
Over and Over: She likes to turn up this song while she’s cleaning. She just enjoys singing along and pretending she’s on stage.
Don’t Renegade on Our Love: The title is perhaps too indicative- she loves this song but hates that it makes her feel like she betrayed everyone around her.
Fallingwater: This song is either a “cry alone at night” song or a “scream in the car on the way to work” song.
For the radio bumper assignment, I based my bumper on the iconic “You’re watching Disney Channel’ ads that would air when I was younger. I thought the idea was creative and nostalgic, but mainly because of Defunctland on YouTube. When I looked into what a radio bumper was, the assignment description explained that it is a “short recording that identifies the radio station with signature music or an expression that makes sure the listeners know what they are tuned into.” It reminded me of Defunctland’s “Disney Channel’s Theme: A History Mystery” where the host, Kevin, talks about Network Identifiers. Kevin goes on to explain that bumpers are a fascinating liminal space that is able to tell viewers, “Here is where you are, here is what you’ve been watching, and here’s what’s next.” The video is all-around amazing, so I encourage anyone reading this to watch it. That being said, because this video taught me what bumpers were when I first watched that video, I wanted to reference it by using the Disney Channel theme for my bumper.
To make this bumper, I recorded myself saying my name and saying, “You’re listening to DS106 radio.” From there, I uploaded my recording and the audio clip of the Disney Channel theme to Adobe Audition to start editing. Because the audio was so short, editing was easy but I did run into one challenge. I wanted some music to play first and then for me to talk, but to do that, I had to set the clips at different audio levels and then have them fade into each other. The frustrating thing about Adobe Audition is that I couldn’t figure out how to do a fade transition for the audio. What kept happening was the first audio clip would fade into zero, and the next audio clip would fade from zero, but it was jarring and didn’t sound good. The solution I found told me to set the two clips to different volumes and then overlap each other. That is what I ended up doing, but I am keeping my eye out for a better way to do this.
I like how my radio bumper came out, and I’ve enjoyed listening to everyone else’s. I’m excited to maybe one day hear it on DS106 radio!
We will be working with ds106 radio this week, and in some future weeks, so we want you to try your hand at making your first radio “bumper” – a 10-30 second short audio that announces the radio station that is played between songs to remind listeners what they are tuned in to. This should be saved as an MP3 file, and then upload it to SoundCloud. Make sure in Soundcloud that you enable the option to allow downloads (so we can add it to ds106 radio!) Your audio must be embedded in your blog post summary of this assignment. You can embed Soundcloud audio by putting the plain text URL on its own line, and when you publish, WordPress will create a player to allow visitors to listen. The radio bumper is an assignment in the Assignment Bank, so you should tag your blog post correctly when you’re done. You may be able to get Dr. Oblivion to help out, if you ask nicely. Tag: radiobumper
For this I naturally had to go for the Technoir vibe my first thought was all about industrial sounds however I switched to thinking more along an unsettling vibe. I used one of the sounds from freesound made by a creator called looplicator. It was just perfect with some additional modifications I made it more unsettling. I was far less sure of what to actually say unfortunately.
I did try to look ups some examples after a bit of trial and error I ended up with this.
It took a few tries, but I managed to get it done. Ended up coming out far shorter than I wanted since I wasn’t the most inspired and did not know much about radio going in. So, mine is not cool or anything more about telling the viewers to relax and just enjoy. Since my original one was too cynical according to a friend.
I think this assignment was a really good exercise for developing my character’s personality. I was inspired by Live it Up With Liv’s version of this assignment and I thought it looked fun so I wanted to give it a try. For this playlist there were a few elements I wanted to apply: country, independent woman, and wanting more. For the country element, you can see that in songs like “Fancy” by Reba, “The Other Side of the Door” by Taylor Swift, and “Ain’t No Love in Oklahoma”. I think she would like these songs because she works on a farm in a small town so country music is in her roots. The independent woman part can be seen in “Woman” by Kesha and “You’re Just a Boy (and I’m Kind of the Man)” by Maisie Peters. Krissy is a confident woman and that confidence will be important to have on her mission. The last factor of songs that give off the feeling of wanting more can be seen in the song “Belle” from Beauty and the Beast as well as “1985” by Bowling for Soup. I think the sense of yearning for more is a relatable feeling in the Innocent Bystander Archetype. In the beginnning of her story, she feels that she is meant for more but by the end, after all the action, she will be changed for better or for worse. Some songs have overlapping themes. For example, “Girl in a Country Song” by Maddie & Tae and “girl i’ve always been” by Olivia Rodrigo shows both elements of country and independent woman. Additionally, I made Krissy with very similar interests to mine, she is a strong, independent woman, so of course I want to feel represented by her. While reflecting on this assignment, I realized that Krissy has very similar music taste to me. I think in Live it Up With Liv’s assignment, Liv went out of her way to find a healthy mix of music that she regularly listened to and music that fit the vibe of her character. In constrast, this assignment went very fast for me because I would think “Oh! This song I like fits, and this one too!” so I see a lot of myself in this playlist. As I mentioned earlier, this assignment was a great way for me to develop my character’s personality, and in turn I hope anyone who reads this has a better understanding of who Krissy is.
