More and more people are tuning in to podcasts. As audio-only media starts to gain popularity, the demand for professional sound engineers is becoming more and more evident.
Proper sound editing and mixing are crucial in high-quality podcast production. This helps ensure that the sound and audio millions of people hear are well-balanced and engaging. Otherwise, it is easy to lose listeners’ interest, making it difficult for podcasters to establish a solid audience.
The steps involved in post-production podcast content creation are crucial. These involve editing, mixing, and mastering audio to make sure good sound quality.
Audio engineers are well-equipped with the technical knowledge and skills to ensure and elevate the quality of raw sound recordings. They can provide editing services and audio mastering that can turn your podcast episodes to a whole new level.
Thinking about hiring an audio engineer? To give you a better understanding, here is a quick overview of the roles of sound engineers and the benefits of having one as part of your podcast production team.
What Is An Audio Engineer
Source: Unsplash
Audio engineers are professionals with technical knowledge and skills in the elements of high-quality audio production. While audio engineers are commonly found in the film and music industries, their expertise is being introduced into the up-and-coming world of podcasting.
In their line of work, audio engineers often work closely with a team. They typically collaborate with other engineers, musicians, producers, artists, hosts, and other professionals to develop the group’s desired mix.
Audio engineers are critical to the production of high-quality audio. They are responsible for various sound elements from the start to finish of a podcast production that helps ensure clear, crisp, consistent, and engaging audio throughout a recording.
Different types of audio engineers can work in podcast production. This includes the following:
Live Sound Engineer
A live sound engineer is extremely beneficial for podcast hosts who conduct live audio recordings. Much like a recording engineer, they are responsible for setting up the recording studio and ensuring that all microphones and equipment work properly. Live sound engineers play a more active role during recordings as they diligently keep track of the sound levels and troubleshoot issues that come up during the session.
Recording Engineer
Recording engineers are responsible for preparing and properly staging a recording studio. The goal of a recording engineer is to set up the space for the best possible acoustics, allowing crisp and noise-free recording. They also operate the necessary audio equipment, such as the preamplifiers and mixing consoles.
Mixing Engineer
Mixing engineers work on podcast post-production. They are tasked with mixing and skillfully combining audio tracks to create a complete and balanced audio recording. Mixing engineers also play with effects, filters, and other sound levels to build a more engaging mix.
Mastering Engineer
A mastering engineer is a well-experienced professional responsible for finalizing the edited and mixed audio. They can make changes and adjustments as they see fit before processing the audio for completion.
Reasons To Hire An Audio Engineer For Podcast Creation
Source: Unsplash
Hiring a sound engineer for podcast creation can be a significant investment. Here are some notable reasons you should consider adding an audio engineer to your team.
Ensure podcast sound quality
Podcasts are audio-only media. Therefore, it is critical for podcast content creators or producers to ensure the quality of their audio recordings. Audio engineers have the knowledge, skills, and experience to make sure that podcast recordings are done correctly.
Audio engineers can help start from the setup of the recording studio to the choice of equipment and until the numerous edits and polishing involved in audio post-production. They have the technical know-how to fine-tune recordings to make them sound crisp, polished, and professional, which is important for high-quality podcasts.
Find the right podcast tools and equipment
Source: Unsplash
Audio engineers do more than just mix and edit audio. Because of their technical knowledge, they can also choose the right tools and equipment needed to improve the quality of your recordings.
Finding the right type of microphone is critical in podcast production. While many believe that an expensive microphone is all you would need, audio engineers know there are other factors to consider.
Aspects such as the environment and the space’s acoustics can significantly affect the quality and clarity of your audio. With the help of an audio engineer, you can design your studio better and find the suitable recording tools and equipment you need.
Expert production knowledge and skills
Unlike the common misconception, podcasting is not as simple and easy. The podcast production process goes through a series of steps, and the audio engineer plays a critical role in each one.
Audio engineering uses technical knowledge and skills to create enhanced sound. This involves the processes of recording, editing, mixing, and mastering raw recorded audio. In podcast production, the first step revolves around audio engineering.
For this step, it is the audio engineer’s responsibility to set up the recording equipment properly. This includes the microphones, the preamplifiers, as well as the mixing consoles. Aside from that, the audio engineer is also tasked with operating this equipment, adjusting them whenever necessary.
The next step is editing the recorded audio. The audio engineer would use a digital audio workstation (DAW) to capture, manipulate, and enhance the audio to their liking. A critical part of this involves cutting out parts of the recording, deleting unwanted sections, and minimizing noise in the background.
The mixing stage in podcast production involves combining various audio and soundtracks to create a cohesive and balanced recording. An audio engineer’s knowledge, skills, and experience is crucial in this step. They are tasked with adjusting each soundtrack’s level and adding filters, effects, and equalizers to keep the audio clear and well-balanced.
Mastering is the final stage of audio engineering in the podcast creation process. This step revolves around polishing and finalizing the edited and mixed recordings to create the finished output. The audio engineer is responsible for processing the audio and making sure that the sound quality is up to standard and high quality before release.
Save time
Most often than not, those just starting in the podcast industry do everything themselves— from the necessary research, script writing, recording, editing, and publishing. However, doing all these things on your own is tiring and extremely time-consuming.
Hiring an audio engineer for your podcast production will allow you to save a lot of time. While you can still handle all the research and writing, you can delegate everything to your audio engineer once you finish recording. Not only will this save you time, but it will also increase your overall productivity and efficiency when creating content for your podcast.
Bottomline
Podcast hosting is not easy, especially if you’re doing everything yourself. When it comes to podcast creation, post-production is considered to be the most laborious and time-consuming. Not only is it technical work, but it requires keen attention to detail as well as some basic recording, mixing, and editing skills to pull off.
Hiring an audio engineer can significantly improve the quality of your podcasts and save you precious time. Once you’re done recording, you can simply forward your raw audio to your audio engineer and wait for the magic to happen.
When you outsource podcast creation, you give yourself more time to work on other aspects of your podcast channel. You can spend more time researching, writing, and even marketing. All in all, adding an audio engineer to your production team can greatly benefit your channel.
Want to know more about outsourcing tasks? Sidekicks is an on-demand virtual company, and we’re eager to help visionaries and entrepreneurs like you. Get a free ebook and learn more about how we can help you by signing up for our newsletter. We also offer a free 30-minute consultation if you prefer something more personal.
