[Studiotalk] Remote Studio Volunteers Query

[Marlin, Mike@CSL]

Thanks, Miles, this is very useful information. We'll let you know if we have further questions.

Mike L. Marlin, Director
California Braille and Talking Book Library
Sacramento, CA
O: (916) 651-0812
E: mike.marlin at library.ca.gov
W: btbl.ca.gov

From: studiotalk <studiotalk-bounces at islemail.org> On Behalf Of Stephen Lewis
Sent: Friday, January 15, 2021 10:42 AM
To: TBBS Recording Studio Info <studiotalk at islemail.org>
Subject: Re: [Studiotalk] Remote Studio Volunteers Query

CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the State Library. DO NOT click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender, are expecting the information and know the content is safe.

Greetings Mike and all.

We here in Texas have also transitioned to having most staff telecommuting, no in-person studio volunteering, and remote (cloud-based) studio volunteering, beginning last March at the beginning of the this long pandemic lockdown period. We successfully transitioned magazine production to this remote / telework environment but have similarly had new book production grind to a halt - though we have been looking into / working towards a variety of potentially amazing remote book production services and processes. Also similar to your description, we have had some limited on-site staffing that has enabled us to continue our own analog-to-digital A2D (and digital D2D / C2B) conversion work at an impressive pace. That said, I will try to directly address your specific questions below:


  *   Does your network library studio use remote volunteers, and if so for which tasks (narrators, monitors, reviewers)?

Yes. Mostly remote self-recording for narrators and remote reviewing for reviewers. We have limitedly explored some promising remote recording services that can enable both solo / self-recording of narrators AND (most excitingly) facilitate high-quality remote interaction of traditional recording teams of both narrator and monitor.


  *   Did your volunteer policy already allow remote volunteers or did you have to amend it, and if so what was needed to be put into place?

Nothing in our previous policy. However, we had experimented with solo / self-recording home narration work (on magazines) on and off again for many years so this was slightly easier to achieve. We're finally beginning to roll out new policy documentation that is mostly an expansion of existing IT/ITS security guideline acknowledgment form (which also incorporates potential loaning of equipment) with the assistance of agency legal counsel.


  *   For those of you who have remote volunteers, do you supply your volunteers with any software, i.e. HABC or APH or ? If not do they supply their own software to create audio files?

We hope to eventually loan out hardware (and possibly software or SAS "software-as-service") in the future but currently we have narrators use the free Audacity software and purchase their own microphone. We actually do have a small amount of audio hardware (microphones, acoustic audio "shields", mic stands and more) that was acquired years ago as part of our work towards eventual remote volunteer recording work but we have not yet initiated that loan program beyond one or two instances.


  *   Finally, do your volunteers make their own corrections as they go or after being reviewed, if at all?

It varies from narrator to narrator. Most perform corrections on their own as they record, if they notice themselves stumble, etc. We have staff and volunteers reviewing the remote narration recordings in much the same way they did when it was all done on-site but now it's all through a cloud environment. Then the narrators have to look over the review worksheets and perform corrections. Actual correction insertion into the final audio file product is facilitated by the narrator themself, in some cases, or by staff in other cases. It really depends upon the skill level of the narrator.

In a nutshell, we are using our agency's Box.com account as a virtual / online cloud studio. We provide PDF scans of magazines for narrators to record from and reviewers to review from. Box incorporates digital document editing functionality that enables staff and volunteers to edit excel spreadsheets that are digital versions of the paper forms we'd traditionally use in on-site / in-person studio volunteering Narration/Monitoring and Review work. Narrators "sign-out" / "self-select" or "self-assign" specific magazine articles they are going to record and note that on the digital Monitor (article inventory) sheet and then they record the audio file / article and upload it to our Box account's specific directory/folder for that magazine issue. Staff and volunteers then "sign-out" for each specific article they are reviewing via a separate digital Reviewer worksheet. Narrators check those Review sheets for corrections they need to perform and then they either record just the bits needing fixing and upload those as small separate audio files or add them to the end of the original file and re-upload the file or in a few rare cases they do the audio insertion themselves. The rest of the process is handled by staff outside of this cloud environment, using our agency GoToMyPc remote access functionality where they download these files and stitch them together into a cohesive whole for mastering and navigational mark-up.

I'm available to discuss these evolving processes in greater detail, should anyone have questions.

- SMiles Lewis
Volunteer Recording Studio<https://www.tsl.texas.gov/tbp/vrs.html>
Texas State Library & Archives Commission
Talking Book Program
Audio Production Administrator / Studio Director
www.TexasTalkingBooks.org<http://www.texastalkingbooks.org/>
www.Tsl.Texas.gov/tbp/<http://www.tsl.texas.gov/tbp/>


From: studiotalk <studiotalk-bounces at islemail.org> On Behalf Of Marlin, Mike at CSL
Sent: Thursday, January 14, 2021 3:57 PM
To: studiotalk at islemail.org
Subject: [Studiotalk] Remote Studio Volunteers Query

Dear NLS studio folks,

Like many of you, I suppose, in person volunteering for us was suspended when the pandemic hit back in March 2020. Since then our Studio Coordinator Christopher Duran has been diligently converting A2D local recordings at home while we have all been teleworking. Alas our new titles production has come to a grinding halt.  I have been asking our administration about enlisting remote volunteers, but at this juncture we're unable to utilize them. While we are awaiting some action from our legal team to initiate remote volunteering (long story), I thought I would inquire about others who may be utilizing remote or online studio volunteers.

We are curious about the following:


  *   Does your network library studio use remote volunteers, and if so for which tasks (narrators, monitors, reviewers)?
  *   Did your vvolunteer policy already allow remote volunteers or did you have to amend it, and if so what was needed to be put into place?
  *                   For those of you who have remote volunteers, do you supply your volunteers with any software, i.e. HABC or APH or ? If not do they supply their own software to create audio files?
  *   Finally, do your volunteers make their own corrections as they go or after being reviewed, if at all?

I know this is a lot to ask but we're very curious and hoping to come up with a viable remote studio volunteer program for now and even after the pandemic has passed and we can return to in-person volunteering.
Please feel free to respond to this post or contact me  directly.

Stay safe,
Mike M.


Mike L. Marlin, Director
Braille and Talking Book Library
California State Library
P.O. Box 942837
900 N Street, Suite 110
Sacramento, CA 94237-0001
email: mike.marlin at library.ca.gov<mailto:mike.marlin at library.ca.gov>
Phone: (916) 603-7209
Toll Free in CA: (800) 952-5666
Fax: (916) 654-1119
Web site: btbl.ca.gov


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