I uploaded this earlier but it only contained 1 minute of the recording. I think I would benefit from having background music throughout the audio essay or have a better transition from music to no music. I couldn't successfully get my music level to be low enough that I felt it wouldn't be a distraction.
Comments
Review
I thought you did a really good job with the tone and cadence of your voice, as well as the intro and outro music. As far as constructive criticism, I think you could fade in and out your audio clips to make the overall audio essay a bit more cohesive. However, the clips you chose are effective and add a lot of value to the overall essay. Finally, enunciating your words a bit more may make the overall essay more engaging.
The narration is working…
The narration is working well in its tone and level of formality. The transitions in the narration into the clips seem to be working well. The first clip could be faded out more smoothly. I'm not sure the opening music is working optimally yet. It may be that transitions can be woven together with more sounds or music, etc. Some of the volume levels can be adjusted for consistency. I wondered if the third clip might be taken out and the narrator give the information. And I wonder if the fourth clip might be a bit long. Can you give details on how someone would report fake news? The narration is working well, so working on the clips, transitions, and other fine tuning will make it even stronger. Nice job.
Review
1. I think the audio samples are you used are chosen well. However, maybe you should consider fading them in and out. Sometimes they abruptly end and it can be a bit jarring. Overall, they added to your audio essay rather than detracting from it. I didn't find any of the samples too long. The length for them worked well within your piece and I wasn't left feeling like all I had heard were audio clips.
2. I think your intro and outro music need to be incorporated a bit more smoothly. Same with the audio clips, I think the music would work a lot better if you faded it in and out. Right now, especially in the beginning, the music just abruptly stops. It would work better if it softly faded off in the background. You also don't really use sound effects in your piece. That's not a bad thing, however, if I were you I wouldn't be afraid to experiment with a few different sound effects to see if they work well in your piece. Maybe a few social media notifications going off in the background as you discuss how false news spreads faster. Have it start off a little slow and then just have a bunch of notifications going off.
3. The quality of your voice audio is good. I can clearly hear and understand what you are saying. The tone of voice you use it good. At various points, you shift your tone to fit with what you are talking about at the time. I don't really have any suggestions for improvements at the moment.
4. I've already discussed some technical things above. Overall, I think if you work on fading the music and audio clips in and out it will help the piece flow a lot more smoothly. Right now a lot of it just starts and ends abruptly and that kind of takes me out of the piece a little bit.