I decided to further characterize Bethany (and indulge myself) by looking for a house for her on Zillow. Since she is based in Chicago, that’s where I opted to search. She really doesn’t need a lot of space, especially since its just her. I could see her eventually getting a pet, so a pet-friendly establishment was a plus. While Bethany is only a receptionist for a funeral home, she does have the extra cash flow from Smithy, so the price wasn’t anything I was too worried about.
I found this stunning apartment that I know Bethany would LOVE. Located in downtown Chicago, the one-bed/one-bath setup is just enough for her. The brick and hardwood fixtures are breathtaking, and the balcony would be perfect for her morning reading. There is enough space in the living area for a small office, which Bethany will use for all of her after hours work.
While the bedroom is a pretty stark white, Bethany would fill the room with life through a huge rug and lots of wall art. There is still some personality in this room, though! A wooden beam runs through the ceiling, bringing some much needed warmth to this part of the house.
Coming up with the setting for where my character lives is a central part of crafting their personality. For Krissy, I wrote about her background, stating that she grew up and lived on the farm her parents worked on and that she would one day take over. I had Krissy live in a big farmhouse in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. I chose Pennsylvania for her home state because I know many people in Lancaster have very traditional values, and my thought for Krissy was that although she may have some traditional beliefs, she believes she is meant for bigger and better things than what her fellow Lancastrians believe. Additionally, it’s essential to be distinct in what area of Pennsylvania she lives in because Lancaster is so dramatically different than the big cities of PA like Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Typically, there aren’t many farms in those cities. This particular house perfectly depicts Krissy and her family. The house has four bedrooms, perfect for her, her parents, her sibling, and a spare guest room. It only has two bathrooms, but the house is amazing in every other way. There is also a large plot of land in the backyard, perfect for crops, animals, equipment, etc. The house is unassuming, but the inside is gorgeous, rustic, colorful, and well-decorated. This is similar to Krissy, who should seem destined to continue her life as a farmer, but will get to one day save the world. The house was built in 1971, but it looks like it was built in the 1900s. The furniture looks like it was pulled from the movie For Richer or For Poorer. It shows Krissy’s taste for the old-fashioned aesthetic. This house is the perfect fit for Krissy, and I know Krissy would consider it her dream home!
The thought of what house I would buy without any financial restrictions has always been a thought in my mind, especially as I continue to progress into adulthood and have to think about fully living on my own with a job and a stable income. I’ve always dreamed of living in a house on the West Coast in the San Diego area, and immediately went to browse around the area. I’m also not a huge fan of the more boxy shaped modern houses and am more drawn to clean and minimalistic houses with some rustic aspects to tie it together. After a bit of searching, I found this house that looks perfect, listing at 4.5 million with 5 beds and 3 baths, and a setup and all the space one could need.
A connection to our class theme of Tech Noir I thought of was how the market of houses would look under a vastly developed technological society. Smart homes would be commonplace, but could be used to exert control over their inhabitants. There’s also concerns of privacy as technologies that makes a home “smart” could be hijacked by powerful corporations or government entities to monitor and manipulate people. Would every house look the same and be “smart homes” or could there be diversity present and how would that ratio look? How would a boundary between security and privacy look in a market of houses full of surveillance and AI-driven systems? Furthermore, large tech corporations could dominate the housing market, buying up properties to embed technology in them, then price out working-class residents to raise property value and essentially cut off any sense of community. Overall, my vision of the housing market in tech noir is a space governed by technology that shapes the living experience for its residents.
When I was first looking through the assignment bank the Soundtrack assignment caught my eye immediately. I have always been around lots of music, and am a big fan of all types of genres. I thought this assignment would be perfect for me to express different eras that have been impactful to me and led me to who I am now. Music is an amazing way to tell a story about yourself and that’s how I interpreted completing this assignment to be true to me. I chose eras of songs that were released in the 2000s and 2010s to reflect my favorite songs to listen to growing up, embodying my childhood. Then switched to Grateful Dead and Phish because my parents were a heavy influence in getting me into all sorts of music, and they love listening to jam bands, originating with those two. Lastly, I chose vintage songs mostly by Frank Sinatra to represent my grandparents, who loved Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald, as they were big role models in my life before they passed away and I love listening to all sorts of Jazz to reminisce on being in their car looking at Christmas lights.
Enjoy viewing a compressed version of the eras and influences of my life!
