Conducting Recorded Interviews: The Decisions That Matter
Recording interviews for podcasts, documentaries and marketing so the audio is clean and the conversation is usable.
Tomas Lindqvist
The key figures
- Separate tracks
- recording each speaker separately allows independent processing
- Overlap
- speakers talking over each other cannot be separated later
- Room choice
- soft furnishings reduce reflections
- Headphones
- prevent speaker bleed into microphones
Why this is worth getting right
Interview problems such as overlapping speech and inconsistent levels are hard to fix and cost hours in editing.
Do this, not that
Do
- Record each speaker on a separate track
- Ask guests to avoid talking over answers
- Record room tone before starting
- Monitor levels throughout
- Keep a backup recorder running
Don’t
- One microphone for several speakers
- Speakers on loudspeakers instead of headphones
- Unmonitored recordings
- Rooms with hard surfaces everywhere
When to bring in help
Our advice Bring in help when interviews are being recorded for a series.
Where this comes from
- European Broadcasting Union — Speech recording practice
- Adobe Help Center — Audition User Guide
The figures and practices above come from the sources listed.
Working on something like this?
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Where to go next
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