The Ink-Pot and the Palette

Story: Real Worlds, by Salieri
Reader: luzula
Fandom: Due South
Length: 5 hours, 9 minutes

luzula is a prolific reader who makes podfic in an interesting range of fandoms of which Due South and its C6D branchings are the most mainstream. There's an emphasis on the mythic and the fantastic in her work (she has made Gilgamesh and Watership Down podfic!).

This story is one of only two pieces by luzula that I've heard, and it's a story I haven't read and wasn't familiar with, so I'm reviewing it outside the context of her or the author's body of work. I note only that its posting date of September 2009 makes it one of the most recent in a long line of contributions stretching back into podfic ancient history, August 2007.

I establish all this to make it clear that I, a podfic n00b, am reviewing the work of a highly original and very experienced veteran. So, cum grano salis, everybody.

( Review of 'Real Worlds' as read by Luzula )

The first time I rode Clyde to and from work, back in September, it was a major triumph of will.

Now I have a fixed route whose traffic hazards and potholes I'm very familiar with. I know my bike better, too.

My ride in to work takes 27 minutes. Going home, about 30. It's not boring--far from it!--but it has become routine. So lately I've been listening to podfic and audiobooks as I ride. Only in one ear--it would be crazy to block out traffic noise. I'm of two minds about this, but so far, I feel perfectly safe.

There are these bike stereo speakers on the market now, which are cool but pose three significant problems: they aren't rainproof (lame!), I hate hearing other people's music so why would I subject people around me to mine?, and finally, um, porn. Hah! Can you imagine riding around with some story by fleshflutter or leonidaslion blaring out of your handlebars?

Yeah, me neither.

Podbang is eating my brain! I just finished editing the sixth of my twelve chapters.

Once the other six are edited, there's music to add, and then I have to join the chapters up into either two or three files (this sucker's too big for the archive, I'm pretty sure!).

Editing has made me realize how much I learned as I went along, and how much I still have to learn. The hardest thing at this point is letting small problems and errors go because I just don't have time to be a perfectionist.

Where did my four-day weekend go? *looks around* Aaarrggh! I need more days off!

My dry spell on Restraint (the Regency J2 AU) has come to an end in the last couple of days. This weekend I've written most of the bridge section whose absence was preventing any further progress. I feel like I can finally write through to the end now. OMG this has been a long haul. Started that sucker more than a year ago, and have been stuck for the last three months.

It feels wonderful to have found my feet again on this novel. I've never discovered anything more fun than writing fresh new story--new snarky dialog, new minor plot twists, new character reveals. I LOVE THIS STUFF!

In other fannish activity, I just finished recording the eleventh of the twelve chapters of my Podbang entry. Many hours of editing lie before me. Many, many, many hours of editing. But the recording is almost done.

And I posted one of my very few fics to the A-Triple-Oh! Archive. PEOPLE WHO ARE IN THE OPEN BETA: Do you post locked or unlocked, and why?

Oh, and I just started watching "White Collar". Wow. Fun AND slashable. I like.

And finally, I took 25 night photos this evening and only one was any good.

( Moon River )

As threatened yesterday: photos are back!

( Here's my super high-tech podfic recording studio: my closet. Ta-da! )

(crossposted at LiveJournal)

My first podfic is now up at The Audiofic Archive.

It's Coming Clean, a 7200-word (42 minute) Sanzo/Goku Saiyuki story by kispexi2. It's set post-quest, it has a strong hurt/comfort element (my favorite!) and, as the clever title suggests, involves a confession, a bath, and some sexin'. Kis rates it hard-R, which seems about right.

Podfic has been a long time coming for me. I'm picky about my audiobooks. I'm picky about my fanfic. My first real foray into podfic was the wonderful Candle_Beck's Last Day on Earth, read by the author, and I thought, wow, this is awesome! My second was a fabulous story so poorly read that I was shouting at it by the end (though, to give it its due, I did listen all the way through--the story was just that good).

So I set out to do justice to kispexi2's skilled writing by setting a high bar on my reading and editing. I sailed right under that bar (I still don't know what the hell I'm doing with Audacity, the recording software, and yes, I pronounced "Sanzo" both ways, and I don't think I got out all the mouth noises and there's a distinct break at one point where the sound quality changes levels), but I learned a lot and I'm going to come closer to the bar next time.

Next time is Podbang, where I'll be undertaking a 30,000+ word story, probably in the Due South fandom, for a surprise gift recipient.

Meanwhile, if you're one of the rare Saiyuki fans on my flist, I hope you'll give "Coming Clean" a listen.

I've been in the closet all afternoon. I dragged a bar stool into my tiny and clothes-packed bedroom closet and set up the microphone on a stack of folded shirts. I made a sound booth out of my fleece bathrobe and a sweater-coat and sat with my computer on my lap, facing the back wall of the closet.

It's nice and acoustically dead, the environment you want for voice recording. I've read about three-quarters of kispexi2_2's story, but started fumbling badly, so I'm taking a break.

Here's what I've learned so far:
1. Turn phone ringer off
2. Take down the windchimes
3. Turn off the self-updating virus software that announces its activities
4. Pee before scootching into the closet on a bar stool, because scootching back out again is not the work of a moment

I haven't listened to any of what I've recorded yet. I don't know if a listener will be able to distinguish my Gojyo voice from my Sanzo voice. I hope I sound a little dramatic, rather than a lot lame.

But I'm having fun.